Call me bourgeois but I like the cultural events that pop up in and around Key West. Pretty soon the theater season will shut down as all the snowbirds pack their bags (again! how do they do it twice every year? Pack, unpack, pack, unpack...) and bugger off to see their families Up North, leaving us to fan ourselves and enjoy outdoor activities during hurricane season. So, as I look forward to the Keys emptying out in a few weeks I try to take advantage of those activities that restricted to the winter when the islands are packed with visiting patrons of the Arts, and artists anxious to evade snowdrifts.
The open space in front of Fort Zachary is currently occupied by a bunch of peculiar constructions, all part of Sculpture Key West. Its an annual event that this year was split part of the time at the West Martello Tower, home of the Garden Club, and then at its traditional home in the State Park. I always enjoy wandering around trying to make sense of the whatever is put out for us philistines to enjoy and emote over. This year it seems a little less whimsical than years past, but there's plenty to see. These two dudes got into the spirit of the thing:
They were laughing and puzzling out loud, as all of us tend to do when confronted by these apparitions and no handy guide book to explain how they should make us feel. They suggested this cryptic offering should have been labeled "This Art Exhibit Brought To You By Why..." and who am I to disagree?
Don't ask me to explain, I just spent a happy forty-five minutes wandering around in the warm afternoon sun looking and wondering and sometimes my mind wandered and I spotted background action too:
This white flowing tent-like thing put me in mind of Arabia, mosques, and bright white walls. God and the Artist only know what it is meant to be to be, if anything. Which is, I suppose the point:
When you take a walk around Sculpture Key West some works of Art seem plain stupid or odd, but others speak to you in most unexpected ways. This next one, nothing more than stacked pieces of wood, brought to my mind most forcefully memories of cold damp winters spent in the Santa Cruz mountains of California living by the power of a wood stove.
There were three "walls" of stacked wood and a few small piles scattered around but I had the greatest difficulty not spending more time pondering them and remembering that which they evoked of my life in Ben Lomond. On the wooded theme there was a rather odd looking yurt lurking prominently in the middle of the open space, which, the closer I got to it, opened out into an honest-to-goodness maze, a hurricane house they say. Art? I don't know but it sure was hot sweaty fun to explore:
The next erection I came across baffled me. It looked like some sort of towering redoubt, most uninviting. And this one had a label, which turned out to be no help at all as it simply stated the obvious:
From the Land of the Inexplicable I plucked this other set of strange monoliths, made of metal frames with some narrow mesh over them and the whole thing painted a silverish shade of white. They were set out in a wide swath for all to see and walk through, as illustrated above:
And then there was the almost compulsory exhibit of Trash as Art the re-use of the recyclables made, this time, into an amusing wigwam pyramid of color and space:
Over all this nonsense the permanent metal statue on the walls of the Fort stood guard:
While down below, at moat level, my favorite gathering of sculpted metal skeleton pirates gloating over their chest of treasure were moved to make way for an oblique mirror contraption:
The other exhibit that made me laugh was a series of roadsigns placed along the path back to the main parking lot. They were built in the style of international warning symbols, red bordered white triangles with various nonsensical symbols, crashing waves and the like.
All good fun, but the best part of Sculpture Key West is to take the time time to come back, perhaps without the interference of the camera and hang out with one's friends and enjoy the space and the day and the company of people you like:
What better to way to spend an afternoon in the spring than to stand chatting on the waterfront at Forty Zachary Taylor, surrounded by the blessing of Art?
The next erection I came across baffled me. It looked like some sort of towering redoubt, most uninviting. And this one had a label, which turned out to be no help at all as it simply stated the obvious:From the Land of the Inexplicable I plucked this other set of strange monoliths, made of metal frames with some narrow mesh over them and the whole thing painted a silverish shade of white. They were set out in a wide swath for all to see and walk through, as illustrated above:And then there was the almost compulsory exhibit of Trash as Art the re-use of the recyclables made, this time, into an amusing wigwam pyramid of color and space:Over all this nonsense the permanent metal statue on the walls of the Fort stood guard:While down below, at moat level, my favorite gathering of sculpted metal skeleton pirates gloating over their chest of treasure were moved to make way for an oblique mirror contraption:The other exhibit that made me laugh was a series of roadsigns placed along the path back to the main parking lot. They were built in the style of international warning symbols, red bordered white triangles with various nonsensical symbols, crashing waves and the like.All good fun, but the best part of Sculpture Key West is to take the time time to come back, perhaps without the interference of the camera and hang out with one's friends and enjoy the space and the day and the company of people you like:What better to way to spend an afternoon in the spring than to stand chatting on the waterfront at Forty Zachary Taylor, surrounded by the blessing of Art?