Museum of Arts and Design (MAD)

Pinning Madeleine Albright.

Currently on display at the Museum of Arts and Design is an exhibit featuring over 200 brooches worn by the former Secretary of State to all manner of diplomatic doings. A perfect pairing with her recent book: "Read My Pins: Stories from a Diplomat's Jewel Box", with which it shares its name.

Featured is a menagerie of animals & insects, an arsenal of mini-weapons (including a pocket-sized rocket-launcher), and a dizzying array of Americana. There's plenty of razzle-dazzle to go around in the small space on the second floor, and plenty of tea-time chatter to accompany the rhinestones glinting off the sterile museum florescents.

Is it a "must-see"? For those enamored of their knitting nook and the titillating bi-monthly meeting of the Cat Lovers Collective, absolutely.

For the rest of us, it's a pleasant, if mildly intriguing foray into the mind of a brilliant stateswoman, via her brooch-box. Dirty.

Now you're thinking about going. Admit it.

Just to the right of Albright's brigade of bosom adornments is an intriguing view of the night sky, as seen reflected on the heavily polished floor below it. The exhibit "Walk on the Sky. Pisces." by artist Zoulikha Bouabdellah and curator Carol Solomon offers a chance for patrons to walk across the sheeny surface in hospital booties. There you can peer into a constellation array of blinking lights mirrored from above, depicting the astrological arrangement. From a narcissistic point of view (March 14 — I'd like the Harry Potter Lego set, NOT the one from last year. Or a golden egg... a golden egg now!) it's a trippy gimmick. Read the plaque beside it for the myth behind its meaning. Interesting. And short. Like "Cliffs Notes" short.

From the second floor offering I took the elevator to the sixth. I didn't really know where I was going, just kind of felt the flow and let it happen. At first, I thought I was exiting onto a staff floor -- but upon closer inspection I realized I'd stumbled into the MAD "Open Studios".

This people, is worth the price of your ticket. It's as awesome as getting to explore the tidal pool at the Aquarium. Except in this tidal pool, the starfish talks to you about all the cool jewelry she's made. That was a stretch. Go with me. Official MAD description:

"The Open Studio program gives visitors a chance to get a behind-the-scenes view of the artistic practice. Every day artists are in our studios actively working in materials such as ceramics, fiber, wood, mixed media, glass and metals and talking with the public about their processes, materials and concepts."

During my visit a gracious Sarah Abramson, from Sarah Abramson Jewelry was delighted to demonstrate the before and after of firing a piece she'd made in the nearby kiln. Her work is self-described as exploring "the transition from two-dimensional drawings to sculptural forms". What was the piece you ask? A stunning brooch. All too beautiful, the symmetry of the visit. (MAD Studio Hours.)

In summation the venture was a fresh distraction. MAD is free from the heavy history of the MET and void of the stark pretension of the MoMa. I will warn those who are about to run for the door though that a few exhibit spaces are closed until October 13 when they'll unveil "Slash: Paper Under the Knife". Still lots to see right now.

Grab your best brooch and go.

INFO:
Museum of Arts and Design (MAD)
2 Columbus Circle
212.299.7777
http://madmuseum.org/