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Danielle's avatar

oh god, ok, so this is literally my job (museum curator) and I have so many Opinions and Feelings about this...

because yeah, on one level it's hugely annoying when you pour your mind and soul into an exhibition/gallery, and then you see people engaging with via the medium of selfie instead of reading the captions and pondering wisely. and it's annoying when you want to *have* that experience as a visitor, something contemplative and quiet maybe, but you're being BLOCKED by a rampaging group of students wielding selfie sticks.

but not everyone experiences art in the same way, and looking through a camera lens is still a form of looking... maybe we see it as less 'pure' because we're looking with a goal in mind (the perfect photo) that isn't about the art/artist per se, like we're mediating the work and inserting ourselves into its significance - rather than 'this is a picasso', it's 'this is MY photo of a picasso and also that's my buddy steve next to it'.

thing is, historically, those impulses have always been present in how people viewed art. like if you consider the Grand Tour, where 18th century aristocrats would f off to italy for a couple of years to learn about CULTURE, only a minority of those travellers were really and truly there for the contemplative experience. it was more important to show that you'd viewed the most important antiquities and paintings (even if you were really in italy to party), and to bring home copies in the form of plaster casts, sketches or bronzes - which is why so many Grand Tourists sat for their portrait with artists like Pompeo Batoni, who specialised in s w a g g y representations of rich travellers surrounded by statues.

i could go on about this for ages - i won't tho - but it's a really vexed question which boils down to, why are we looking and what are we looking FOR?

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Soldier Birder's avatar

I highly recommend everybody watch Brad Troemel’s video report that dives deep on this subject.

https://youtu.be/M9hKJR-3oZw

Linking behind the paywall for the spy nation, but I encourage everyone to support his work, well worth it.

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