The Observant Eye

The Met on a Friday evening is a great place to people-watch. Up and down the museum’s trademark front steps, well-dressed couples embark on first dates; parents steer their children across the street and, in anticipation of the dinner they are going home to eat, away from the ice cream vendor parked by the curb; teenagers frolic carelessly, glad to be free of school for the weekend; and tourists pose for photos that can’t possibly fit the full grandiosity of the museum in one frame.

And, on at least two Fridays each month, a group of 25 New Yorkers leave the work week behind and head to the Met for The Observant Eye. In this series of seminars, held from 6:30-8:00 p.m. on various Fridays, young professionals participate in a casual discussion focused on one to two pieces of artwork. This was all I knew about the series when I arrived at the Met this past Friday to attend The Observant Eye for the first time.

Not quite sure what to expect, I stopped at the info desk for directions to the Velez Blanco patio, where my confirmation email had instructed me to meet. Gathered around a curator with a clipboard, a group of twenty- and thirty-somethings started to mingle while filling out release forms, since apparently our session was about to be photographed for a new brochure. After discreetly reapplying my lip gloss, I filled out my “model” form, grabbed one of the museum’s little folding chairs, and followed the curator into a nearby gallery.

Since each session deals with a different piece of art from any one of a number of periods, and the focus of a particular session is not announced beforehand, it was anyone’s guess as to where in the museum we would park our folding chairs. When we stopped in front of a Rembrandt self-portrait from 1660, I was intrigued. How would we discuss what seemed to be such a straightforward work for nearly an hour and a half?

I soon found out. The curator, a soft-spoken woman who clearly loved her job and knew a great deal more than any of us about art, began the discussion by encouraging us to give our initial impressions of the piece. She then guided us through an examination of everything from Rembrandt’s use of light to the possible moods his facial expression was meant to convey, sharing useful pieces of information about the artist’s life and style along the way.

Several times throughout the discussion, just as we began to think that we had exhausted all of our observations, the curator had us switch places so as to view the work from a different perspective. Those up front moved to the back, those on the left moved to the right, and vice versa. And each time, we were amazed by the new details we noticed just by changing our angle.

Having taking quite a few art classes in college and being a frequent visitor to museums, I like to consider myself fairly knowledgeable when it comes to art. Yet Friday’s discussion brought to my attention aspects of Rembrandt’s work that I never would have considered on my own.

And, from now on, I will be taking in artwork with a much more observant eye.