As many of us know, Vincent van Gogh’s The Starry Night is pretty popular. I had seen it countless times, especially online. I even saw it on the wall at a friend’s house when I was invited home for thanksgiving. Before visiting the MoMA, I thought I already knew everything about it. Because I am familiar with the image, I assumed seeing the original painting would not feel much different. I guess I was wrong.
First of all my perspective of the art changed completely when I saw many groups of visitors trying to see and take photographs of the original art. In my mind I was like, but we see this daily online, in homes and offices. But then I reminded myself that this was actually the painting that Van Gogh created in 1889. Then, my attention got drawn even more. I realized I was not looking at a digital image or a printed reproduction at that point, I was experiencing the artwork itself.
From a look, the texture seemed thick, well layered, and well colored. At least different from the reproductions I have seen in the past and even at the gift shop.
In class last week, due to poor sound quality, I struggled to fully understand John Berger’s video as he explained his ideas on art reproductions and how they make artwork more accessible. However, the few I was able to grasp seemed really interesting, and experiencing both original and reproduction art at the MoMA made the ideas much more clearer and meaningful. Although I initially learned about The Starry Night through reproductions, the original painting had a presence that my experience with printed images had never captured.
After I left the gallery and walked into the museum gift shop, I immediately noticed The Starry Night everywhere. Of course it is popular. The painting appeared on notebooks, postcards, tote bags, puzzles, and other souvenirs. Then I fully understood that the reproductions do not replace the original. Instead, they allow visitors like me to take a small piece of the museum experience home with them. Now I see how reproductions help make art part of everyday life, even in cases when we do not have museum access or the original arts.
