"I couldn't quote you no Dickens, Shelley, or Keats..."

The MONA museum: http://www.mona.net.au/ 

is a tourist site that I never get tired of going too.  I love that Hobart has a museum that is a tourist site because it is unexpected.  The museum changes often enough to be interesting for me every time.

I find happiness in the fact that Hobart is attracting more of the type that will understand and appreciate a museum like MONA but also that there is still a large share of the type that find MONA disturbing.

I enjoy peoples reactions to their visit.  I love that I get to go whenever I want and experience of all the changes.

As my friend Kat planned her visit during MOFO: http://www.mofo.net.au/ (she wanted to see Amanda Palmer who cancelled)- so the museum grounds were as crowded as I had ever seen them.  There was a strange mix of random cruise ship people- loudly announcing their ignorance of where they were or why and then many I assumed were comped festival artists, and personnel.  I would normally have not gone during a time I knew would be crowded, so I am glad I got to see such a mix of visitors.

We had biked (there had been rain showers off and on all morning so skating was too risky) to the museum from the domain.  The wait for the museum was about forty minutes but at least the exhibits were not unbearable crowded as the capacity was capped.  There is now a movie theater that will be running the Operas (finally!) from New York- which for the last two years has been making me feel very left out of the world...not being in a city where I could go and see the Opera feed. 
http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/liveinhd/LiveinHD.aspx 
http://www.sharmillfilms.com.au/?page_id=2195 

I am going to catch up a bit as we are in between visitors again for another week. 

 

Fitta is the word for vagina in Swedish

Now that the very long, black corridor in MONA is hung with artwork that is no longer the vagina casts, I felt compelled to write an 'ode to'.

When the museum first opened its doors, two exhibits were spoken of a lot.
The very large 'Snake' by an Australian artist Sidney Nolan.
(Below is a link to an article about the piece and the artist)
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/years-on-nolans-masterpiece-finally-uncoiled/story-e6frg6nf-1225979664721

And- the long wall of vagina casts.
http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/4/mona-s-brutal-banality

There are times that I am happy I never took too many classes about Art, because I do enjoy having enough ignorance to not have to over think my trips to museums.
So here is my take on the long wall of 150 plaster casts of various aged women's vaginas- I think they are excellent.
Growing up in the United States, and also my time in Australia leads me to believe that true nudity can not be over rated. With the amount of easily accessible porn, whether fashion porn or porn directed at the male audience, there is very little shown of unaltered real life nudity.
I am definitely the Aunt who will take her friends teenage daughters on their first trip to a sex shop, and leave behind a copy of 'Our Bodies Ourselves'.
I loved the idea of all those school aged Tasmanian girls and boys going to MONA and having the vagina wall there.
I hope they bring it back soon.
I also wonder- where is the collection housed 'off season'?