Rules for Going to an Art Museum
Sun_Fortune
1,374 Posts
1. Shut Up. If you have to talk, do so in low tones. It is not necessary to tell your companions the little bit of art history you remember from the requirement survey course in college.2. If you are not interested in art or the artist, don't go.3. Do not buy those audio tours. 4. Do not discuss content -- its obvious green is a symbol for sickness and red for sexual desire, but shut up and look.5. Do not walk in front of someone who is examining a painting, get right up to the canvas, give it a quick cursory glance then examine the placard and walk away. 6. Do not stop in front of each painting for ten seconds and take a picture of each as you go.7. Do not wear a really fragrant cologne or perfume.8. Do not walk four to a group and then idle, for no reason, by a passage way.9. Be courteous and respectful to those who are examining a painting.10. Shut UP!This comes from a terrible afternoon yesterday at the MoMa to see the Munch show. That museum has jumped the shark.
Comments
Enjoy yourself! It's only art.
I have been to some great museums, but nothing is more fun than watching crazy ass people.
in the case of munch, the art is not about enjoying yourself. Dont get me wrong, Ive been to a lot of fun art shows with djs and and shit like that, but spending 17.50 and a whole Sunday to look at my favorite painter and not be able to enjoy his works due to the stampede of phillistines, well, there you have it.
I went the opening of the new MOMA and the space is incredible. But I woundn't think of going now. It's still too fuckin' crowded w/ goofy tourists.
More RULEs
Point w/ your chin and nose, not your fingers.
Turn off your damn cellphone ringer.
Beware where and when you use that word. There are some folks that may whoop on someone for using "Philistine" to insult.
On a different note:
My first date with my former girlfriend of 2 years was at the Andy Warhol art exhibit in LA. it only took us 45 minutes to get asked to leave. For some reason you are not allowed to jump straight up and down. I still don't realy understand why. Just thought they were being way to stuffy. Hard to take a wall of oxidation urine art and give it the quiet respect some may think it deserves
You're lucky you were allowed to stay that long
now thats a show to have fun at. You were right. that was a cool show too.
waddya mean about "philistine?" I used it as an insult. As a certain russian might say, "a philistine burps and then says excuse me."
I hear ya. I just enjoy going to free museums and galleries, to be honest, and DC is awesome for that.
Personally, I also enjoy standing in front of a piece and having my pic taken, as well as discussing things in a "inside voice". After all, it's a social space.
in arabic the word Palestinian translates in "Philistine".
When I used to have a video editing company with a Palestinian it was a word used to describe family. Kind of took me back when I first heard it in a non-deragatory sense.
i think the word traces back to either ancient greece, israel or rome, i forget. the Philstines were an invading horde at the time, and apparnetly not too keen on the finer things.
Anyways, People at art shows should be allowed to move about just as long as they don't destroy paintings or any other art. People shouldn't take something as leisurely (sp?) as going to an art useum all that serious, kinda kills the idea of having fun/ enjoying yourself.
Art taken from Jewish families during the Holocaust has just been returned to its proper owner and is about to go on display in Los Angeles at MoCA.
I'll be there and, unfortunately, I won't be hopping throughout the building
Phil??is??tine P Pronunciation Key (fl-stn, f-lstn, -tn)
n.
A member of an Aegean people who settled ancient Philistia around the 12th century B.C.
A smug, ignorant, especially middle-class person who is regarded as being indifferent or antagonistic to artistic and cultural values.
One who lacks knowledge in a specific area.
adj.
Of or relating to ancient Philistia.
often philistine Boorish; barbarous: ???our plastic, violent culture, with its philistine tastes and hunger for novelty??? (Lloyd Rose).
[From Middle English Philistines, Philistines, from Late Latin Philistn, from Greek Philistnoi, from Hebrew Plit??m, from Pleet Philistia.]
Word History: It has never been good to be a Philistine. In the Bible Samson, Saul, and David helped bring the Philistines into prominence because they were such prominent opponents. Though the Philistines have long since disappeared, their name has lived on in the Hebrew Scriptures. The English name for them, Philistines, which goes back through Late Latin and Greek to Hebrew, is first found in Middle English, where Philistiens, the ancestor of our word, is recorded in a work composed before 1325. Beginning in the 17th century philistine was used as a common noun, usually in the plural, to refer to various groups considered the enemy, such as literary critics. In Germany in the same century it is said that in a memorial at Jena for a student killed in a town-gown quarrel, the minister preached a sermon from the text ???Philister ??ber dir Simson! [The Philistines be upon thee, Samson!],??? the words of Delilah to Samson after she attempted to render him powerless before his Philistine enemies. From this usage it is said that German students came to use Philister, the German equivalent of Philistine, to denote nonstudents and hence uncultured or materialistic people. Both usages were picked up in English in the early 19th century.
And remember, only philistines go to the museums on weekends.
#1 - Don't go to the fucking in MOMA in NYC on a weekend.
sorry dude, but it's one of the most prominent tourist spots in nyc. tourists run mid-town on the weekend.
try back again on Tuesday for a better experience.
but...to add to your list (and my favorite thing to overhear at museums)
"my kid could draw something like that.."
taken from the Ft Worth Moma grand opening - Cy Twombly apparently is no more talented than this Soccer mom's punk ass 7 yr old.
from Nabokov:
"A philistine is a full-grown person whose interests are of a material and commonplace nature, and whose mentality is formed on the stock ideas and conventional ideals of his or her group and time. I have said 'full grown person' because the child or the adolescent who may look like a small philistine is only a parrot mimicking the ways of the confimred vulgarians, and it is easier to be a parrot than to be a heron. 'Vulgarain' is more or less synonymous with 'philistine': the stress in a vulgarina is not so much on the conventionalism of a philistine as on the vulgarity of his conventional notions. I may use the terms genteel and bourgeuois. Genteel implies a lace-curtain refined vulgarity which is worse than simple coarsness. To burp in company may be rude, to be say 'excuse me' after a burp is genteel and thus worse than vulgar. The term bourgeois I use following Flaubert, not Marx. Bourgeois in Flaubert's sense is a state of mind, not a state of pocket. A bourgrois is a smug philistine, a dignified vulgarian."
if it were'nt for the raer factor, this would describe a lot of folks on this board.
I don't get this at all. Manners are totally relative.
So am I a philistine because I eat yellow mustard?
From my interpretation, it isn't abot manners. In western society, burping is foul. I know in some cultures, it can mean any number of posistive things. And I respect that. But its really a bit foul. And it is something you can control. So, to burp, knowing that you are expelling something unpleasant and something that draws attention to itself in a childish way, and then to apologize for it afterword is not a good look. Im not saying, you cant burp when it might be really funny. But when Im just sitting around, and this dude burps after every sip of beer, and is like "'scuse me'" in a sarcastic way, that is a bit eh.
the only way you could get any more dorm art would be to attend a toulouse latrec / klimnt double whammy
its like complaining there are too many tourists gauking at the mona lisa
hot damn! I agree Munch has a huge dorm art contingent/fan club. But this was a giant collection of over eighty of his paintings and a bunch of prints and sketches. I had only seen the occasional print and lesser work in person.
I will be going back on a weekday when I can find the time, but I wanted to go with my girlie, and she works works.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5160093
for a huge David Hockney show (whom I couldn't really care less
about, but went to hang with the family...) and many
of your "rules" were crossing my mind. The terds with the
audio tour headphones and the jackasses who walk right in front
of you while you are looking at a painting seem to be connected -
sometimes I think those narrations are telling them, "be sure
to step directly in front of everyone and get as close to the
painting as possible..."
When I don't go with the family and it's something I actually care about,
I just try to go on the off-hours, like a weekday afternoon when
the tourist hordes are back in the suburbs picking up the kids
at soccer.
So can anyone who has ever got one of the audio tours tell me
if my thepry is correct, and it really just tells you what it
says on the placards, so you don't have to read them??
I had a really enjoyable time and learned a lot having my girlfriend explain things to me when I was at the Uffizi and Academia a couple weeks ago.
-people dont understand why you cant bring food and beverages into the galleries. leave that shit at home.
-touching the artwork. i have seen this more times than i want to admit. (when i worked at the warhol museum i watched a woman slide her hand all the way across "the last supper, two times" the piece is about 20 feet long.
-museum stores. aside from books and prints the amount of crap they sell is rediculous.
-weekend crowds. It is so loud in the museum that i have to leave during my breaks just for some peace of mind. i dont understand how anyone enjoys artwork when you are practically elbow to elbow with people, most of whom could care less about whats hanging in front of them.
-members. just because you buy a pass once a year, does not mean you own the museum. Keep it at the country club.
Went to see an exhibition of Peter Blake's new work a couple of years ago and, I think fairly, pointed out to my girl that he was rehashing old ideas without bringing anything new or interesting to them before turning round and seeing him standing next to me.
The Louvre was worst of all. We went there during the day and it was hell, then went back at night (friday) and it was free entry for under 26's and the unemployed.
Completely different atmosphere. People actually went to look at art, not because their tour book said it's a must see.
The best was the Musee D'Orsay in Madrid. A level of Picasso, a level of Dali, then a level of random modern stuff.
Another rule is just because you're in a tour group doesn't mean you're not responsible for your individual actions.
I can appreciate these rules more than Sun Fortune's. His whole "shut up" thing is kinda