In a message dated 8/10/2003 9:53:31 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

<< Of course, today it is not considered important to focus only on original
artifacts. Of course, today it is equally acceptable, and sometimes perhaps
even more helpful in reaching the general public, to "tell a story" rather than
to focus on "original artifacts."

 Nevertheless, these choices are not "natural," but rather are conscious
methodological ones that have become available to museologists in the last years
in which the "originality" of the object and the "hand of the artist" have
become less important, since the ever continuing enlargement of interest
began--roughly in the 1930's--to include more indepth information about patrons,
audiences, social/cultural/economic/juridical circumstances, gender, etc.
  >>
Indeed, these choices are "conscious methodological ones," which in my
opinion often confuse the museum visitor, who still conceives (perhaps naively and
foolishly) of museums as places to see historical artifacts and original art.
I believe that a large segment of the museum-going public is more interested
in seeing original artifacts than in reading a story, illustrated with
reproductions and the occasional original object.  I don't have fancy surveys to back
me up, just the anecdotal evidence acquired by frequently mingling with
visitors in my own museum, who are very clearly still under the spell of the aura of
the object.  Context and interpretation are important, to be sure, but I
think there are many folks like me, who would rather read a "story" in a book or
magazine while comfortably seated at home or in a library, rather than having
to navigate a museum to do so.  Oops, I forgot, we're trying to reach people
who don't read, aren't we?  I'm not sure that making them read complex stories
while standing and having to peer around other visitors is the answer.

Ironically, it seems to me that it's some of the people who work in museums
nowadays to whom "originality" and "the hand of the artist" have become less
important, not necessarily the public.  When a curator only grudgingly agrees to
release original objects from storage and place them on exhibit to satisfy
public demand, because they don't tell the "story" HE wants to tell--as I have
seen happen in my own museum--I suspect that something is terribly wrong.

Harrumph.

David Haberstich

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