Here's what I keep discovering: the bigger your world gets, the more you want to learn, the more you realize you don't know, but the more wonder you hold for what you do see.
I've been to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts more times than I can count. I've been taking students there almost every school term since 1997. Everytime I go, I see something I haven't noticed before.
My students will confirm that I can't shut up in there...I want to show them everything that excites me or fills me with wonder. However, after an hour of being dragged around, listening to me rush from amazing piece to amazing piece, their feet hurt from walking on the marble floors more than their hearts are open to much more amazement. I turn them loose to wander on their own, and all I do is say to myself, "Oh, I should have showed them...the Magritte, the Picassos, the Dalis, the other Monet, the veiled lady...." but there's only so much I can pack in. They have to find the rest on their own. That's what a good teacher should do, right? Prime them to want to discover on their own? I hope so.
Anyway, my big discovery this year is directly linked to my own year. I've seen Charles Caryl Coleman's "The Bronze Horses of San Marco, Venice" many, many times. This year, however, is the first time I've seen it after being in Venice, after standing on that same balcony of St. Mark's Basilica in St. Mark's Square. Here's the painting, and here's the photo I took. This is why art can stop me dead in my tracks sometimes.
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