Stanley Whitney Retrospective @ AKG

Tonight we went out to dinner at The Terrace and then walked over to the Albright Knox to attend the members only opening reception and artist talk for the artist Stanley Whitney who was Becky's undergraduate art professor and mentor at Tyler School of Art back in the 70's. 

We walked over to the gallery after our dinner but first we had to walk those two blocks down the street back to our car to drop off our leftovers. Then back again and by the time we got to the reception we only had time to walk through the gallery to briefly see the show before it was time to make our way over to the auditorium for the artist talk. When we got there the place was very crowded and we were able to get a couple of the last seats available off to the side of the room which was fine because we could see the stage ok. The artist sat on the stage with a curator having a discussion about his work. Becky really loved seeing and hearing him again after so many years. This was a retrospective show of his work going back to the early 1970's and including all aspects of his career.

Unfortunately she was not able to get to speak with him at the reception. Maybe if we had gone at 5 pm and spent the entire time there she might have had an opportunity. He has a Instagram account and she can contact him through that to talk about seeing the show.

While we were walking through the museum we saw several people we knew and then a few more in the auditorium. We were actually very surprised at how crowded the museum was and not just at the reception. They announced that over 600 members had registered to attend the members only reception. It was also a Thursday night and the museum was open to the public without charge except for the reception where you needed a wristband. There was also a large crowd for live music in the newly renovated sculpture garden that is now enclosed. This was the first event since the grand opening and people were everywhere throughout the museum. We saw that when we were trying to park. We never saw the area parked up so much for an event except maybe when there were doing their summer concerts so many years ago. I guess things are different now and they are really promoting the new building and renovated spaces.

We generally like going over there when it's quiet and we will do that again very soon to really look at this show but it probably would be nice to get over there on a Thursday or Friday night for their live music events.