first year mfa show

it took a couple of visits to the gallery for me to make sense and work through the mfa show. in saying that i didn't feel that it was a difficult show in anyway, just that i needed to adjust to the show as a whole itself. the bfa open which was up before was packed with work and felt overwhelming and crowded, while this show felt almost bare in comparison. at first that was the most troubling aspect to me but after going back an getting over any type of initial shock (exaggerated) I was able to really look at the work and enjoy it.
i did not go into the gallery expecting a cohesive show with all the pieces making any type of connections. I was interested in the size of a lot of the work, how it seemed to be a much smaller and intimate scale. none of the pieces felt too overwhelming or crowded. even when there was the possibility of crowding, like in the space with the installation, the result came off as a comfortable fit of the paintings on the walls that were almost housing the installation.
the size of the works left me a little put off at first. it seemed as though the gallery was so open and just about eating them up with the amount of space that was open, and then very full in some places. the only aspects of the show that i thought were negative had to do with the setup. it took me sometime to figure out exactly how to get into the space where the video was being projected (which maybe kind of pathetic) but i almost overlooked it entirely thinking that it was possibly just the sound that i was supposed to be hearing, luckily i did figure that out. the other was the use of the walls that were setup, but only partially. i am all for making space where space is available and can be set up. the main gallery room is a very big space and does not always need to be wide open to allow for a full look straight to the back wall. i felt the arrangement of the second wall made the space cramped which had an effect on the sculptures on the wall as well as the paintings on the main gallery wall.
overall, i enjoyed the work and am glad that i did go back a couple more times to really look at it. my main distraction was the hanging and how open the space felt in relation to the size of the work, but even now i am still trying to figure all of that out. i am the last person to think that bigger is always better and prefer smaller works, looking at them and making them myself, and i am still trying to think of a way of seeing these works to really appreciate them.