from Guardian Unlimited
Art for shuffling's sake
go to article

An amusing article that makes me laugh. The writer started off with how Richard Wollheim, a well known British philosopher of art, used to regularly spent 4 hours in front of a single painting in his museum visits "for stray associations or motivated misperceptions to settle down...that the picture could be relied upon to disclose itself as it was." Then, he proceeded to show how, at the other end of the spectrum, the "herd instinct" the modern blockbuster show produces neither do the greatest paintings justice nor encourage meaningful museum experiences.

He muses "We are doing this art appreciation thing all wrong. We pay large sums of money to see beautiful paintings and then see them in conditions that are about as conducive to aesthetic pleasure as rush-hour strap-hanging on London's Victoria Line. At the end of the article, he concluded firmly that "if we were really serious about art appreciation, we would choose to see paintings in more rewarding ways than we do at present.

The state of visitorship at blockbuster shows in the Singapore museums have not reach the point whereby visitors have to book in advance or be limited to timed-ticket entry, so to me, beseides raising the general consciousness of problems associated with blockbuster shows, this article more importantly triggers us to think about how we can take the initiative to construct a more positive museum experience for ourselves despite circumstances.