Every squeak from the heavy boots or scuffle of rain jacket sleeves echoed throughout the pure white walls and corridors, passed along by whispers among portraits. The blank infinite walls harboring one source of light, one small canvas lost in the flux of history and discarded museum maps. Floor after floor, in the never ending steps and layers, the sedimentary rock unfolds itself, revealing its true hidden strata for those who look close enough. This timeless place, every turn a new page into history; it was my history textbook, except more lively and echoing. Each step I take is a footprint into time, sucking me into another person's shoes, immersing me in worlds created by canvases, layers of oil and pigment. Those who take the time to not only notice the surface of the painting but the life behind it, letting each delicate step towards the world created by the gallery be as ethereal and experiencing as in it, are the ones truly capturing the moment. Breathing in the breeze of the countryside, or feeling the chaos from uneven splatter of colors, all more than just capturing it in a piece of film.

But as the stomping boots crack the concrete staircase, the scenes scattered, escaping from being trampled and dissolving into mere shadows of existence. A stampede of elephants with their feet denting the world created, the breeze dying abruptly, and chaos melting into mere dust. I stepped aside, away from the boisterous rush of blurred raincoats and hats, and peered through the glass wall and down 5 floors. My endurance for appreciating the paintings was running thin, yet I had not reached the uppermost layer of the rock. The rain was reduced to only a drizzle outside, sprinkling an invisible layer of sugar on the bright collage of New York umbrellas. 

I directed my attention back to the stomping stampede of visitors as they were all huddling around a painting, with cameras, snapping pictures as if the red carpet had claimed its home to be here. I tread carefully towards and around them. I tried to not get lost in the crowd, lost in the dampness of bright colors and humidity. I stood on my toes in an attempt to gauge what was happening, only seeing a dark blur of blue and yellow. 

The night sky, with its whirling clouds, and shining stars, draws the viewer towards it, fascinating them with its endless swirls and movements. It depicted a never ending night in a small canvas. Following the churning clouds, the eye gets lost in the frenzy of currents, feeling as if the artist is painting over the grey somber weather outside, another life in the world we physically reside in. The eternal canvas of the sky that no one can reach, yet still captured by brushstrokes, paint, and curved lines felt by those not only standing in front of a 28 by 36 inch image, but under an eternal scene.