Hi Mary,
I did not get the impression that kitsch was being dismissed as unworthy of
collection or interpretation. There are several very cool museums(properly
used term) whose collections include a great deal of excellent kitsch. I
would wager a significant percentage of many of our collections, including
mine, could be classified as such. I think the point was that the whole
notion(s) being presented at these creation museums(improperly used term)
IS kitsch.
I think your description "the detritus of popular culture, thrown by the
wayside and reinfused with worth by someone else" fits the bill perfectly.
Mark Janzen
Registrar/Collections Manager
Edwin A. Ulrich Museum of Art
Martin H. Bush Outdoor Sculpture Collection
Wichita State University
(316)978-5850
"Rizzo, Mary"
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Not to weigh in on the worth or lack thereof of a creation museum, but I
think there is room for comment on some of the larger issues regarding
what counts as a museum. Certainly many scholars argue that all museums
contain ideological messages, subtly or not. As the NY Times article on
the Creation Museum points out, the very idea of the museum as a place
where the world is categorized into significant and insignificant
objects is ideological. Or we could think back to controversies like the
Enola Gay exhibit which was wrapped up in ideologies of national history
and memory. A great text on this is Barbara Kirschenblatt-Gimblett's
_Destination Culture_ which looks at how and what is given value by the
museum.
Secondly, following Karl Wolff's link to the Creation Evidence Museum,
I'd like to point out that the museum is described as "packed --
literally, to bursting" with visitors. Can't think of many other
traditional museums where that's the case. Why are people flocking to
such a museum? Right there we see why we should consider this issue a
little more seriously.
Finally, I'd like to also address the concept of kitsch. I think its too
easy for museum professionals to dismiss kitsch as worthless of our
regard (after all, it wasn't that long ago that professional historians
and others dismissed women's history, working-class history, popular
culture, and so on, as unimportant). Kitsch has an important place in
our consumption-oriented society. Usually it's the detritus of popular
culture, thrown by the wayside and reinfused with worth by someone else.
What that suggests is that one person's kitsch is another's dear
treasure. Dismissing something as kitsch often shows a particular
cultural, intellectual and class orientation that doesn't ask the
important questions about how society is working. I'm thinking about
this for an article I'm writing and I keep coming to the same
conclusion: museum professionals, public historians, etc should try to
understand the role of kitsch rather than merely dismiss it. Clearly,
there's a large proportion of the population out there that is very
interested in these kinds of things.
Best,
Mary Rizzo
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