Feb 192016
 

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One of my Somnambulant customers works at the Warhol Museum. She had me make a custom painting for her for Valentine’s Day, and as a sweet little perk, she put me on the list at the door, so Chooch, Henry and I got to spend a leisurely afternoon eyeballing some arts on Saturday. It was cold and snowy that day so having something fun to do indoors was welcome. I hate staying home during winter weekends.

I was kind of nervous at first, because the last time I was there was three years ago and I don’t want to say that Chooch was a dick, but he was definitely….a dick. I mean, a six-year-old in a multi-floored museum probably is a bad idea no matter who the kid is.

Also, add Corey to the mix and Chooch was pretty high-energy. And it wasn’t even that he was bad and like, getting yelled at by the museum police or anything. But he rushed us through because, you know, he was six.

But this time was awesome! We made it through every floor and he was genuinely interested in things, especially Male Genital Diagram.

“The names on these things are so weird,” he museum-whispered to me and we started cracking up while pointing at butts.

Highlights for me are definitely:

  • Watching Henry walked briskly past every single piece of art because art is garbage to him. “Dogs Playing Poker” or GTFO, right Henry!?
  • Chooch’s extreme discomfort on the audio-visual floor, which featured a black and white 14mm film that had something to do with a sensual haircut. And then what I referred to as the Velvet Underground Den, a room hidden behind a heavy black curtain with seats in the middle and floor-to-ceiling heavily-psychedelic images projected on every wall while Velvet Underground pulsated us back to the 60s. Chooch was like, “NO THIS IS NOT FOR ME” while I was like, “THIS WHAT OUR NEXT GAME NIGHT SHOULD BE LIKE!”
  • The Mr. Chow exhibit. Yes, the famous restaurateur! In addition to portraits of him painted by his famous friends (such as Keith Haring and Basquiat), Mr. Chow’s own pieces are currently on display, and I’ll tell you, refuse and coagulated eggs never felt more inspiring. Chooch and I were in awe, pointing out the various garbage we were able to discern among the paint, while Henry frowned and waited for us by the steps. I felt so motivated to go home and paint shit after that!
  • In one of the rooms, there was a box of costumes which patrons were encouraged to try on. This was definitely Chooch’s jam. We walked on him modeling a black garment, similar to a witch’s robe I guess, and with a very stern visage, he slowly opened the robe to veal a pink tutu beneath it. The serious face melted into his signature “Derp” and he slowly shook his hips accordingly. Of course there was an audience for this.
  • Getting to chat with my customer, Kris! She’s stuck with Somnambulant from the beginning, through all of the hiatuses and changes. She’s just a really cool broad. I painted her and her British boyfriend as teabags, the triangular kinds, because he loves tea. Her tag is an American flag and his is the Union Jack. It was so ridiculous, but really fun to paint!

The only lowlight was that all these cool-looking people were like, “I LIKE YOUR SHIRT!” to Chooch and for once, no one said anything about my stupid purse. Chooch was so smug about this.

Before we left, he got to try his hand at screen-printing. One guess what he chose to screenprint….

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Yep.

 

  2 Responses to “Staying Warm in the Warhol”

  1. His Smashing Pumpkins shirt!!!!!!!! Very awesome. Did I somehow miss the painting of the triangular tea bags? :( That’s how PG Tips tea is. <3

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