Skip to main content

The Museum of Modern Love by Heather Rose: book review



The Museum of Modern Love  (2016) is set in 2010 in New York City. It is part fact, part fiction. This is ‘not the story of potential’ but a ‘story of convergence’ – something that ‘once set in motion, will have an unknown effect.’

The narrator is an music teacher writing about one of his students, Arky Levin, who composes music for films, with three Oscar nominations.  But he ‘has not been himself for many months.’ Arky’s wife Lydia had just left him. Lydia had asked him to keep one promise, but it was a devasting one, and he has not been able to focus on his music.

Levin goes to the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) for inspiration. A 64-year-old woman is sitting next to a sign: The Artist is Present – Marina Abramovic.

Marina Abramovic, the artist from Serbia, is silent, unmoving, as she sits immobile in the museum’s atrium while spectators sit opposite her. No one knows that for Abramovic, sitting is painful, stillness is an illusion of calm, for she’s been having hallucinations since day one: ‘inside a war has begun.’

The official photographer of Marina’s exhibition, the archivist Marco Anelli, promised to capture the face of everyone who sat opposite her. He didn’t think it would be many. He never envisaged that there would be a queue – people woud sit for two minutes or two hours or the whole day: the length of time was determined by the sitter.

Jane Miller’s husband Karl had died, and she was visiting MOMA when she noticed Arky Levin watching The Artist is Present – Marina Abramovic – one of the greatest art events in modern history, because it is Abramovic’s longest-duration solo performance of her career.

To Levin, ‘something about her was as alluring as polished wood or light catching a sleeve of antique silk.’ He didn’t want to leave. Her performance event lasted 75 days.

This is Levin’s search for connection. Over the course of the MOMA performance event, Levin meets people watching the exhibition, and he slowly reflects on his life, the separation with his wife Lydia, and what it means to be committed to an act of love.

What is art? ‘Art will wake you up. Art will break your heart.’

This unique story explores the concept of art and how it connects and resonates with people on different levels. Is art the object or the obsession, the passing or the passion, the heart or the healing? Readers will also connect on their own level, and follow the story from the artist’s point of view, or from the viewer’s point of view. It is a thought-provoking, insightful book, not only of the love of people, but of the love of art.






MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).


Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2016 update on Rike Park, Tbilisi: from construction to busy park

From a flat patch of uninteresting dirt, Rike Park in Tbilisi, Georgia, has transformed in four years (from 2014-2016) into a busy park full of trees, flower beds, sculptures, fountains, and events. Rike (Rikhe) Park is on the left bank of the Mt’k’vari River (the Kura River) near the Old City of Tbilisi. The Peace Bridge links the right bank to Rike Park. Rike Park is below the hillside Presidential Palace and, via cable car, it is the starting point for the ride to Sololaki Ridge (with the Narikala Fortress and the Mother of Georgia statue). The glass box-shaped cable car terminus was opened on 23 June 2012, and since then the park has continually developed into a ‘people’s park’ where people can walk around, eat at the nearby restaurants, sit next to the statue of American president Ronald Reagan, climb the steps to Avlabari district, and access the sights of Meidan Square, the Peace Bridge, the Metekhi Church, the Old City, the waterfall, the sulphur baths, and t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Pir-E-Kamil - The Perfect Mentor by Umera Ahmed: book review

The Perfect Mentor pbuh  (2011) is set in Lahore and Islamabad in Pakistan. The novel commences with Imama Mubeen in medical university. She wants to be an eye specialist. Her parents have arranged for her to marry her first cousin Asjad. Salar Sikander, her neighbour, is 18 years old with an IQ of 150+ and a photographic memory. He has long hair tied in a ponytail. He imbibes alcohol, treats women disrespectfully and is generally a “weird chap” and a rude, belligerent teenager. In the past three years he has tried to commit suicide three times. He tries again. Imama and her brother, Waseem, answer the servant’s call to help Salar. They stop the bleeding from his wrist and save his life. Imama and Asjad have been engaged for three years, because she wants to finish her studies first. Imama is really delaying her marriage to Asjad because she loves Jalal Ansar. She proposes to him and he says yes. But he knows his parents won’t agree, nor will Imama’s parents. ...
1 comment
Read more

Hop on hop off bus tourism comes to Tbilisi, Georgia

City Sightseeing buses have arrived in Tbilisi. The iconic red double-decker buses, a feature of many cities around the world since the company was established in Seville, Spain in 1999, is now in six continents and almost 100 cities. The company established its Tbilisi business in November 2013, with its operations commencing in February 2014. The 90-minute tour stops at 11 major locations in Tbilisi (with 2 to 5 minute waiting times at each location): the Old City (where it commences), Freedom Square, Rose Revolution Square, Marjanishvili Square, the Dry Bridge, Konka, Avlabari, Metekhi, Akhundov Museum, the Sulfur Baths, and European Square. Passengers can hop off at any stop and see the sights, hopping back onto the next bus at any time. Alternatively, passengers can remain on the bus for the whole tour and take photographs when the bus stops at each location. There are one day (24-hour) passes (for 35 lari – about $20) and 48-hour passes for 55 lari, with family d...
2 comments
Read more