Hordes clear $20 barrier
Apparently the high entry fees designed to keep out the riff-raff didn't work. Tyler Green over at MAN is complaining that MoMA is so crowded that the art is in danger of being tampled. Among Tyler's suggestions are banning cameras and baby strollers. I've always thought camera bans were crass attempts to force you to make a visit to the giftshop for a postcard or poster. And as a new parent, I'm not too thrilled about the idea of a two-three year moratorium on my museum attendance. I was just getting used to the idea that a baby wouldn't be much problem to take on a gallery crawl.
Maybe they should just make the tickets $25. Still less than Disneyland.
People go to museums -- as well as galleries, fine restaurants, movies, Broadway -- to have a civilized, visceral and thought-provoking experience. In today's "it's all about me," selfish, TV-driven culture, people are more and more imposing their lack of class and morals on other people. This includes the insidious use of cellphones in public places, and cameras at museums. I would NEVER donate artwork to a museum that allowed photography or strollers. I'm surprised insurance companies will insure museums that allow this, too.
I'd have to agree with you that using a cellphone in a contemplative space like a museum or gallery shows a lack of class, but I hesitate to say it shows a lack of morals, as well.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art received several donations from you last year, Anonymous. I suppose you'll be ending your donations, since it allows both cameras (no flash, please) and strollers.
I think museums should not be some sort of elitist place where cool people like us meet but, instead, places where normal people go. Inevitably, that'll involve dealing with strollers. But I find it utterly pathetic to complain about the fact that, apparently, art is now becoming somewhat popular. I guess some people are just way too attached to the idea of starving artists and small elites that supposedly are the only people who appreciate art. My personal experience indicates that there's much more riff raff amongst the well-to-do than amongst normal people in museums. Those rich people who only go to a museum because that's part of what apparently is required behaviour are much more annoying than families with kids that have decided to maybe have a peek at some of that nice art.
Tyler's comment was not some general complaint about the riffraff, but a very specific one regarding poor crowd control and the danger it poses to priceless art work.
Perhaps it's a bit of exaggeration, but he noticed people bumping into paintings and stepping on sculptures. Someone took multiple *flash* photos of a work on paper and a nearby guard said nothing.
This is not about who's more "annoying" in the galleries, the unwashed masses or the stiff upper lips. It's about the museum's fundamental duty to protect its art.
Yes, Tyler's post about protecting the art and MoMA's overcrowding is valid. I simply found it supremely ironic that prior to MoMA's reopening the art blogs were ablaze with indignation that this heinous $20 entry fee would keep out families. This attitude, in the short term at least, appears to have been wildly wrong. Additionally, the comment from "Anonymous" above is exactly the kind of elitist attitude that is the real barrier to wider acceptance and enjoyment of art, not a measly twenty-dollar bill.
But that's not how your article came across, Todd. I think art museums should be free. But part of good funding for art includes paying museum employees decent wages and teaching them how to deal with people.
Has it been scientifically proven that camera flash damages art??
> "Has it been scientifically proven that camera flash damages art??"
As far as I know, *all* light is ultimately damaging to artwork, *especially* to works on paper.
Some conservation advice from MoMA itself: http://www.moma.org/collection/conservation/
"Even though your artwork may be framed under UV filtering acrylic sheeting, the intensity of the light and duration of exposure is a concern. Try to avoid direct and excessive daylight. Close window curtains or drape the artwork when possible. Windows can also be covered with a film or a screen that will lower light intensity and ultraviolet rays. If possible take down the artwork periodically and exchange it with another piece, allowing the work to "rest" in storage. The most light-sensitive materials include watercolors and gouache, modern color inks, pastels, newsprint and all color papers. It is important to remember that light damage is cumulative and irreversible."
More from the Library of Congress: http://www.loc.gov/preserv/care/paper.html
Even absent any solid evidence, I think I'd opt for the conservative route anyways.
BTW, Tyler has a follow-up re: a Truitt sculpture that's been damaged: http://www.artsjournal.com/man/archives20050101.shtml#94535
Well I'll be...
The flash bulb myth debunked...
http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/cdl/1996/0724.html
* * *
"An electronic flash on a camera is typically sized to use f8 for a film of 100ASA at a subject distance of 3m (10ft). From photo handbook data, this is equivalent to a light dose at the artifact of about 30 lux seconds (lx-s). An alternate route to this estimate is via the Illumination Engineering Handbook data: Xenon flash tubes for photography range from 10 to 200 Joules rating. Given efficacy of about 50 lumens per joule, a wide-angle reflector throwing the light forward into about 1/4 of the sphere, this gives a range of 20 lx-s for little builtin flash to 400 lx-s for big fat studio tubes.
"For convenience, round up to 50 lx-s for each amateur. Assuming the gallery lighting is the lowest most museums can tolerate, 50 lux (5 foot candles) then each flash adds the equivalent of one second of normal gallery exposure. So, 300 amateur flashes a day is equivalent to adding five minutes to the display day. In order to actually increase damage by 10% on a ten hour day, one would need to experience 3600 flashes per day. Two large professional flashes would raise the ante a little, they would need 225 flashes a day to add 10%. For museums at 150 lux (15 footcandles) these numbers become 10,000 amateurs, or 700 pros, every day. To actually double fading would need 100,000 amateurs a day. Most museums would kill
for those attendance figures! As for the UV wrinkle, xenon is used because it has a spectrum very close to daylight (6,000K). Given typical glass tubes and plastic diffusers, the UV ratio will be a little higher than properly filtered light, but UV type damage is far from the Achilles heel of artifacts at controlled light levels, it is color fading, and UV is not the issue here.
"In other words, flash may very well be banned for reasons of copyright, or as a disturbance to the act of contemplation (my
personal vote) but there is no preservation reason. I think the ban started originally because flash bulbs (and their precursors the open magnesium flash) were a genuine fire hazard, and an explosion hazard (hot fragments) and a garbage problem. Of course, tripods, hot studio lamps, and bulky equipment are still hazards, and a photography policy still necessary, but please don't wave the red flag of conservation over flashcameras."