Museum of the White Mountain’s Person of Interest
My first impression of Person of Interest could be summed up to instead of piquing my curiosity it just piqued my frustration. That said, I do not think this was any of the artists or curators faults. The reason I had such a bad first impression was that my first encounter with the exhibition was during its opening.
Openings are nice because they have to potential to give artists an opportunity to network and meet other artists. I find a downside to them though is that they can sometimes make it hard to connect with the art. Having so many people in one space can make it loud and hard to concentrate. Sometimes people can make the bad habit of standing in front of a piece just mingling which can make it hard to really see the art.
This is especially detrimental to this exhibition for two reasons. The first is because this exhibition includes immersive art, which you cannot fully enjoy from a distance where you cannot interact with it. Secondly, because a great theme of the exhibition is connection. Which, given the chance to become immersed in the story of Lara and Anna is super captivating.
Knowing that opening nights have affected my experience with exhibits in the past, I made it a point to go again on a different day and give Person of Interest a second chance. Maybe if I saw it without all the distractions then I’d be able to connect with it. To my surprise, the second time around the exhibit really pulled me in. It was interesting how Lara and Anna had affected so many people’s lives. How they also affected the art of people they had never even met in person. The timeline along the wall was a really good visual of this. It was really the main piece that helped to discover who Lara and Anna were and how so many people were connected over time. It piqued my interest too. Every time I found a new piece to the puzzle of who they were I wanted to know more. There was a real sense of fate and of the invisible links that connect us all.
The overall immersion art was very unique and pleasant. For example, I do not know if I would have originally read the letters if they were just placed on the wall for me to read. Since they prompted me to interact with them though I was immediately pulled in. The use of sound and music throughout different pieces added another interesting component to the exhibition as well. Out of all the guest artists, I found the musical piece Menjaga Selamanya to be my favorite. The piece was just very intense and invoked a lot of emotion in me.
It is always exciting for me to see immersive art like this because it is something I am personally interested in. It was especially exciting to find artist’s practicing this right at the school I am attending. I look forward to seeing more exhibitions like “Person of Interest” and hope local artists continue to push the boundaries of imersive art further.