Fiona MacLeod on an afternoon of contemporary art that turned into a full-blown investigation into her own taste
I planned an hour, maybe ninety minutes, at the Backyard Biennial East, thinking a brisk walk through some contemporary installations would fill a pleasant Sunday afternoon. I left roughly four hours later having formed genuinely strong opinions about pieces I hadn’t expected to care about even slightly.
Where My Hour Plan Immediately Fell Apart
The very first installation, something involving reclaimed materials arranged in a way that shouldn’t have worked but somehow properly did, stopped me dead for a solid fifteen minutes while I tried to work out exactly why it was affecting me as strongly as it clearly was.
The Piece I Actively Disliked
I want to be honest here rather than pretending everything moved me equally, because there was one installation, heavily promoted across the biennial’s materials, that I found genuinely underwhelming despite trying my best to find something in it worth appreciating properly.
The Piece That Completely Won Me Over Instead
Tucked into a corner most visitors seemed to walk straight past, a smaller, quieter work using sound rather than visual scale, that ended up being the single thing I thought about most on the walk home afterwards.
Talking To Other Visitors
I got into a properly spirited discussion with a couple near the exit about which pieces had actually worked for us and which hadn’t, discovering we disagreed almost entirely about which installation was the standout, which felt like exactly the kind of conversation good contemporary art should provoke.
What Four Hours Taught Me About My Own Taste
I’m apparently drawn to quieter, more subtle work over anything relying purely on scale or spectacle, a preference I hadn’t fully articulated to myself before spending an entire unplanned Sunday afternoon working through exactly why certain pieces landed and others simply didn’t.
Would I Recommend Setting Aside This Much Time
Absolutely, don’t plan the hour I originally planned. Give yourself the whole afternoon and let it run properly long, because the pieces that actually stay with you rarely reveal themselves in a quick, efficient walk-through.