they call him the bodhisattva

So I went back to KC this weekend and toured the new Bloch building of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. Its really a gorgeous addition and adds about 3 times as much space, mostly underground and built into the side of the earth. I particularly enjoyed Kiki Smith's zodiac-as-blanket/chess-board, whose description began with "Constellation is a meditation on the infinity of space and our human desire to know and tame it – to make it our own." Mom and I nearly peed ourselves over that one.

When the tour was over, I scampered away to the old building to explore all my dorky childhood favorites. That biblical figure in red and fur was Caravaggio's St. John the Baptist in the Wilderness.






Also, Church's Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, which is giant in real life, always impressed me.






Then of course, the Chinese room. With this guy.



All I could think of was Patrick Swayze in Point Break, preaching, "They only live to get radical, so they'll never appreciate the spiritual side." That's culture.