Newspaper Page Text
LIFESTYLE
THE CHAMPION, THURSDAY, MARCH 28 - APRIL 3, 2024 • PAGE 14
British artist Michael Shaw returns spectators
to the kitsch of the 1960s with his colorful soft
sculpture Lava Lamp, inspired by the colors,
shapes, and movement of a lamp popular 60 years
ago.
EUM
The Balloon Museum in Kirkwood is an offshoot of ones in Rome, Italy, and London, England. Photos provided
Balloon Museum features inflation art from
the imaginations of international artists
BY KATHY MITCHELL
FREELANCE REPORTER
The Balloon Museum, recently
opened in Kirkwood's Pullman Yards,
might very well be called The Balloon
Art Gallery. The exhibit Let's Fly
features the work of 17 international
artists, all created using balloons and
other inflatables.
Each room is a world to itself
where light, sound, and color
interact with inflatables of varied
sizes and shapes to provide a unique
experience. While each exhibit has
information on what the artist had in
mind with the creation, The Balloon
Museum is to be experienced rather
than studied. Even visitors who have
no real interest in art can enjoy the
beauty and theme-park-like fun. The
experience starts even before visitors
enter with samples of balloon art on
the museum grounds.
Balloon Museum is an exhibition
born in Rome, Italy, in 2021. There
also are versions in London, England,
and Naples, Italy, as well as similar
ones in Paris, France, and Milan, Italy.
The museum's introductory panel
states, "Always at the avant-garde,
the curatorial team is committed to
redefining the way art is experienced
by pushing back the boundaries of
art installation, and the classical
interactions we know. Synonymous
with freedom, flight, and access, the
Let's Fly experience takes spectators
on an unprecedented sensory
journey."
Visitors may immediately feel
a bit disoriented when they step
into the first room where there are
mirrors on every side, including the
floor and ceiling—creating the feel
of stepping off into space. Some
exhibits are interactive, and guests
are invited to—gently please—swing,
topple, wade through, or lob the
inflatables.
In one exhibit room, visitors can
look up at a balloon tree, "a crown
of red balloons clustered around the
branches of a young sapling tree with
roots." It is the work of South Korean
artist MyeongBeom Kim, who,
according to display information,
"Through an intimate dialogue and
being attentive to the whispers
between all things...wishes to
contemplate on how objects around
us are remembered."
Visitors also must look up to see
Canadian sculptor Max Streicher's
Floating Giants - two larger than
life inflatable human forms of white
translucent nylon spinnaker that
hang suspended above visitors. The
exhibit sign explains that the ghostly
figures are to suggest Gulliver in
Jonathan Swift's 1726 satirical novel
Gulliver's Travels.
Fans of the Netflix movie Emily in
Paris may recognize A Quiet Storm,
an exhibit in which "soap bubbles,"
balls filled with white smoke, float
through the air. Conceived in 2009
during an encounter between Fabio
Di Salvo and Bernardo Vercelli, A
Quiet Storm explores the boundaries
between nature and technology.
The largest—and possibly the
most awe-inspiring—exhibit is
Hyperstellar, which looks like a
huge swimming pool. However,
the "water" is more than a million
balls, each about six inches in
circumference, in which visitors may
wade and play in as they might in an
actual pool. Periodically, a dramatic
voice announces, "The show is about
to begin." Soon after, a six-minute
spectacle of music, light, and the
movement of balls hanging from the
ceiling begins. The museum describes
Hyperstellar as a "sensorial journey
that challenges the perception of our
place in the universe."
The anime-inspired Ginjos
created by Italian artist Rub Kandy
are more than 30 inflatables in
various colors and shapes—some
glow in the dark—with huge eyes,
but no noses, mouths, or ears. Like
the roly-poly toys they are fashioned
to resemble, the Ginjos pop back
up to their original position when
pushed over.
British artist Michael Shaw
returns spectators to the kitsch of the
1960s with his colorful soft sculpture
Lava Lamp, inspired by the colors,
shapes, and movement of a lamp
invented in 1963—"a vertical glass
globe containing a transparent liquid
in which colored balls of melted wax
circulate."
Visitors pose as their companions
take photos in a series of balloon-
scape boxes, including an all-green
room with a balloon coffee table, a
balloon potted plant and a balloon
catus. There's also a blue room with
steps and platform beneath a cloud
made of white balloons in assorted
sizes.
For those interested in how the
world of inflatables came to be there
is a timeline on one wall that tracks
them from before the 15th century
work of Leonardo Da Vinci up to the
very place they are visiting.
Let's Fly will be at The Balloon
Museum through April 12—possibly
longer—Mondays through Thursdays
2 until 8 p.m.; Fridays 2 until 9 p.m.;
Saturdays 10 a.m. until 9 p.m.;
and Sundays 10 a.m. until 8 p.m.
It is located at 225 Rogers St. NE,
Atlanta. For more information, visit
balloon museum.world.
