I have never posted to this list before, but this discussion thread is
fascinating to me.  Indigo, I think you have hit the nail on the head.  As a
graduate student in Museum Education, I have spent a lot of time looking at
the ways in which various types of museums attempt to educate and engage the
public.  I grew up going to art museums and when I entered this degree
program, I thought that I wanted to work for an art museum.  However, I have
come to believe that there ARE some fundamental problems in many art museums.

I have observed a general attitude (even in this discussion)that if visitors
are not interested or engaged in art, it can be blamed on just about every
factor imaginable, other than that the museum might need to change
something.  The public is accused of being "AD/HD", anti-intellectual, or
just plain unable to "get it".  Schools are accused of not doing enough
education about art.  Society is accused of being too consumer and
entertainment driven.

While all of these things may be true to some degree, the fact is: museums
hold the relics of our culture in trust for the public.  If visitors don't
"get it" for whatever reason, it is the museum's responsibility to address
the problem.  Art museums need to stop imagining that exhibiting a painting
on a white wall with minimal information is the way to inspire some sort of
spiritual experience.

Art museums lag behind other types of museums in addressing the needs of the
public.  If visitors are intimidated by art museums, it is not due to some
flaw on their part; it is because art museums are intimidating places that
continue to treat the public as fundamentally "uneducable".

I still can't figure out what's so wrong about wanting to have fun while you
learn.  God forbid learning should ever be so enjoyable that it might be
called "entertainment."

I will always be an art lover, but I think I'd prefer to work for a history
museum.

Briana

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