Self, Centered
BY SOFIA FALL
Exhibit 3 was an enormous yellow
room. With an arched cathedral
ceilings, skylights. And yellow writing
streaming faintly in a line along
the yellow walls. It had vibrant,
multitextured installations. Benches
with modular monochromatic
mustard carpet. And I was there,
too, dressed by coincidence
entirely in primary color blue,
which was thrilling—I’ll
admit it—from the moment I arrived.
To see it flouting so completely the curated
yellows of the room—drawing
in all the gravity in the gallery. At first
I didn’t stay there long. It was dizzying
to be so suddenly in possession
of such a force. And I wanted to see
what else was exhibited there in the museum.
Much of it was beautiful and even
mesmerizing. Much of it moved me,
more. But the yellow room had put
an odd little spell on me. As soon
as I left it I knew I’d return and as soon
as I did it was obvious why. It was
because when I stood in the center
of the room in the immensity
of my blue I had never been so powerful,
so colossal. As if my very presence
had reordered the trajectory
of every object in the gallery. I
was the punctum. I was the art.
I thought I felt what planets feel, briefly
passing in front of the sun blocking
the moon from all the light
that ever touches it, all the warmth
it has in the galaxy—and then
the college student closing the museum
asked me if I could please leave, and I did,
and upstairs it was just an ordinary
night with ordinary streetlights
polluting the cosmos with
their wrong colors and their petty
insignificant displays of brightness.