For my own peace of mind, I need to clarify a couple of the points
   that I made, and draw some distinctions.

   First, there is no doubt in my mind (and no fuzziness in the
   statistics) that professions that are largely female are relatively
   underpaid.  The reasons behind this are complicated, I imagine, but
   I think that it is self-evident they probably include a bias toward
   typically male occupations and spheres of activity.

   Second, I emphatically do not mean to say that the only measure of a
   museum's value is its public appeal.  What I meant, and believe I
   said, is that one can't say that, with an increasing emphasis on the
   putatively feminine aspects of museums (ie their education programs),
   that museums have become increasingly undervalued.  If anything
   the reverse is true: more education (ie more feminization, if you
   accept this, which I am iffy about myself) more public interest.

   I disagree with Hank's rather slashing comment about museums which
   have not experienced tremendous rises in attendance. This is a
   particularly obvious instance where the efficiency of the market is
   complicated by values that are other than economic.  As an example, on
   a recent visit to the Metropolitan Museum, the Toulouse Lautrec and
   Winslow Homer exhibits were mobbed.  To get to one of these exhibits,
   visitors had to walk by an exhibition of drawings from the collection.
   Among these drawings is one of the most exquisite and loving Leonardo
   da Vinci drawings in existence (a fully realized and sfumatoed drawing
   of an angel's face).  How many people stopped by this drawing?  In the
   half-hour I spent with it, maybe ten people looked for more than 3
   seconds.  As far as the relative value of the art is concerned, it
   certainly could not be argued that the Lautrec and Homer were more
   valuable than the Leonardo as evinced by their relative
   visitorship.  I personally would have traded every Homer and Lautrec
   in existence for this drawing.

   So, the line I want to draw here is between what I said and what Hank
   thought he was agreeing with.

   Eric Siegel
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