Dia: Beacon —Where Industry, Metal, Glass Converge

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I expect coldness at Dia: Beacon, all angles, no softness. There will be no pastel ballerinas guarded on the walls in this former factory space in Beacon, N.Y. Entering, I wonder what Dia stands for. Is it an acronym? Does it mean “downtown industrial art” or something? No, I learn, this art space was named for the Greek work for through.

Located in Dutchess County, Dia: Beacon is a place meant for large works created in the 1960s and after. There is not much softness here in works like those of Richard Serra that, for me, are reminiscent of tanker hulls: large, hulking, claustrophic containers. I like most a pile of broken glass swept together in a continental shape and am surprised to learn from a docent that the title of the work is Map of Broken Glass (Atlantis) by artist Robert Smithson. This very much is a cherub-free zone.

Fear, madness, illusion, strength, discomfort, stalking, madness, danger, and flight are all notions very much present here. This place—with its postcards, its series of slashes marking up walls, its runway of metal—demonstrates that everything can be art, pain can be art, hurt can be art, giant spiders can be art. Art isn’t all about angels, art can be real, art can be crashed cars, art can be holes in the floor, art can be wooden crates and broken mirrors and closing-in walls. Art can be everywhere, even in an old factory in upstate New York.

It’s worth a visit and worth taking the kids. The youthful adventurers I bring along are much more engaged than they’ve ever been when looking at paint on canvas.

—Lori Tripoli