Perhaps, I am just on a quest for normalcy. Yesterday, I decided I should go to a museum. I haven’t really done that on my own in years – we have been to a lot of museums on our various trips, but just to get up and say “I think I will go to a museum today”….hasn’t happened for a long time.

So, about noon, I left the house, walked the 2/3 of a mile to the Van Ness Metro Station, paid by $1.20, was happy to see a train waiting for me, and rode to Gallery Place, 6 stops away. I must admit to getting a bit sad every time I go downtown, because it looks far from what it used to look like, with fewer than half the workforce that used to be there, and especially now that the tourist season is basically over. At Gallery Place, which is the stop for DC’s Chinatown, there are a number of Chinese restaurants that have not made it and whose sites stand empty. In addition, G Street particularly is dirty and generally unpleasant, something that it was not a few years ago. That doesn’t mean that it’s more dangerous (although it might be), just more unpleasant.

On the other hand, the building that houses the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian Gallery of American Art, recently having been redone, looks to be in very good shape.

My reaction to the museum was strange. My usual museum visit is thorough. I start in the first room and visit every other room before I leave. Today, I went through the first floor and a small part of the second, and decided I had seen enough. Maybe I was a bit tired, but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that my mind was full. I could absorb no more.

So what did I see? I saw a dozen or so new pieces of art, shown in groups of two describing the relationship between the artists. I saw a massive exhibit of art of the American West, concentrating on views not normally seen, those of Latino, Indian and Black artists. I saw the folk art galleries, which now have a number of new pieces on display. I saw a display of the work of Washington artist Alma Thomas. And I saw the work hanging the hallways between these galleries.

From the exhibit on the West. The first is a portrait of novelist Sandra Cisneros by Angel Rodriguez Dias, the second by Hung Liu, and the third by Jacob Lawrence who lived in Seattle for decades.

So let’s look at Alma Thomas. You may not like these. I do. Thomas was a DCPS teacher and prominent artist, the first art graduate of Howard University. Apparently her reputation has been growing and growing.

So, a question from the folk art exhibition. Can you tell which of these I like and which I don’t?

One more thing. It’s always interesting to see two famous people come together when you didn’t know they had had any contact. You may remember, for example, when I learned that Horatio Alger, Jr. was the live in tutor for the children of New York Jewish financier Joseph Seligman. Today, I learned that Jackson Pollock’s primary art teacher was Thomas Hart Benton and that they remained close until Pollock’s early death. Hard for me to imagine.

I came home mid-afternoon. Turned on the so depressing news. Turned it off and realized why I decided to go to a museum.