I know this post is not about me and is making great thoughtful points, I just couldn’t help get a little frustrated by the cynical take on museums. To be recognized as a nonprofit museum the organization must prove they’re a public benefit and that they're educational. Plenty offer an experience beyond just looking at art hung up on a plain wall. I mean the wall shouldn’t be attention grabbing in the first place if you’re trying to display art. Often the people working in them provide more cultural context than I would have if I had just passed it on the street. The opportunity to even see them is often only possible because of the preservation efforts of that organization. Okay I’m a little impassioned because I work for a tiny nonprofit museum and I have so much respect for everyone here, many just volunteers who want to make their community a better place. Your inability to experience the piece as it was intended for its time is a part of being human and experiencing the remnants of the things that came before us… even if it was up on a wall for you to pass by
Better on a museum wall than crumbling away with the rest of the church. But what pieces get put on those walls? Who decides? Who owns them? For that matter, to whom do you prove the public benefit of the art you curate?
Consider that a vast trove of art by women is buried in museum vaults, or that artifacts that serve a cultural purpose to people of today were stolen a hundred years ago and are on display (or in vaults) in western museums.
Not all museums are arbiters of authority... But some certainly are.
“Ironically, with more things happening at once, there are fewer things to interpret; ritual demands time and space, but we consume an endless stream of space without time.”
I think you’re positively DEAD ON. We have music and film at our fingertips, but hold it cheaply because of its immediacy. We have art, but cordoned off in institutions of art that gate-keep the viewing experience. Language, but not world-of-mouth, but screen-shared. Stimulus, Stimulus, Stimulus, and no space for a response. The symbols start failing to deeply signify any longer due to over-saturation.
You'll love this essay "The Disappearance of Rituals: A Topology of the Present" by Byung-Chul Han, basically an extended version of this with a few other points in mind, quick to read as well
Museums have done that for centuries. We basically do to art what we do to wild animals in zoos - and then call it "conservation". No difference, really.
The convenience of the world demands things no longer be in situ but rather in vitro. It also fits our times of short attention spans and instant gratification so we can believe we've experienced the essence of something while only being duped by its facsimile.
This is also how politics and many human relationships also work now. There is no room to ponder complexity, subtlety, context, uncertainty. We just want those answers right now, presume they're 100% correct, and can move on to consuming the next thing.
And to the points at the end, a lot of this is what Albert Borgmann in 1984 called "the device paradigm" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Device_paradigm). Once you see it, you cannot unsee it with every form of technology that surrounds us.
Good point about the loss of the perception of what is sacred. But the claim that listening to a vinyl is more magical is a bit narrow if it doesn’t consider how the LP itself felt like a compressed version of what came before. To some people, downloading music already feels more sacred than streaming it instantly. Mechanism-wise, we aren’t so different from what came before. But we are moving faster.
Your interpretation of the de-sacralization of the El Greco implies that your reaction to it in a church would even now be a religious one. But isn't it true that presupposes that your interior world and that of the worshippers of El Greco's time would be the same to support that reaction? The painting has become an aesthetic object, not a religious one; your response, after all this time and after all the changes in the world and in the importance of religion, is of a museum goer in New York, not a
Interesting take, I‘ve never thought about it that way! Convenience culture seems at first like a helping hand, which makes everyday activities easier and more accessible. However, we tend to oversee the downsides and the longterm consequences, until they‘ve already taken place.
I dig this piece, Adam! It's relieving to see a discussion on the consequences of our technology. I've felt for a while now that the culture of the West -- particularly the US -- lionizes the idea of productivity. We gave up the friction of experience without considering what we were losing. Maybe the Ents were right: we are too hasty.
Reading this and a bunch of other works on this app helped me realize the root of all our woes in and with modern life is capitalism, it makes me more aware of a collective unconscious, it makes us more connected in my head, and my brain gets a kick out of noticing intricacy, or things it can peg as intricate🫶🏼
“Now I’m thinking of music. On the modern social media platform, the experience of watching video and listening to songs is all rolled into one. But why does it still feel more magical to pull a record out of its sleeve, place the needle, and listen to the gritty music emerge from a record player? It was more of a ritual, there was more meaning to interpret, and at the end of the day humans operate on meaning.” - have been thinking this exact sentiment for a while now! I’ve got an essay in the works wholly focussed on this but it’s lookin for a home perhaps outside of Substack — I may have to quote you there 📚
Reminds me of something Nicholas Carr wrote in his new book
"It has blurred the distinctions between categories of information—distinctions of form, register, sense, and importance—that the epistemic architecture of the analog era preserved and even accentuated. Content has collapsed, as our adoption of the drab, generic term content to refer to all forms of expression testifies. Everything now has to fit the internet’s conventions and protocols, with their stress on immediacy, novelty, multiplicity, interconnectedness, and above all efficiency."
The distinctions of form are part of the rituals. Putting on the record, going to the theatre, even going to blockbuster and making a movie choice." Now everything is just "content"
I know this post is not about me and is making great thoughtful points, I just couldn’t help get a little frustrated by the cynical take on museums. To be recognized as a nonprofit museum the organization must prove they’re a public benefit and that they're educational. Plenty offer an experience beyond just looking at art hung up on a plain wall. I mean the wall shouldn’t be attention grabbing in the first place if you’re trying to display art. Often the people working in them provide more cultural context than I would have if I had just passed it on the street. The opportunity to even see them is often only possible because of the preservation efforts of that organization. Okay I’m a little impassioned because I work for a tiny nonprofit museum and I have so much respect for everyone here, many just volunteers who want to make their community a better place. Your inability to experience the piece as it was intended for its time is a part of being human and experiencing the remnants of the things that came before us… even if it was up on a wall for you to pass by
i'm not trying to shit on museums and i'm sorry it came off that way - i love museums. it's just a useful metaphor
Better on a museum wall than crumbling away with the rest of the church. But what pieces get put on those walls? Who decides? Who owns them? For that matter, to whom do you prove the public benefit of the art you curate?
Consider that a vast trove of art by women is buried in museum vaults, or that artifacts that serve a cultural purpose to people of today were stolen a hundred years ago and are on display (or in vaults) in western museums.
Not all museums are arbiters of authority... But some certainly are.
I love this line, near the end.
“Ironically, with more things happening at once, there are fewer things to interpret; ritual demands time and space, but we consume an endless stream of space without time.”
I think you’re positively DEAD ON. We have music and film at our fingertips, but hold it cheaply because of its immediacy. We have art, but cordoned off in institutions of art that gate-keep the viewing experience. Language, but not world-of-mouth, but screen-shared. Stimulus, Stimulus, Stimulus, and no space for a response. The symbols start failing to deeply signify any longer due to over-saturation.
Great read.
You'll love this essay "The Disappearance of Rituals: A Topology of the Present" by Byung-Chul Han, basically an extended version of this with a few other points in mind, quick to read as well
Yes!! Adam's essay instantly took me back to when I read Han's
thanks for the recommendation. I’ll check it now. Have a great weekend, @Guilherme Curado.
Museums have done that for centuries. We basically do to art what we do to wild animals in zoos - and then call it "conservation". No difference, really.
The convenience of the world demands things no longer be in situ but rather in vitro. It also fits our times of short attention spans and instant gratification so we can believe we've experienced the essence of something while only being duped by its facsimile.
This is also how politics and many human relationships also work now. There is no room to ponder complexity, subtlety, context, uncertainty. We just want those answers right now, presume they're 100% correct, and can move on to consuming the next thing.
And to the points at the end, a lot of this is what Albert Borgmann in 1984 called "the device paradigm" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Device_paradigm). Once you see it, you cannot unsee it with every form of technology that surrounds us.
Thanks for the rec - going to check this out now!
Good point about the loss of the perception of what is sacred. But the claim that listening to a vinyl is more magical is a bit narrow if it doesn’t consider how the LP itself felt like a compressed version of what came before. To some people, downloading music already feels more sacred than streaming it instantly. Mechanism-wise, we aren’t so different from what came before. But we are moving faster.
Your interpretation of the de-sacralization of the El Greco implies that your reaction to it in a church would even now be a religious one. But isn't it true that presupposes that your interior world and that of the worshippers of El Greco's time would be the same to support that reaction? The painting has become an aesthetic object, not a religious one; your response, after all this time and after all the changes in the world and in the importance of religion, is of a museum goer in New York, not a
Interesting take, I‘ve never thought about it that way! Convenience culture seems at first like a helping hand, which makes everyday activities easier and more accessible. However, we tend to oversee the downsides and the longterm consequences, until they‘ve already taken place.
please come to London on your book tour!!
Thanks. This is the perfect opportunity to yell on top of our lungs EMBRACE STREET ARTTTTTTT
Adam: I thought you might be interested in the piece I wrote about quitting all social media forever 11 years ago:
https://sassone.wordpress.com/2014/08/13/thoughts-on-social-media/
reading "about looking" by berger currently and came to substack for a bit of a break, but lo and behold i can't escape him
That really resonates with Walter Benjamin’s concept of the ‘aura’ - and how it is diminished through mass production and changing contexts.
I dig this piece, Adam! It's relieving to see a discussion on the consequences of our technology. I've felt for a while now that the culture of the West -- particularly the US -- lionizes the idea of productivity. We gave up the friction of experience without considering what we were losing. Maybe the Ents were right: we are too hasty.
Reading this and a bunch of other works on this app helped me realize the root of all our woes in and with modern life is capitalism, it makes me more aware of a collective unconscious, it makes us more connected in my head, and my brain gets a kick out of noticing intricacy, or things it can peg as intricate🫶🏼
“Now I’m thinking of music. On the modern social media platform, the experience of watching video and listening to songs is all rolled into one. But why does it still feel more magical to pull a record out of its sleeve, place the needle, and listen to the gritty music emerge from a record player? It was more of a ritual, there was more meaning to interpret, and at the end of the day humans operate on meaning.” - have been thinking this exact sentiment for a while now! I’ve got an essay in the works wholly focussed on this but it’s lookin for a home perhaps outside of Substack — I may have to quote you there 📚
Always a pleasure reading your stuff Adam!
Reminds me of something Nicholas Carr wrote in his new book
"It has blurred the distinctions between categories of information—distinctions of form, register, sense, and importance—that the epistemic architecture of the analog era preserved and even accentuated. Content has collapsed, as our adoption of the drab, generic term content to refer to all forms of expression testifies. Everything now has to fit the internet’s conventions and protocols, with their stress on immediacy, novelty, multiplicity, interconnectedness, and above all efficiency."
The distinctions of form are part of the rituals. Putting on the record, going to the theatre, even going to blockbuster and making a movie choice." Now everything is just "content"