A passionate essay in the UK Times rails against the emerging emphasis on access and public palatability among museums, claiming that it distracts and destroys the true purpose of the institutions. According to novelist/journalist James Delingpole, that true purpose is this:
They exist today, just as they did 250 years ago, for the preservation, collection, display and study of precious objects. If in the process they also manage to create some kind of beneficial social change be it bolstering its visitors’ education, self esteem or sense of community, then all to the good, but these are no more than side effects, not a museum’s raison d’etre.
He suggests that bending that purpose toward popular appeal distorts the organization rather than improving it.
The flaws in this access-for-all argument, are nicely exposed by Josie Appleton in her paper for the Institute Of Ideas – ”Museums For The People?” By endlessly trying to second-guess the needs of their audiences, she argues, museums are failing in their primary function of preserving, displaying, studying and where possible collecting the treasures of civilisation and nature.
Resources that might have gone into the maintenance of collections are instead being diverted to fashionable ”access” projects; curators are now so busy interacting with the public that they barely have time left for study; and the harder they try to make themselves more user-friendly and socially relevant, the less they fulfil their purpose as wholly distinctive institutions which provide a refuge from the mundane cares and concerns of ordinary life.
Along the way, Delingpole challenges the trend of hanging artwork lower to accommodate children and the disabled (”thus are politically correct considerations given a higher priority than scholarly or aesthetic ones”), as well as the effort to increase the diversity of staff and leadership (”Does anyone really think when they enter a museum: ‘Goodness me. All the curators and staff here look hideously white’?”).
Which leads me to this eloquent retort to Mr. Delingpole: ”tough noogies.” Considerations of access, accessibility, relevance, and equity are part of the museum’s job, just as are collection, preservation, display, and study. The most effective institutions are masters of ”uncompromising compromise,” committed to providing both access and excellence, even when the two seem at cross purposes.
The answer isn’t to retrench into some centuries-old conception of the museum, but to stretch forward to a 22nd-century vision of one. Those institutions that internally focused on their collections and their scholarship a century ago misunderstood their purpose, just as those that over-emphasize their external focus misunderstand it now. This doesn’t mean museums should live in the middle of the road, but that they should embrace the entire thoroughfare. It’s horribly complex and difficult to do so, but such are all necessary and noble things.
I suspect that the real reason so many museums are pursuing “accessibility” is that they risk losing their funding if they don’t. Being a “user unfriendly” bastion of history and cultural artifacts is certainly a choice an institution can (and sometimes probably should) make. But not if they expect to get public funds to support their efforts. I ain’t sayin’ this is right, just the way things are.
While museums are in the business of preserving and displaying works of art, they also provide a service. This service is to offer patrons the opportunity to experience artistic works. Patron expectations have changed over time and with ADA laws, “user friendly” trends, and equity issues at the forefront of these expectations, museums must respond in order to remain successful.
Furthermore, the arts now play less of a role in school and more of a role in the community. Like it or not, it is becoming the museums’ and community arts organizations’ job to pick up the slack in order to maintain arts education in the lives of our youth. This shifting role in education leads to alternate delivery methods and more diverse audiences.
Museums are simply keeping up with the times and it is their job to do this without risking the artistic integrity of their product. This is a delicate balance that can be (and is most certainly) achieved by arts institutions across the country. Acknowledging the shift in expectations, responding to the community and ensuring effectiveness of delivery is not about diluting the product, it’s simply making sure that the product lives on. Without the patron – the perceiver – museums would simply be a storage and maintenance facility for framed canvases and chiseled rocks.
One might well ask of Mr. Delingpole, “…preservation, collection, display and study of precious objects” FOR WHOM?
I’ve long agreed fundamentally with Dostoevsky, whose view (badly paraphrased) is that, while a work of art may exist in a desk drawer, store room or rehearsal hall, ART doesn’t exist until the work encounters an audience.
So, without access, what evidence is there that any object is precious?
(By the way, Andrew, your “entire thoroughfare” argument is brilliantly stated and absolutely on the point.)
Great comments, all. The one area where I share concern with Mr. Delingpole is the question of time. How can museums balance this interplay of preservation and access, not just to serve the audience of the moment, but also to preserve the opportunity of that balance for generations or even centuries to come?
In other words, as we work hard to improve access and engagement of current citizens with enduring works of creative expression, how do we ensure the cost of that access (in worn or broken artifacts, in collections that serve what’s currently popular rather than what’s enduringly important) is not paid by those not yet born?
The rhythm that determines a successful museum isn’t a calendar year or a fiscal quarter, but a millenium.