Disney...museums & the 21st C
3/16/1998

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Sender: Museum discussion list MUSEUM-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM
Poster: "Robert A. Baron"
Subject: Re: Disney...museums & the 21st C
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Date: 3/16/1998

At 07:41 AM 3/16/98 -0800, D. Neil Bremer wrote:
>Robert A. Baron wrote:

>> Theme parks, never offer opportunity to question, doubt is not part of the
>> program, and indeed, they do whatever is necessary to insure that the
>> displays and events and rides are adjusted so that the visitor leaves with
>> an image that is uplifting and positive. Sour notes are not tolerated. To
>> appreciate being at a theme park the visitor may not question its premise.
>> Cynicism, scepticism and incredulity break the theme park's magic spell.

>And museum's don't?? A prominent art museum director, in Museum News,
>said that "Disney is the epitome of controlled response while museums,
>like great national parks, are places of discovery." Excuse me, museums
>AREN'T controlled response? You mean to tell me we do not tell everyone
>that these are temples of importance? You mean to tell me we do not tell
>society exactly WHAT is important by giving them the "choice" to see
>what WE exhibit next to labels only WE can read...for the sole purpose
>of letting them know this exhibit is important and somehow profoundly
>affects their existence?

Neil Bremer is correct in that many museums (leftovers from the past) still pass themselves off as elite institutions and crown themselves with self-importance. But, of course, this is part of the tradition. But Mr. Bremer misunderstands my point. Theme parks don't have the freedom to criticize or leave their patrons upset. Museums, more and more these days, do. And I'll use Mr. Bremer's own example from below to prove it: "Enola Gay." But there is a methodological problem in his criticism of what I said: I chose to compare what theme parks do best to what museums do best, while Mr. Bremer chose to bring in what museums do worst. Anyway, the feeling of belittlement that visitors often experience when they walk into museums -- not the feeling of being overwhelmed by the magnitude and capacity of the place -- may stem from a false response to the setting, a response conditioned by how society reports on museums. Listen to how the television news reports on art and art events. For them art is a social activity engaged in by people pretending to be superior and elite. They report on art cynically, conveying the impression that ordinary people can't, shouldn't and won't understand art. As far as I am concerned, that is their problem; it has nothing much to do with what is really going on in art--well, actually it does, but not in obvious ways. The above notwithstanding, I think it entirely appropriate that society design frames (here, museum architecture) which indicate how we feel about the material the building holds.

> >> Take for example that wonderfully conceived Disney "exhibit" "Pirates of
>> the Caribbean." I've read recently that the scenes of the pirates chasing
>> buxom women have been taken out and have been replaced with pirates chasing
>> people carrying food. It is true that originally the scene exhibited, and
>> therefore may have fostered (among some), stereotypes of relationships and
>> lust. But the entire drama to succeed must depend upon the ability of
>> visitors to relate to stereotypes and to fixed fictional ideas of how
>> people lived. The reason why the ride was changed to a more "politically
>> correct" version had nothing to do with correcting stereotypes; it had to
>> do with a change in public sensibility to the sensitivity of women.
>> Disneyland just didn't want to offend, indeed, its success is tied up in
>> its refusal to offend.
>> >I can only say...."Enola Gay"

I don't understand the point of bringing in the Enola Gay exhibit, here. Enola Gay was an exhibit in the Smithsonian; whether you agreed with its point or not, it was a serious effort to make a statement. Imagine the Enola gay exhibit in Disneyland. Impossible. To my mind, the fate of the Enola Gay exhibit goes to show that in the popular mind, sometimes there is little difference between theme parks and museums. Certainly those who had the exhibit closed were not open to having their fixed ideas challenged; they wanted the kind of uplifting experience normally found in theme parks. There is an added problem, of course; and that is that the Smithsonian is a "national" museum and therefore considered by many to be a vehicle for promulgating our national mythology; hence the Enola Gay difficulties.

> >> How interesting that in the
>> beginning Disneyland also had strict dress codes and, further, even refused
>> entry to anyone whom they felt wasn't properly presenting himself. This
>> translated to refusing entry to youths with beards, and later, forcing some
>> people to leave if Disney security thought them to be breaking the "mood"
>> of the park.

>Ask any number of visitors about the "mood" in a museum. I do not mean
>any highly interactive museums, just the more traditional ones. I think
>there is quite a bit of data to show a "mood" is created. Then ask how
>those traditional museums tolerate young children breaking that "mood"
>simply by being kids and making noise.

Now here we have a problem. I don't think that museum "mood" is created out of respect for the objects on display, but rather for the comfort of other museum patrons. We don't want children running up and down the galleries because the noise would be disturbing to people trying to concentrate on the works. There is also a need to respect the physical integrity of the works, so some level of decorum must be enforced. How do you feel when trying to read in a library and kids are making disturbing noises all around you.

>> At their heart, theme parks are dramatic entities while museums are
>> contemplative ones. Notwithstanding the fact that theme parks often borrow
>> from museums, and vice versa, and notwithstanding that the lines dividing
>> the two can get quite blurry these days, the major difference, as I see it,
>> is that museums ask their visitors to do a little work to make the exhibits
>> meaningful. They offer images of worlds that the observer must reconstruct
>> in his own mind to make real. Docents may help in this process, but
>> ultimately it is the observer who is responsible for his own benefit. He
>> may fail; and that is okay. While the museum attempts to be understood,
>> there is no requirement that it bow to the lowest common denominator.
>> >
>There's that "dumbing down" worry that keeps so may traditionalists
>awake at night. No one is saying to dumb down the content. I, for one,
>am not saying to turn museums into theme parks, I never did. What I am
>saying is that we must pay attention to the dialogue created by a museum
>experience. For too many years it has been a soliloquy on the part of
>museums. "This is important...understand it or keep coming back until
>you do...if that doesn't work...get out." Art and artifacts have
>stories. Those stories should be exhibited so that society can hold
>onto something with their FIRST visit, growing into a contemplative
>experience with actual works when they are ready. If the visitor is
>already savvy to a museum experience, they can jump right into the more
>scholarly level of engagement.

I'm certain that Mr. Bremer is describing a set of impressions that people sometimes take away from the museum experience. I'm happy to say that I never experienced anything like that. The great thing about museums (to my mind) is that you can take away as much or as little as you like. No one, not even the most sophisticated connoisseur comes away from a museum experience with everything possible to learn. At the same time there are good exhibits and bad ones, good labels and bad ones. I agree with Mr. Bremer that more can be done to make the museum experience accessible to visitors. But that will always be the case. Cultural and aesthetic artifacts are complex items. Many may indeed not be available to every museum visitor. If you watch people go through the art galleries you quickly learn that they stop at those objects that are accessible to them. Further, I agree with Gombrich who said that there is no wrong reason for liking a work of art, but there are lots of wrong reasons to dislike art.

Today museum visitorship is at an all-time high (in New York surpassing attendance at sporting events!); so I might be forgiven if I claim that in spite of it all, museums must be doing something right. It may be that they are borrowing techniques and technology from the theme park experience to help bring in the masses and to make the museum more accessible, and that is fine; but technology alone does not make the experience. However, some people on this list talk as if it does.

Robert Baron

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