OUR AFTERNOON AT THE SKIRBALL CENTER

This weekend, Taylor and I finally made a trip to the Skirball Cultural Center.  Last year they had a Maira Kalman exhibit, who I talked about in this post, that I really wanted to visit, but wasn't able to make the trip out to see.  However, now that we live literally around the corner from this place, I was excited to finally stop by.





It's a relatively small museum, but we really enjoyed the Noah's Ark and Women Hold Up Half the Sky exhibits, which I had been hearing so much about.  Taylor is half Jewish, and I grew up listening to Bible stories since I can remember, so it was also a really enriching experience for the both of us to see the Vision and Values exhibit and get an overview of ancient Jewish culture up til the migration of many Jews to the States.


NOAH'S ARK EXHIBIT
So I think it is safe to say that this was targeted towards kids, but I actually learned a lot from it.  I don't think I could count how many times I've read or listened to or watched some sort of story about Noah's Ark, but I think being in this exhibit actually made me look at the story in a new way.  When we were "inside the ark", surrounded by all these animals, I realized how crazy it must have been in there.  I think one thing that stuck with me was leaving the dark interior the ark and stepping outside to see the dove floating above our heads with the olive branch.  It must have been a moment of so much hope and fear and excitement.  






WOMEN HOLD UP HALF THE SKY
This was a visually arresting, conceptually beautiful and heart breaking exhibit.  It is based off the  book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, by twice pulitzer prize journalist Nicholas D. Kristof and his wife Sheryl WuDunn.  (Yet another Jewish guy, Chinese girl couple... I am beginning to realize how much of a cliche we are...); It was a solemn experience learning about issues of gender inequality and human rights that women around the world face.



The exhibit was covered by a canopy of white translucent plastic pockets forming a cloud-like sky, and is filled with wishes that guests of the exhibit could write down on colored pieces of paper


Amongst the many issues they discussed- sex trafficking, domestic violence to name a few, one of the things that caught my eye was this map showing where slavery exists in orange.  Couldn't help but notice that big orange blob to the left in the shape of the United States of America.  Not only that, but it turns out that most of it is actually occurring right here in Los Angeles. It reminded me of this article, that I read recently about a young woman following her heart and moving to Los Angeles to build a program to end sex trafficking in LA.

Towards the end of the exhibit, we were able to fill out cards to send to our senators and congressmen and advocate for these women. Although it seemed like such a small gesture, it was great to exercise our rights of our democracy for those that don't have any.



After that, we ended our trip by visiting the "archealogical dig".  Taylor and I were too lame to actually participate in actual digging, I just made him take a picture of me instead. haha.


All in all, it was a great experience for the both of us, and we hope to visit again!