The Menil Collection Assignment

                                                                The Menil Collection
                                                                      Renzo Piano
                                                                            1982

The first thing I noticed about the Menil Collection when I walked up on its property was the size. This seemed to be a fairly small building. Walking up and around the building I did notice several things. First things people notice are the outdoor sculptures. There are several attractive pieces distributed throughout the property. As far as the building itself, I noticed a lot of symmetry and repetativeness. The building is painted is a grey tone that matches other small businesses accross the street. The white steel and roof add an elegance to it, along with its large windows. My wife and I walked around the main building before entering and wondered about the outdoor ceiling. The ceiling was angled exactly the same throught the outside, but depending on what side you were on, you experience a different view. At first I thought it was the designers way to demonstrated how something can be seen differently depending on the angle one is looking at it from. I also thought it was made this way because of the way the sun rises. I thought with the angles that it could produce shade throughout the day along with an artistic design and feel to it. I also noticed the large windows and how they had some type of object covering everything but the small edges around it. It made me believe that some sunlight could get through there. The inside of the Menil resembles a very large museum. These walls were probably 20 ft tall, and there is an enormous amount of space in there. It has beautiful floors and is a beautiful museum. I later read the phamplets and the online website and realized I was pretty close to the real reason about the ceiling. Apparently it was made this way with the skylights to filter the sunlight, so it wouldn't directly hit the paintings and cause damage to them. Piano also got the design from his sailboat which was a "leaf" type design for the ceiling. The last thing I read, also stated that he wanted to have the museum look small on the outside, but big on the inside. The man has clearly succeeded in doing this.

                                                                     Rene Marquerite
                                                                    Le Viol (The Rape)
                                                                           1934
                                                                      Oil on Canvas

There were several pieces that caught my eye at the Menil, but this one here blew me away. As soon as I laid my eyes on this pieces my mind just ran wild. This is a picture of a head, it could be a manikin's head or maybe a person's head. The actual face of the manikin is the body of a woman. Here she uses the breast as a set of eyes, the belly button as the nose and the woman's pubic area as the head's mouth. I noticed how the sky starts off dark from top to bottom then gradually fades off in the distance. The same is done with the ground starting off in a darker shade of brown and fading as it meets in the center of the drawing. She is using the horizon in the background to demonstrate atmospheric perspective. The hair on this head really resembles a glossy, wavy like hair that is seen in women more than it is seen in men. The title of this painting helped me interpret it as an abstract painting. "The Rape" also helped my mind wonder, with questions and comments. I grasped several things from this painting. I believe with the title and the painting she is referring to men's sexual affection with a womens body. This shows how a lot of men see women more as sexual objects than individuals. A man can be stairing a woman directly in the face, but the only thing his mind is capturing is an image of her nude body. The title makes me believe that she feels men "rape women" with their eyes, because men generally focus on the sexual aspect of a relationship and will do anything possible to succumb a women into allowing them to what they feel is the prized possesion. Something else that came to mind was that the background, both the sky and the ground are empty and plain. No clouds, birds, trees, etc. I believe she did this because when a man stares and studies a women he indulges himself in her beauty, beauty here being her body, and does not see anything else that can be going on in the surrounding areas. Men just enter a trance and forget about the outside world. This was a very beautiful piece both my wife and I really enjoyed discussing. The Menil is a great place to visit and I intend to go back, since I hear they like to switch their art work continuously so people can enjoy a lot of different art.