I visited The Phillips Collection today. I apprec...

I visited The Phillips Collection today. I appreciate that the museum has an endowment, or some sort of income that enables curators to continue to purchase art and have special exhibits. However, I was primarily there for the permanent collection, as I have a special affinity for early-to-mid 20th century modern art.

I WAS SO DISAPPOINTED that the Rothko room, which was one of my main motivators to see the museum, was surrounded by The Warmth of Other Suns, a temporary, only-for-pay exhibit. It wasn't financially possible for me to pay to see the exhibit, and that's not mostly what I wanted to see anyway.

One docent quietly told me that I should just walk into the Mark Rothko room, and if anyone questioned my presence, proclaim that it IS part of the permanent collection and that I should be allowed to see it. And that's what I did, along with my oldest daughter. However, it shouldn't feel clandestine to visit what should be open for visitors to the permanent collection!! What is more: I was HORRIFIED that there was a piece from TWoOS in the Rothko room, and further horrified by the audio file that looped, loudly and relentlessly!!! SO WRONG ON SO MANY LEVELS. That room is supposed to be a "chapel"; a place of repose and contemplation. I can't tell you how tremendously disappointed I was in my highly-anticipated experience of the Rothko room.

Here I am, traveling from Arizona, in the DC area for two weeks, and I have told people far and wide that likely my most anticipated experience was the Rothko room at The Phillips Collection. And now I will tell and re-tell the story of how poorly the museum is set up, how awkward it makes it -- intentionally, I feel -- for free visitors, and what a deflating, disappointing, dissonant experience it ended up being.

I have been to countless museums that have a for-pay or extra-pay area for special exhibits. However, I've never been in a museum where the special exhibit is so integrated into the passageways of what should be public, and then we feel like we have to walk with eyes downcast, moving quickly, to access what we should be able to access. I don't know who planned that, but it is a truly horrible arrangement.