“Monet & Friends Alive” was an immersive-experience exhibit combining technology and art that columnist Darla McCammon visited at Newfields, the former Indianapolis Museum of Art. Photo provided by Darla McCammon.

By Darla McCammon
Guest Columnist

WARSAW — We are temporarily changing topics this week because I took the most fabulous trip to Indianapolis to what used to be the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

This museum, now called Newfields, is an experience you will want to add to your bucket list! Newfields is considered one of the top 10 art museums to be found in the United States.

We have talked before in this column about the “immersive” experience called The Lume to be found at Newfields. This ultrasensory art exhibit is also being offered at a few other art museums in the U.S. I wrote about the Van Gogh experience but did not make it to that remarkable event. My daughter was determined to take me to see the one called “Monet & Friends Alive.”

We started early in the morning when the museum opened. A long line was already forming. Our tickets led us to take the elevator up to the fourth floor of this unique structure. We exited the elevator and displayed our special tickets at the entrance to the section devoted to one of my favorite artists — Monet. As a bonus, many of his friends and contemporaries who came to be known as the “expressionists” were included in this presentation — a presentation unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

In their literature about this experience, Newfields says, “Just as the impressionists changed the way people thought about art in 19th century France, Newfields and Grande Experiences’ immersive technology will change the way you think about exhibitions. Monet & Friends Alive brings to life the impressionists’ groundbreaking paintings, projected in an enormous scale in vivid detail, showcasing the bold brushstrokes of Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, Cezanne, and more.”

Particularly to me, since I also love great music, was the effort that combined some of the world’s most famous sounds in wonderful music choreographed with the moving screens that were everywhere! And I mean everywhere. At one time we were visiting Monet’s famous water lily paintings only to look down and see that we were standing on a floor of water with fish swimming across the projected pond under our feet! The Monet exhibit has now ended, but Newfields is planning to bring some more of these amazing immersive experiences to our area. We need to keep checking with them to see when we can enjoy this technology that our expressionist painters would most certainly have admired.

Events

Lakeland Art Center & Gallery: Juried show. Art is accepted and installed on Sunday, June 4, for the juried show that opens at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday, June 7. The reception will be from 2-4 p.m. Sunday, June 25, with the awards presentation for the winning art at 3:30 p.m. This show will end at 4:30 p.m. Saturday, July 22. All artists are encouraged to participate in this show.

Warsaw City Hall Art Gallery: Kim Lanoue is the featured exhibitor at the Warsaw City Hall Art Gallery. The gallery is inside of Warsaw City Hall, 102 S. Buffalo St., Warsaw. The gallery is open from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. daily, and admission is free. To exhibit at Warsaw City Hall Art Gallery, contact Darla McCammon, curator, at (574) 527-4044 (leave a message) or send an email to [email protected].