On January 29th, 2020, I had the opportunity to visit the incredible city of Washington, D.C., and the Hirshhorn Museum for the first time. I was with the BRINK team for a rapid 1-week product planning sprint, kick-starting a new project with a longtime client.
On the first night of arriving in Washington, D.C. we attended a SEED SPOT DC Impact Accelerator event hosted at the Booz Allen Hamilton Innovation Center. The event began with an hour of networking, drinks, hors d’oeuvres, photobooths, and tag walls. Once everyone’s juices were flowing and all the small talk was bubbling, we were chaperoned into a seating/presentation area for a short inspirational talk by Scott Case. Co-Founder and CEO of Upside Business Travel, and Founding CTO of priceline.com.
After the talk, we had the opportunity to hear from 11 innovative startups giving 1-minute pitches on their businesses and seeking support, funding, and awareness from others who shared or believed in their vision. It was a packed house and the crowd was incredibly supportive and encouraging. It turned out to be a super inspiring event.
Along with work, we did have some free time to check out the city and experience a little bit of DC life while we were there. Here are a few snaps from our AirBnB, studio, downtown DC, and a beautifully quiet and rainy night at the memorials.
(Then we’ll take a look at the Hirshhorn, I promise).
Ok, now let’s look at some art!
We visited the Hirshhorn on February 2nd, and there was a whole host of exhibitions to see. I didn’t capture every piece in the museum (for some reason, I feel like they might throw me out if I did?) but I did take pictures of some of the pieces that stood out.
The first exhibit was by Barbara Kruger titled Belief+Doubt. In true Kruger style, this was a typographical take-over of the whole downstairs lobby environment making inescapable, bold statements.
After the Barbara Kruger experience, we walked around the downstairs exhibitions which featured various artists; apparently, I did not take many pictures during this part of our visit, but here are a couple of pieces I did capture (sorry, I didn’t note the artist – if you know, send me a message).
Next up was the Color Wheel by Pat Steir; a series of canvas paintings spanning nearly 400 linear feet and moving through the wheel of color one canvas at a time, each with their own unique brush stroke and paint drip in a complementary color to the background.
Timelapse by @goodhumeurman
After making it through the Color Wheel, we moved into the second-floor exhibition which featured works from several renowned artists.
On the third floor was a massive installation of texture from Mark Bradford in his exhibition Pickett’s Charge. Unfortunately, I didn’t capture any photos from this one myself, but I highly recommend you check out the links captioned below (or the bolded text above) for more details.
The third-floor exhibitions were the real tour de force of our whole visit to the Hirshhorn Museum and had a lasting impact on everyone in the group, with one exhibit taking us almost 2 hours to get through – and worth every second.
The exhibition that captivated the group was called Manifesto by Julian Rosefeldt, an epic 13 video installation featuring actor Cate Blanchett performing excerpts from some of the great manifestos of the past century. Each video projected onto its own screen in a shared space in which you can hear all of the videos playing simultaneously.
Starting softly, the videos gradually began to increase in volume making you lean in and really focus on the video in front of you, at the end of each video the main character turns to the screen and resites the final part of the monologue in monotone. With all the pieces playing at the same time it makes for a truly multidimensional and immersive exhibit experience.
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Here is a list of relevant and useful links: