I must admit that I love visiting art museums. In my opinion, art is one of the best ways to analyze the evolution of human culture. It has evolved from simple cave paintings depicting the day’s hunt to visual guides of significant religious moments to becoming a complex analysis of the emotions running through an artist’s head while splattering paint on sheet of canvas. Art is the embodiment of humanity’s mission to evolve and express itself.

Fortunately for me, my recent vacation to Eastern Canada involved visits to several large-scale art museums. While in the cities of Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and Quebec, I was able to tour several art museums, and many more history collections as well. One of my personal favorites was the Art Gallery of Ontario. In one sentence, I would describe my visit to this collection as short but sweet. Although my parents and I were only able to visit the museum for a short period of time, the 90 minutes we were there was by far worth while!

The reason art museums were such a high priority during this trip was mostly due to my schooling. For the last few months, my curriculum included a course on art history and appreciation. This was conducted via a lecture series from The Great Courses. These lectures were absolutely amazing and eye opening. The first half of the course involved learning how to analyze a painting, such as learning about color, perspective, composition, and emotions evoked. In the second half, I was able to use these tools to admire several curated pieces while learning about the history of Western European art.

With a built-up library of knowledge from the course, I was really excited to visit the museum. The first step of the day through was breakfast. The morning’s breakfast involved a visit to the Toronto neighborhood of Kensington Market, were we ate some absolutely amazing egg sandwiches from a wonderful restaurant called Egg-Bae. Now fueled for the first half of the day, We rode the streetcar to the Art Gallery of Toronto (AGO). Because we were only going to be there for 90 minutes, we had to prioritize what to see first. The first stop of the visit was to the Infinity Mirrored Room, created by artist Yayoi Kusama.

This is an immersive art installation that places you inside a room completely covered in mirrors. The art gallery is meant to be viewed one group at a time, so we had to make reservations. Fortunately, we were able to find a spot about 30 minutes away, which gave us some valuable time to explore the galleries. I must admit that the AGO is a complete maze. If you want to find something in particular, it could be cumbersome, but it was perfect for wandering. The following 30 minutes was spent perusing the galleries highlighting Canadian art. While exploring, my parents and I managed to find the Henry Moore Sculpture Gallery. This was perhaps the largest concentration of his work that any of us had ever seen! Along with the final pieces, we also were able to see several of his studies. During the Great Courses lecture series, I learned about the importance of studies, which were rough sketches that artists would make before creating the final painting or sculpture. It was amazing to see the process Henry Moore went through when designing his pieces. His studies started out as realistic sketches of figures, but were over time morphed into more abstract shapes. In the end, the completed piece had only the barest essence of a human figure left, and was almost entirely abstract.

After exploring the galleries for a half hour, we were finally able to visit the mirror room. Overall, the exhibit was incredibly immersive and one of a kind. I also instantly recognized the installation via several Pinterest and Instagram posts. After visiting the Infinity Mirrored Room, we stopped at another immersive installation. This one was a completely dark room surrounded by speakers. This piece was designed by Icelandic artist Jonsi Birgisson, who wanted visitors to be immersed by the sounds of a volcano. After experiencing these two stunning pieces, I have come to the conclusion that I love immersive art.

With a few minutes left at the museum, we decided to head downstairs and visit a bit of the pre-renaissance/early-renaissance gallery. While we were there, my parents and I had a wonderful conversation with a museum docent, who taught us about one of her favorite pieces. This painting was called Christ Washing the Disciples’ Feet, and was painted by the Italian painter Tintoretto in 1548/49. What was really amazing about this painting in particular was the perspective in the foreground. The painting was commissioned by the clergy at the time to be placed in a hallway-type environment. Striving to impress the Italian clergy, Tintoretto designed the painting to have multiple perspectives from different angles. Compared to other two-dimensional works, which look skewed and morphed when viewed from the side, Christ Washing the Disciples’ Feet was purposefully meant to be viewed from the both the front and the sides. While you walk along side the painting, the perspective shifts to match your position. This was by far the most amazing optical illusion I had ever seen.

Although we weren’t able to see the entire gallery, the visit to the Art Gallery of Ontario was really entertaining and one of the many high points of the vacation. If you are in Toronto and either love art or are learning to appreciate art, then I highly recommend visiting the Art Gallery of Ontario.