Bad at Sports » museums

Museum Guards Make Art; Here’s Where to Find Some of It.

Claudine Isé — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 18:07:22 +0000

Fred Wilson. Guarded View, 1991. Installation view.

Which museum job is the hardest? It’s a question that can be endlessly debated; for my part, I’ve always thought that museum guards have a pretty tough go of it. Guards always have to be the bad guy, telling people to step back from the painted white line, put away that camera, back up from that sculpture. And if an artwork gets damaged, who do you think is on the front line of blame? Yep, the older woman in uniform who requested a wooden stool to sit on during non-peak traffic hours. What a lot of people tend to forget — or don’t realize in the first place — is that many museum guards are also practicing artists who are as keenly invested in the works on the walls as are museum patrons and institutional staff. Robert Ryman worked as a vacation relief guard at MoMA. Numerous other artists, famous and not, have served their time guarding the objects that give white cubes their meaning. For about a year now the magazine SW!PE has focused on work by New York-area visual artists, writers and performers who were, or still are, working as museum guards in New York at the time their work was made. From SW!PE’s mission statement:

This magazine exists to disseminate and exhibit the artistic output of workers, in turn exposing the dignity, humanity, and brilliance of these works and the people who created them. It is both a celebration and a battle cry, not only of the artists showcased inside, but for all workers.

Guards Matter not only calls attention to the simple fact that the guards (workers) matter, but that the matter they produce is important. It was in this grand tradition that SW!PE was created. We hope for it to act as encouragement and at the same time, a platform, for a very special group of artists to be seen, but more importantly – heard.

Starting with their fourth issue, due out in early 2012, SW!PE will expand its scope to accept submissions from people employed as museum guards all across the US. Submission guidelines can be found here. The one thing I did note with this magazine is that the artists included are predominantly male. I’m assuming that’s simply because there are more male-artist-museum guards out there than female ones? Though I don’t know why that should be.

Edward Leonard, Untitled. Oil and wax on canvas, 2010.

Emile Lemakis, Emile Doppelganger: Life as a Working Stiff (Breakfast), 2010. Photograph.

Jeff Elliott. Untitled -Mark II, 2008. Acrylic on canvas.

Related: Check out this article from the Los Angeles Times from last January – it discusses a special radio documentary made by Portuguese broadcaster Sofia Saldhana called “The Sleeping Fool” produced for local NPR station KCRW. The Sleeping Fool offers glimpses into the various thoughts that drift through the heads of museum guards while on duty; it won the best new artist award at the Third Coast International Audio Festival last year. You can listen to “The Sleeping Fool” here.

Also: Esopus has an ongoing series in its magazine (all print issues) called “Guarded Opinions” in which a museum guard is invited to give his or her impression of the art they oversee. (Here’s where issues of Esopus are sold; in Chicago, it’s available at Quimby’s, The Art Institute, and a bunch of other places).

And finally: An artist’s book by the late conceptual artist Don Celender –known for his interviews with filmmakers, prison wardens, religious leaders and labor figures about the art they like — titled Observations, protestations and lamentations of museum guards throughout the world; it’s hard to find, but you can hear a podcast discussion of the book produced by The Art Gallery of Knoxville by clicking here. (Celender is #10 on the list).

(Thanks to Philip Von Zweck and Karly Wildenhaus for the tips and links).

Museum Exhibitions and The Book

Claudine Isé — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 23:10:07 +0000

I’m fascinated (alas, only from afar) by the Louvre’s Special Guest program and in particular with its use of acclaimed novelists as guest curators. (I’ve posted on this program before, here). The Louvre has featured Toni Morrison in this capacity in the past; right now, the novelist and semiotician Umberto Eco is unveiling a series of exhibitions and other programs relating to the topic of “The Infinity of Lists” which draws upon his book The Vertigo of the List. This, along with an email from one of our readers (hi Elizabeth!), has got me thinking about the relationship between books and museum exhibitions – and in particular about what happens when novels are the inspiration for museum exhibitions – or even for museums themselves.

Recently Eco was interviewed by The Art Newspaper about his year-long series of programs for the Louvre. In the article, Eco says that Homer’s Iliad served as a conceptual starting point for his “Lists” project:

“The starting point for my ‘list of lists’ was Homer’s Iliad: firstly the creation of Achilles’ shield by Hephaestus, which not only symbolises perfect form but is in itself a work of art on which is engraved what is considered an allegory of the creation of the universe, an overall vision of Homer’s world. And secondly, the part where he lists all the ships leaving for the Trojan war.” Eco plays with these two opposing dimensions—perfect form and the list—in an attempt to rationalise the world. “The shield of Achilles is the epiphany of form, and every picture in an artist’s search for that form is a shield of Achilles,” concludes Eco. “Behind each list is the sense of ineffability.”

Related is this New York Times article, sent to me by the aforementioned “Reader Elizabeth,” on the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Orhan Pamuk’s creation of a museum of the objects that appear in each of the 83 chapters of his novel The Museum of Innocence. Located in “a narrow 19th century building” in Istanbul, Pamuk’s Museum will contain things like salt shakers, figurines, keys, and a quince grinder. The protagonist of Pamuk’s book, a man named Kemal, falls in love with an ex-beauty queen named Fasun. Kemal begins to collect objects that remind him of his love and which, eventually, he uses to create a museum/monument to her. Pamuk describes the role that objects played in the writing of this novel as follows (the author of this NYT article is Negar Azimi):

“As I wrote this novel over the past 10 years,” Pamuk told me, “I encountered everyday objects that would make their way into the story. At other times, the story would demand an object to keep it moving, so I would bring one in. When I am stuck, I cast about looking for ideas from objects around me. My perceptions, or you can say my tentacles, are wide open to everything in shop windows, in friends’ homes, in flea markets and antique shops and so on. This is how the Museum of Innocence came about.” (Click here for a slideshow of objects from Pamuk’s Museum).

Pamuk’s accumulation of mundane objects as sources of literary inspiration seems related to the process of list-making that so fascinates Eco. And Pamuk’s Museum– the physical one, that is–also appears to be built upon a foundation of Lists. In the photo essay accompanying the NYT article, Pamuk says of a collection of old keys housed in his Museum:

“The key is an ordinary object. I want my museum to be modestly filled with the ordinary things that make up the city, that make up any city. I want my museum to be a museum of the city, to include everything from street maps to locks to door handles to public telephones and the sound of foghorn.”

In Pamuk’s case, the book and the Museum exist symbiotically. Where does the book end and the Museum begin? I like how both Eco and Pamuk are creating museum exhibitions that are very much dependent upon objects and yet, they remain wide-open to interpretation and fantastic conjecture–in other words, to the imagination. And I love how the viewer in both museums is inescapably, unapologetically, positioned as an imaginative “reader” of texts and of artworks – an idea that for me is summed up by Eco, who says of his exhibition:

“I want to invite people to go beyond the form of the physical limits of the picture, to imagine the etcetera, a very important concept that suggests that it may continue. I want to invite people when they look, for example, at the Mona Lisa to go beyond what is most obvious and to observe the background landscape and wonder whether it extends into infinity—something that Da Vinci perhaps intended. To look at a picture as if we had a movie camera that would do a travelling shot to show us the rest.”

Wednesday Clips 5/27/09

Claudine Isé — Wed, 27 May 2009 23:34:23 +0000

A webchat with Andy Warhol, Oliver Laric (http://oliverlaric.com/webchat.htm)

Here’s what’s got my attention, web-wise, so far this week:

*San Diego Museum of Art director Derrick R. Cartwright appointed director of the Seattle Art Museum.

*Art Institute of Chicago director James Cuno hopes to initiate massive fundraising drive for free Museum admission.

*No Boys Allowed: yearlong exhibition at the Pompidou Center is for women-only.

*Barack Obama: The Freshman.

*Now on Vimeo: watch the NYFA Panel Discussion on ‘How the Recession Has Impacted the Art World’ (featuring Edward Winkleman, Sean Elwood, Stephanie Howe, Kay Takeda; via Edward_Winkleman).

*Scope Basil is only three weeks ago away, and still ‘aint got no permit.

*”I spent a year asking why the contemporary art bubble was the biggest, bubbliest bubble of them all”: Ben Lewis’ The Great Contemporary Art Bubble preview clip on YouTube ( ART21′s Ben Street has a funny post on the film too).

*Boing Boing writer Joel Johnson chides Wired Online for being clueless about the importance of online media–a great post, but look to the comments for the real dirt. (via ArtFagCity’s Twitter).

*Speaking of Twitter, it could be coming to a t.v. near you.

*Grrr. Argh: Monster Kid Home Movies (via Boing Boing).

*Pierogi’s famed flat files now searchable online. (via Art Fag City).

*A live conversation with a dead Andy Warhol, via psychic via webchat (via Rhizome.org).

*Beautiful/Decay needs YOU to help pick the theme for its next limited-edition publication. Winner gets a copy of the book. For free!

*Applications for the 2009 William H. Johnson Prize are now available. Due date is July 31st. (Via Artipedia).

Friday Clip Show

Claudine Isé — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 16:08:17 +0000

Are re-blogged links the blogger’s version of the sitcom flashback episode? Uh, maybe, but in any case, here’s a partial and purely subjective roundup of the past week in art, culture, etc. in Chicago and beyond, via a whole mess o’ handy links, of course….

*Artists selected for the 53rd Annual Venice Biennale have been announced; find the list here.

*New City art editor Jason Foumberg has a nice recap along with some thoughtful analysis of last week’s “The Invisible Artist: Creators from Chicago’s Southside” panel discussion at the School of the Art Institute. UPDATE 4/4: There is some very interesting, enlightening, and pretty damn sharp back-and-forth going on in the comments section of this article by panel participants and others who strongly disagree with (or have misunderstood) Foumberg’s assessment of the panel and the issues it addressed.

*The mass firings of adjunct fine art faculty at Parsons The New School for Design: blogger Hrag Vartanian’s coverage has been some of the most thorough thus far. Check out his posts here, here and here as a start.

*Time Out Chicago writer Lauren Weinberg has a piece this week on the ways in which Musuems in Chicago and elsewhere are using social media.

*Big yawn: on the Twitter front, an update on @platea’s Twitter happening I blogged about a few weeks ago. UPDATE 4/4: NewCity reported on what happened during the Twitter Island project discussed in that same blog post, here.

*A huge Pose slideshow available on The World’s Best Ever.

*Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes provides an excellent, two-part summary of a rare Robert Frank public talk this week with National Gallery of Art curator Sarah Greenough; part one and two.

*Via C-Monster: The Architecture of the Drug Trade. A fascinating look at the landscape of weed and the architecture of the grow house. Especially loved the comparison of the latter to Max’s bedroom in Where the Wild Things Are.

*Paddy Johnson of Art Fag City writes for The L Magazine on why Jenny Holzer is not the patron saint of Twitter in her review of Holzer’s Protect Protect Project, which originated at the MCA and is now at The Whitney.

*Via ArchitectureChicago: iTunes offering free download of the first movement of John Cage’s 4’33″.

* Get your art on at Chicago Artist’s Resource (CAR)’s Creative Chicago Expo tomorrow (Saturday) from 10-4. Workshops and Consult-a-thons galore for individuals and arts organizations.

*And finally, the hermeneutics of “pin diplomacy”: via Artnet Magazine, Madeleine Albright’s pin collection to be shown at the Museum of Arts & Design in New York. Pins weren’t mere jewelry for Albright, they added a subtle layer to her diplomatic efforts. She wore a bee pin when talks were getting pointed, a balloon pin when she felt hopeful, and a snake pin after Sadaam Hussein’s people called her a serpent. I’m so there!

L.A. MOCA: Where Are They Now? + Rose Art Museum Symposium Tonight

Claudine Isé — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 18:19:18 +0000

For those of you who’ve been following MOCA’s meltdown (see sidebar links to Meg’s previous posts on this subject) and the Rose Art Museum’s deaccessioning debacle at Brandeis, there are a few interesting updates of the linkie sort I’d like to draw your attention to, in case you haven’t already seen them.

First, in the ‘where are they now’ category: two extensive, multi-part interviews with major MOCA players, one still hanging in there, the other out the door in a flash, have appeared within the last couple of weeks over at the Arts Journal blogs. Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes posts a four (!)-part interview with MOCA senior curator Paul Schimmel on the future of the institution, which sounds super-rosy and no less ambitious than before, according to Mr. Schimmel. Find ‘em here: Part one, part two, part three, and part four.

Next, there’s CultureGrrl aka Lee Rosenbaum’s two-part interview with Jeremy Strick about his post-MOCA post as the new director of the Nasher Museum: part one of her interview can be found here; part two, here. Strick seems to have landed very well, I must say; there’s hardly a speck of dust on him.

Lastly, the latest on The Rose Art Museum. From my understanding of the state of things now (mostly via this post on The Art Law Blog, which I got to via this one on Art Fag City), Brandeis has backpedaled from its original plans to sell off the Museum’s collection–now they’re saying that only “a limited number” of pieces will be sold “if the need arises in the future.” It’s anyone’s guess as to what’s true and what’s p.r. spin, but tonight, Monday March 16th, a symposium titled “Preserving Trust: Art and the Art Museum amidst Financial Crisis” will take place from 6:30 – 8:00 pm at The Rose Art Museum. You can view the discussion in real time, as it will also be streamed live, and posted on YouTube afterwards. Here’s an excerpt from the Symposium blurb:

This symposium is prompted by the global controversy over the recently proposed closing of Brandeis University’s Rose Art Museum and the selling of some or all of its permanent collection of modern and contemporary art, in order to meet general university financial needs. At a time of financial crisis, what is the utility of art and of museums, in universities and in other contexts? Is art the most dispensable and disposable of assets when times are tough? Conversely, might art and museums be understood as especially valuable at moments of economic and social distress, helping to remind a society of its core values, exposing citizens to cultural difference, and providing vital spaces for community-building and democratic debate?

Panelists include:

Claire Messud

Robert Pinsky

Stephen Greenblatt

Commentators include:

Katy Graddy

Dirck Roosevelt

Andreas Teuber

Brian Friedberg and Liz McDonough

Moderator: Mark Auslander
Note: The proceedings will be streamed live on the Cultural Production ustream channel, and also posted on YouTube. Co-coordinators: Mark Auslander, Dirck Roosevelt, Ramie Targoff, Andreas Teuber

Art Institute Raises Price of Admission: “Cannibalism,” or Just “Keeping Up”?

Claudine Isé — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:38:09 +0000

There’s been some commentary on other art and culture blogs about this, so maybe we should get into it too: The Art Institute has raised its price of admission by 50%. Now, the general public will pay $18, seniors and students pay $12, up from the $7 it was previously.

There have been a few good pieces on this issue written elsewhere over the past couple of days; in particular I liked Tyler Green’s post over at Modern Art Notes, Museum cannibalism: pricing out visitors. Green points out that Chicago museums are more reliant on admissions revenue than are institutions in other cities, but nevertheless decisions like this make it much harder for average folks, especially younger demographics, to make museum-going a regular thing. Salient quote:

“Museums could do lots of things to avoid pricing out visitors. Trustees could give more. Foundations could give more. Museums could cut more staff. But the last thing they should do is raise admissions charges and inhibit public access to art at a time when we need it most.”

Green then followed up with this post about the Seattle Art Museum’s “pay if you can” admissions policy, with accompanying grey-skies ad campaign. What think you?

Seattle Art Museum Ad, via Modern Art Notes blog

EDITED TO ADD: Someone rightly pointed out that there’s more to the admissions story: free days! Here they are, straight from the Art Institute’s web site:

One late evening per week (Thursdays after 5:00 p.m.) throughout the year
Two late evenings per week (Thursdays and Fridays after 5:00 p.m.) during the summer (May 31 to August 31)
The entire month of February
The week of the opening of the Modern Wing, from May 16 to May 22, 2009

Go directly to the Art Institute’s visitor page for even more details. Plus, children under 12 will continue to get in free of charge, and there will no longer be a charge for special exhibitions or coat check.

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