It takes me forever to go through an art museum. Lots of people tend to rush past the abstract blobs or the paint splotches or the grassy landscapes or whatever they consider to be uninspired, but I rush past all the basins and suits of armor and things that were clearly made for a functional purpose and used by people once upon a time, because that takes all the fun out. (It's a bit creepy to fantasize about the owners of a particular soup bowl when you know that those people actually existed, and slurped and salivated all over that artifact in front of you.)
But I love the useless stuff, the pieces that are meant for British eyes only for the artist's eyes alone, the pictures that were clearly made just for the patrons, because of all the people involved. I can stare at them each for five minutes. I read the little blurb that tells me what I should think, I get up way closer than you're supposed to so I can see the gobs of paint on the sides of the knifestrokes (love that word), I occasionally set off alarms and I never notice when someone else is trying to see the painting I've got my nose pressed up against. Oh yeah, and I mentally disparage the curators' frame choices. It takes ages. And then I make up stories about all the people in the paintings and all the people who painted them, and "who was doing what with whom, why, where, and how often." Basically, I shouldn't be allowed in these places.
So last month, when I actually went to a museum for probably the first time in my nearly-adult life, I discovered that I like art. Not necessarily just literature and music and the things that I do, but also things that I could never attempt in a million years (like making wall-sized triptychs out of thousands and thousands of real butterfly wings.)
Basically, I like making up stories. I'm not imaginative enough to create something from nothing, but when presented with a song or painting or dream I make leaps and bounds until I've created characters and situations and lives that exist in my head for a few minutes until my attention turns elsewhere.
There's actually a children's novel called The Second Mrs. Giaconda that's loosely based on Da Vinci and all his dogs around the time that the Mona Lisa was painted. If I had to write a novel, I think I'd start with a picture as well. Although I'd probably choose one that you were allowed to stare at for more than five seconds at a time.
