Brooklyn Museum: Fred Tomaselli

For a museum with such a majestic exterior, the Brooklyn Museum was disappointing. The first floor was poorly designed and windowless; the entire fourth floor was closed off; the collections (African, Korean, European paintings) were meagre. What the museum did well were small, specific collections: the "Mummy Room" was striking (examples: a mummified baby crocodile; original pages and translations from The Book of the Dead); the contemporary American furniture and art section was attractively designed, with brightly painted walls; the Iranian and Islamic art section is apparently one of the most comprehensive of its type in the country. I would have enjoyed a New York- or Brooklyn-specific art section, like the Greater New York exhibit at MoMA's P.S. 1. I seemed to have proved correct, yesterday, the claim that the Brooklyn Museum is only worth the trip if there's a good exhibit, which there was: Fred Tomaselli.

Some artist-related keywords: California desert, birds, plants, deep red, big art, enamel, 3D, "op-art," pills, constellations, collage.

What Tomaselli does (mainly) is use pills, pieces of plants, dead bugs, etc., to make patterns and images on massive pieces of wood. He paints, too, and makes complicated collages from magazine images. Then he covers the entire piece with a thick layer of enamel, which he lets dry then paints a second, corresponding layer. The result is often something close to an optical illusion, with massive, expansive designs that, unlike messy Impressionist art (Impressionism is for blurry-eyed middle-aged suburban moms!), you can enjoy Tomaselli's paintings from both up close and far away. Looking in detail, you can see exactly what type of pills make up the pattern (he often uses Tums); being far away is also necessary for taking in the entirety of the painting and receiving the aesthetically psychedelic effects. Probably the most visually stunning art collection I have ever seen.