Personal Narrative: My Experience At The Broad Museum

The Broad My museum trip can be summed up with the word serendipitous. When I arrived at the Broad Museum in Downtown Los Angeles, I saw the line to enter the museum go down two blocks. I walked into the lobby, intending to ask a museum attendant on the estimated wait time in line. After hearing the line was going to be a three hour wait, we continued our conversation and started bonding over Yayoi Kusama’s work, especially her Infinity Mirrored Room. Unexpectedly, the museum attendant decided to pull a few strings and gave me direct access to the museum, skipping the line altogether! My experience was already off to a good start, and I immediately went up the escalator to explore all the fun, modern, and vibrant art the Broad had to offer. …show more content…
The medium is acrylic on canvas. I was automatically attracted to this piece due to its size, chaotic features, and elements of line, direction, dominance, and contrast. This piece is 82 feet long and is split up and hung onto two walls. The artwork encapsulates a psychedelic experience with wave shapes and patterns, historical figures, and people and animals of all shapes and sizes with exaggerated features. The left side of the artwork is highly concentrated with lines. Some of the lines create rounded shapes and produce texture. There is also a section that consists of straight, vertical lines that shoot out from an epicenter. Most of the lines follow an oblique direction. Dominance is present with the emphasis on the bigger characters. In particular, the huge black skull figure stuck out to me. The black skull figure is the only dark object amidst the lines of light color. Murakami could have made this choice to highlight the overall deeper meaning of this work. Adding to the dominance element, contrast is also applied with the juxtaposition of opposing colors and tone. In addition, half of the artwork is heavily filled with lines and patterns, whereas the other half consists of diverse depictions of individuals and creatures. This painting reflects the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and the subsequent tsunami that hit Japan, which caused one of the world’s largest nuclear meltdowns and 16,000 deaths (Tucker). I interpret the lines that shoot out from an epicenter to represent the tragic occurrence of the earthquake, and the skull figure to symbolize the evilness that has hit Japan. Murakami applies his personal brand of a colorful pop art style to create an artwork that serves as an ode to the spiritual and physical landscape of Japan in the wake of a natural