SFMOMA road trip: Interns experience the museum for the first time

TEXT AND PHOTOS BY HAILEY MILASICH AND MANJOT DHANDA 

Editor’s note: This piece follows Manjot Dhanda and Hailey Milasich, both interns for The Munro Review, on their first visit to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Traveling to San Francisco by Amtrak, the museum was easy to reach and highly walkable from nearby transit. As their first time visiting both SFMOMA and any modern art museum, the experience felt much larger than expected. Spanning multiple floors and over 170,000 square feet of gallery space, the museum offers an expansive yet accessible introduction to contemporary art.

They visited “The KAWS Family,” a special installation by KAWS, a contemporary artist known for blending street art, pop culture and fine art. KAWS, whose real name is Brian Donnelly, began his career as a graffiti artist in the 1990s, altering advertisements and familiar cartoon imagery in public spaces. Over time, his work expanded into sculptures and museum installations that explore themes of familiarity, consumer culture and emotion. His signature characters, often marked by crossed-out eyes, draw from recognizable figures while transforming them into something more reflective and unsettling.

Pictured at top: “Accomplice,” by KAWS (2010) Fiber glass resin and rubberized paint.

Manjot: Walking out of the KAWS exhibition at SFMOMA, I kept thinking about how strange it felt to see something so playful in a museum that usually feels really serious. The characters looked like they came straight out of cartoons or street art, but at the same time the scale and the way they were displayed made them feel almost emotional. I remember turning to Hailey as we were leaving one of the rooms and asking, “Did you expect it to feel like that?”

Hailey: I vividly remember when you asked me that, and I kinda just paused because I didn’t really know what to say. At first I thought it was just gonna be something fun to look at like bright, playful, almost like walking through giant cartoons at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. But the longer I stood there, the more I started noticing little things that felt… familiar but unfamiliar? The KAWS pieces didn’t just feel playful anymore they looked kinda heavy in a way I wasn’t expecting but also in a fascinating way.

Manjot: Yeah, that’s exactly what I was trying to figure out too. Like at first it feels super simple, but then you keep looking and it just starts to feel heavier without really explaining why. I think the scale played a big role too, everything felt larger than life, which made it feel more serious even though the designs were playful.

Hailey: I have to say I also keep thinking about how we were saying it felt kinda uncanny, like weirdly familiar even though I had literally never seen KAWS before. Did you feel that too? Like you’ve seen it somewhere before but you actually haven’t until then?

Manjot: Oh, 100%. It felt like something I should be able to recognize, but I couldn’t actually place it anywhere. I think that’s what made it stick with me after we left. It wasn’t just something cool to look at in the moment, it stayed in my head because it felt familiar in a way that didn’t fully make sense. That uncanny feeling made the whole experience feel way more personal than I expected. It kinda makes me wonder, is that what makes the exhibit work so well? That it feels familiar enough to pull you in, but different enough to make you actually sit with it after you leave?

Hailey: You took the words right out of my mouth. I have to say, as much as I loved the exhibit, it did also leave me a little off put but again in a neutral way? I would be lying if I said it didn’t freak me out a little bit. Especially with the play on The Simpson’s and how that was incorporated into the pieces. My favorite part though was definitely the Kid Cudi collection pieces. They quite literally had my jaw on the floor. The diamond and shiny idea behind the chain with one of KAW’s designs was amazing. So lemme ask you this, rather than your favorite piece, did you have one you genuinely could not do?

Manjot: I think the piece that actually freaked me out a bit was the Sesame Street couch that was fully built with characters that had their crossed out eyes. Something about it felt way too familiar, like it should’ve been comforting, but instead it was just kinda unsettling. It wasn’t even the flashiest piece, but it was the one that made me stop and really look at it for a second. It’s like it takes something you grew up with and flips it just enough to make it feel off. Do you think that’s why those pieces hit harder, because they mess with stuff we already recognize?

Hailey: Yeah, I think that’s exactly it. But I also have to wonder sometimes it felt like KAWS relied a bit too heavily on that shock factor, you know? Like there is definitely something clever about taking something familiar and making it unsettling, but I found myself asking, does it always have to hit that “weirdly familiar” note? Some of the bigger installations, while visually stunning, felt a little… overdone? Almost like they were more about spectacle than actually making you think.

Manjot: Yes exactly. That’s where I land with it too. The idea of taking something familiar and making it feel off is really cool, but after a while it started to feel a little predictable. Like I knew what the next piece was going to do before I even saw it. It didn’t take away from how impressive everything looked, but it did make some of it feel more like a spectacle than something new. At the same time, I can’t deny that it stayed with me after we left, which probably means it most certainly worked. I just think it would have hit even harder if there were a few moments that broke away from that pattern and surprised us in a different way.

Hailey: I think what stuck with me the most is how even when it started to feel predictable, I still couldn’t fully pull away from it. Like yeah, I might’ve known what kind of feeling the next piece was going to give me, but I still wanted to experience it anyway. And I think that says a lot about how strong the visual language is. Even when it felt repetitive, it didn’t feel boring. It just felt intentional, I guess? But I do wish there were a few pieces that shifted away from that formula, just to catch us off guard in a different way.

Manjot: In the end, I think that’s what made the KAWS exhibition work for me, even with its flaws. It might lean too much on that familiar but unsettling feeling, but it still leaves something behind. It’s not just something you walk through and forget. It sticks with you, even if you’re still trying to figure out why. And maybe that’s the whole point.

Hailey: I think for me, that’s what I’ll carry with me the most from the KAWS exhibition. It wasn’t just about whether I liked every piece or not, it was about how it made me feel while I was there and even after I left. There was this constant push and pull between comfort and discomfort, familiarity and confusion, and I don’t think I’ve experienced that in a museum setting before. Even the moments that felt repetitive still added to that overall feeling, like it was all part of a bigger emotional experience. It may not have surprised me every time, but it definitely stayed with me, and I think that’s what makes it worth seeing.

CONCLUSION:

For those who have not seen it yet, the KAWS exhibition at SFMOMA is worth experiencing before it closes on May 3, 2026. Whether you are drawn in by the playful visuals or stay for the more unsettling and emotional undertones, it is an exhibit that leaves an impression long after you walk out. It may not always surprise, but it makes you think, and that alone makes it worth the visit.

Pictured above: Fresno State students Jeffrey Ruvalcaba, Manjot Dhanda and Hailey Milasich at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

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