As the spring semester starts and the temperature continues to drop, it’s tempting to never leave your dorm room. Take a break from studying and venture out to Smith’s Museum of Art, where several of this month’s exhibits will take your mind off of the freezing weather outside.
“Girl Culture” by Lauren Greenfield, on display until Feb. 24
You may already be familiar with Greenfield’s work. Her films about American beauty and wealth pepper the documentary section of streaming services, her most famous being “The Queen of Versailles.” A Boston native, Greenfield has spent most of her career recording the intricate social rules of adolescence, beauty standards and the lives of American women at the turn of the new millennium. SCMA’s exhibit of “Girl Culture” displays 17 captivating photos of young women grappling with self-esteem and body image.
“Girl Culture” is arranged along a narrow corridor in the museum, off to the side from the main exhibits. The first photo catches attention right off the bat: a dancer, naked from the waist down, surreptitiously hides a tampon behind her back. Moving through the hall, the bright fabrics of preschool pageant contestants, prom queens and mall displays quickly overwhelm the viewer with an array of almost-nauseating color. In between glimmering shots of J-Lo and models in bikinis are photos of the less-confident: a child at a weight loss camp stares stoically into the camera, and in another, a young girl looks frustrated as she tries on bras in a dressing room.
Most of the photos in this collection are now over two decades old, making them an interesting contrast to the state of “girl culture” that permeates social media and our daily lives today. As I stood in the midst of the exhibition, museum staff members passed through the hall to the employee quarters, each of them barely glancing at the once-shocking photos that lined the wall. Twenty years ago, “Girl Culture” questioned if American beauty standards had gone too far. Now they seem to ask: “How much farther can they possibly go?”
“Seeing Shadows” by Rinko Kawauchi, on display until March 31
If you’re looking for something therapeutic, head down to the lower level of the museum for Rinko Kawauchi’s piece, “Seeing Shadows.” The silent film takes place in a quiet room awash with a soft blue light, with plenty of benches and bean bags for resting. Kawauchi’s art draws from Shinto, a religion in Japan that sees the spiritual world and the physical world as part of the same universe. Her work seeks to capture the beauty in every day, transient moments. The artist’s website also features a number of her photo installations.
In “Seeing Shadows,” Kawauchi captures a group of starlings, who swoop and drift together towards the sea in a hypnotic dance. The video is only 14 minutes, but the cyclic motion of the birds makes their movement feel eternal as if they’ll still be flying in the same pattern long after the film ends.
“Plastic Entanglements,” starting Feb. 8
Also opening in February is “Plastic Entanglements,” a large collection of works from 30 artists, investigating the social, technological and environmental implications of plastic. It is a multi-medium exhibition, with an array of drawings, photos, 3-D-printed works and sculptures of found plastics. The show looks at plastic not just as a tangible item but as the idea of constant metamorphosis.
SCMA’s “Free Second Friday” on Feb. 8 will feature a hands-on activity related to “Plastic Entanglements.”
