15 Art Exhibitions to See While High This Summer
If toking and bingeing on your Netflix queue has become boring, perhaps it’s time to change up your visual stimuli. Ditch those new episodes of “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” and your couch for an art exhibit, enhanced—of course—by a bit of Mary Jane. Think of these exhibits as a mini adventure: new worlds made brighter and bigger by the magic of weed. Here are some cool art exhibitions to see while high.
The David Bowie Archive/ Victoria and Albert Museum/ Brooklyn Museum
David Bowie Is
The Brooklyn Museum
Brooklyn, NY
Walking into the Bowie exhibit, the staff will hand over large, bulky headphones. Don’t be dissuaded from entering. This isn’t a normal museum audio guided tour. Instead, these headphones will immerse the viewer into a total Bowie experience. Take in Bowie’s many flamboyant and fabulous performance costumes, paintings, films, handwritten lyric sheets, and music (including video of live performances) after enjoying a J or an edible, and you too may be inventing radical alter egos that compare to Ziggy Stardust. At the very least, you can pay a thoughtful homage to this true renaissance man through this multi-media experience.
User: Nathanmac87/ Flickr
The Jim Henson Exhibition
Museum of the Moving Image
New York City, NY
Maybe you’re feeling nostalgic and missing childhood. Take a grown-up approach and visit the Jim Henson exhibit after enjoying some daytime strains and learn more about his career and the people who helped with his furry creations. Look into the deep eyes of the 47 muppets on display and try to push down any paranoia from that green you enjoyed before going that makes you think that your pupils might be as big as theirs. Jam to Fraggle Rock and the endless tunes of Sesame Street, but please try not to freak out when enjoying the parts about Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. If feeling particularly elevated, take a stab at puppeteering in their more interactive section.
Photo by Rashmi Gill/ Madison Square Park
Diana Al-Hadid: Delirious Matter
Madison Square Park
New York City, NY
Prefer to be outside and puff on a vape pen? Then, this summer, enjoy the Brooklyn artist’s integration of plant materials into her sculptures, many of which appear as though they are actually melting surreally like a clock in a Dali painting. Hopefully the New York City humidity won’t make you melt as well.
Photo by Larry Lytle/ MONA
There’s More to Neon Signs Than Liquor, Motels and Live Nude Girls and Motel California
Museum of Neon Art
Glendale, CA
This museum exhibit will serve as the modern equivalent of getting baked and staring long and hard at a lava lamp. The Museum of Neon Art reopened just this last year, and its current exhibit offers an array of glowing vintage motel signs and neon female figures. Simple and spacious, the venue will be dark and moody—perfect for enjoying that cannabis come up or come down.
Photo by Rene Smith/ Smithsonian Institute
No Spectators: The Art of Burning Man
Renwick Gallery
Washington D.C.
Can’t make it out to the Burning Man festival? No worries. Enjoy whatever garden variety psychedelics suit you and take in the art inspired and created from it at the Renwick Gallery. Just keep in mind you’ll be in a museum in Washington D.C., not the desert, so clothes are not optional, like they would be at the actual Burning Man festival.
Takashi Murakami/ The Modern
Takashi Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg
The Modern
Ft. Worth, TX
If breaking away from cartoons proves too difficult, then have no fear. Takashi Murakami’s works hold high art value, but they also give that same warm, fuzzy feeling as when you kick back and watch some ‘toons on the tube and break out the bong. Not to mention, his art is just plain fun, making it an obvious choice for a list of art exhibits to see while high.
Photo by Mike Steele/ Flickr
Dreams of Dalí
Salvador Dalí Museum
St. Petersburg, FL
You knew we couldn’t make a list of art exhibitions to see while high without including Salvador Dalí. If getting high makes you feel a little cerebral and provocative, check out the Salvador Dalí Museum in sunny Florida. Dali’s surrealist works will challenge your mind and challenge your perception of reality. Blending technology and art, this virtual reality experience will transcend any high you could have had staying home.
Petronella Eriksson/ Pinterest
Heavy Metal—Women to Watch 2018
National Museum of Women in the Arts
Washington D.C.
Want an exhibit with that utilizes interesting materials? Try this entirely female-crafted exhibit where talented artists investigate and challenge the properties of various metals to make their art. Not only will you be visually amazed throughout the exhibit (and likely would be even if you weren’t high), but you’ll be hard-pressed to determine exactly how these artists developed these works.
Adrian Piper/ MoMA
Adrian Piper: A Synthesis of Intuitions, 1965–2016
Museum of Modern Art
New York City, NY
Conceptual artist Adrian Piper has never feared trying new things or playing around, in art or in life. In this exhibit, see her life’s works inspired by experiments with LSD unfold as you too may have experimented with your own choice of substance before arriving at this incredibly trippy art exhibit.
Gauri Gill/ MoMA
Projects 108: Gauri Gill
Museum of Modern Art PS1
New York, NY
At this exhibit, Gauri Gill explores an Adivasi community in the Jawhar district of Maharashtra, India through intense color photography. This community she worked with creates papier-mâché objects, like traditional sacred masks. In the photos, they don these masks, providing an interesting juxtaposition of human form and other living beings. Certainly, the strangeness of these photos definitely makes it one of the best art exhibitions to see while high.
Photo by Ben Blackwell/ SFMoMA
Louise Bourgeois: Spiders
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
San Francisco, CA
If arachnids make you cringe, run far away from this exhibit. If, however, you can handle tiny bodies on eight spindly legs with many eyes after enjoying a dank refreshment, try this exhibit of sculptures to fulfill the list of art exhibitions to see while high. It might creep you out — or it might be just the visual stimulus you’re looking for.
John Akomfrah/ KQED
Sublime Seas
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
San Francisco, CA
Dive into this exhibit for an immersive experience that blends fictional narrative, natural history documentary, and film essay. For the literary geek, it also references Melville’s Moby Dick and the poetry of Ralph Waldo Emerson. After a long smoke sesh, this sublime exhibit will put you at ease but also challenge your comfort level, calling to attention the slave trade and maritime work while it simultaneously calls upon the serene.
Stephan Martiniere/ Video Game Art Gallery
Gun Ballet: the Aestheticization of Violence in Video Games
Video Game Art Gallery
Chicago, IL
At this museum, video games play center stage — and since this particular tackles the subject of gun violence in video games, this exhibit may be best enjoyed the way video games are often enjoyed: stoned.
Yuri Suzuki/ High Museum
Yuri Suzuki: Sonic Playground
High Museum of Art
Atlanta, GA
At this exhibit in Hotlanta, the viewer engages with sculptures that transmit sounds. Not only will your high take on new visual meaning, but the auditory component will send you to a new level. Try sucking on some hard candies throughout this Sonic Playground, just like when you were a kid. But this time, enjoy a special candy.
Lady Pink
Beyond the Streets
Werkartz Gallery
Los Angeles, CA
At this outdoor gallery, see street art’s evolution, with 14,000 displays of graffiti and street art that make for a full display for the viewer. Toke on your vape or visit one of California’s many dispensaries beforehand and make a sunny day of it.
For many people, the nature of strolling through an art exhibit might seem tedious. But after getting stoned and finding the right one for your high, any of these exhibits could be appealing. In fact, some of them are trippy, brilliant, and exciting enough to enjoy totally sober. But, why?
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