Foreboding electronically controlled gates opened before us and we stared at each other, hesitant to walk forth into what looked like the parking space of any industrial storage facility.
After going through a security screening and signing a form waving all kinds of rights we rarely ever thought about, we expected to enter a sacred mausoleum of some kind or at the very least a version of Ali Baba’s cave: rooms filled with glittering artistic treasures, crown jewels of Britain’s art world. Instead, in the decidedly cold controlled environment of the museum store, we were surrounded by crates piled high, dusty plastic covers, glass cases and retractable screens. The art in storage looked somewhat gritty, a Giacometti sculpture wedged between a Beuys blackboard and a Kieffer painting suddenly felt a lot more accessible than the very same artwork elevated on a plinth, strategically lit and accompanied by a facetious wall text.
A nice man gave us a guided tour of the facilities. He told us all about the major obstacles to the preservation of art: humidity, de-accession policies, theft, arson, insects. But he assured us that all these threats were more or less under control. In fact, the preservation team was doing such good work that the store would soon have to expand, taking over a great part of the area. An expression of terror glazed his blue eyes as he went on “In fact, if we keep on like that, the earth will eventually be covered in art.”
We could all adopt a work of art to liberate the overcrowded stores of our national museums. For instance, I could live with a Giacometti sculpture in my lounge and use a Beuys blackboard to write weekly “to do” lists. The world would be a museum as Baudrillard argues when he states that, were museums really democratic, they would be taken apart by the people who could claim a right to bits and pieces of it.
I’m not sure that was exactly what our guide meant, but I would not be surprised if one day his fear of art taking over the world got the better of him and he smuggled a termite colony into work.
Photo: Madeleine Waller
About Me
- Martine Rouleau
- Martine Rouleau is a lecturer and freelance curator. She completed a PhD at the London Consortium and her research interests pertain to the negotiation of the boundaries of public art institutions and their repercussions on the production and the reception of art. She lectures in the Arts Policy and Management department of Birkbeck College and Goldsmiths College and has curated events and exhibitions at Tate, at the Institute of Contemporary Arts and with the Brighton Photo Fringe. She is also a regular contributor to www.aqnb.com and esse magazine.
3 comments:
Instead of hoarding all this stuff, can't galleries be compelled to adopt a 'one in, one out rule' so that each time they purchase a piece of art, they have to destroy an old one? Art is no more meant to last for ever than people are and the efforts made to keep old pictures and sculptures alive are against nature.
Ce qui frappe dans l'évolution de l'objet pictural, est cette réduction de plus en plus prégnante de la peinture à l'objet. Le nouvel objet artistique serait contenu dans l'appropriation de l'objet le plus élémentaire, par delà les notions de beau et de laid. Notre monde contemporain serait transformé en musée vivant et les musées officiels ne seraient que des échantillonnages de tous ses aspects. Notre monde moderne "se regarde passer dans la rue" et édifie son propre passé dans le présent. Actuellement, tel un sacrifice posé sur l'autel de la société capitaliste, ce passé/présent sacré, se fait objet de consommation. Sa conceptualisation remplace le vocabulaire spécifique qui pourrait le nommer. L'ère du virtuel laisse à penser que nous entrons dans un métalangage mathématique, codifié, numérisé qui prendra la place des mots. Toute oeuvre pourra être modélisée, reproduite en 3D! Le CD-ROM remplace le musée, la galerie sur Internet est née. Mais on peut penser que le "grand artiste de demain" se réfugiera - pour y échapper - dans la clandestinité... tel l'ermite du Moyen-Age.
Christine Strohl-Grün
Tres bonne demarche!
Post a Comment