Visiting the Art Museum

Yesterday I decided to visit the Art Museum. The distance is probably about the same for me as to the Textile Museum (about ½ hour walk), but it feels longer (partly perhaps because the last bit is uphill...) The museum is located in the same building as our town library and theatre; and since they changed the bus lines (not much use to me now), I've rarely been there.

 Our "Culture Center" - Art Museum, Library, Theatre (and a café).

The main entrance; across a square from this church (the largest in town, from ~1900):

The sculpture outside the church is one of the works included in the Art Biennial.

I went inside for a short touristy visit (although I've been there many times before).

Have to say that most of the current exhibitions within the Art Museum were of the kind I find it rather hard to relate to. My brochure tells me that the artist behind the video installation above is Hicham Berrada, from France, and the title is Présage (Omen) - set in "an aquatic world" with a "mineral flora" of "chemical substances reacting to an electric current in the water". ("Is this what it might have looked like at the beginnng of time, an event spanning millions of years?")

This (above), also a video installation, may have been by the same artist, but I'm not sure. The theme seemed very similar, anyway. (Creation, beginning of time, whatever...)

This (above) made even less "sense" to me. There was a long row of photos of hour glasses on the opposite wall though, so probably still something to do with time (?)

In one room they were showing various portraits from the museum's collections. The only ones I can say I was really interested to see again were some exquisite 18th century miniature portraits by Peter Adolf Hall - born 1739 in Borås, and died 1793 in Liège, France. They used to be in a separate exhibition in a room of their own, but that was changed a number of years ago. So I've seen them before, but not recently.

I included my own hand in one of the photos , just to give you an idea of the size of them.

I do also quite like this little figurine of a woman vacuuming. (To compare with classic ballerinas and shepardesses or whatnot...) I remember this one from some earlier exhibition as well. ("Live as usual" by Gittan Jönsson, 2009)

Walking back downtown from the art museum, I went through an underpass that has been getting a new mural in connection with this year's art biennial. It turned out to consist of a number of separate panels rather than being painted directly on the wall, though. Won't end up on my list of favourites - but of course a big improvment on grey concrete and random amateur graffiti, which is usually all that most such places have to offer...!