In his essay “The World as Exhibition,” Timothy Mitchell detailed an epistemological exploration of representations of the Orient in relation to “the West” and found that “[w]hat they found in the West...were not just exhibitions of the world, but the ordering up of the world itself as an endless exhibition” (Mitchell 1989, 218). Through this exploration, Mitchell is essentially challenging the division between “a realm of mere representations and a realm of the real; exhibitions and an external reality; an order of mere models, descriptions, or copies and an order of the original” (236). Extending from Mitchell’s ideas, we examined the boundaries between art (representations) and life (reality).
Another traditional bifurcation particularly noticeable in a museum setting is the opposition of art and life. Museums house objects of art, not life, and even the event of visiting a museum is a departure from the daily grind of life for most people. The interaction between the arrangement of the exhibits, and the museum visitors upon whom our group gazed (quite intensely), however, challenges the boundary between the realms of art and life.
Baldessari himself was perhaps asserting a critique on this boundary: the first piece in the exhibit is one that documents where the exhibit has been before. The documentation is part of life- whether or not Baldessari chooses to display it, documentation of the work by this prolific artist is someone’s daily grind. But here it is also art- framed and hung high, protected from curious hands and for all art observers to see.
The gift shop is another instance of blurring the boundary between art and life. There were two gift shop areas near the Baldessari exhibit: one at the end of the exhibit, the other integrated into the main corridor of the second floor of the Metropolitan Museum. The latter is not a partitioned off area of merchandise; it was a few "islands" with replicas of Baldessari's works. There was not a clearly marked separation between the coffee mugs and canvas totes printed with Baldessari quotations, and a corridor inhabited by paintings by other master painters.
The souvenirs in the gift shop were also curious. Baldessari's conceptual art focuses on the concepts conveyed, rather than the material vehicles of these concepts. So if a mug is printed with "I will not make any more boring art," which is Baldessari’s concept, and thus Baldessari's art, then the mug is as proficient a vehicle as the medium Baldessari originally used. It is art. At the same time, even if the mug was never used to drink coffee, its form of a mug refers to one of the most quotidian morning routines of daily life. Also in the exhibits’ gift shop, a set of four red balls were sold with instructions for the museum visitors to take them home, throw them in the air, and take pictures of the red balls mid-air, following the style of many of the Baldessari works. The mug and the red balls extend Baldessari's work into the buyer’s life, making it hard to tell where life starts and art ends, and where art ends and life starts.
The people in the museum also challenged us to think about the boundary between art and life. For example, while the museum security guards refused to talk to us about their work or the artworks, they had conversations among themselves. We overheard one security guard complain to another about constant fatigue; his colleague then suggested that he drink some orange juice. Their utterances on mundane concerns of daily life mingled with the voices on the soundtracks from Baldessari's video artworks in the next room, as well as with the voices of museum tour guides explaining the significance of each piece in the exhibit. Our group couldn’t help noticing how in the interaction of all these voices, art and life blurred together.
We also interviewed several museum visitors. For some, visits to the art museum seemed motivated by an interest in the transcendental qualities of art, which was also part of their lives. The first person we interviewed was a tall man dressed in casual jeans and sneakers. When asked to talk about his museum experience, he responded that he was only there to accompany his friend, who has a passion for art. When asked if they were there specifically to see the Baldessari exhibit, he said yes, although his friend had made that decision. He said, "I don't know anything about modern art, or art really, but this seems interesting, and I would love to learn more about it... I am just here to hang out with my friend." When asked if his friend tells him things about art, he said, "Well, yeah, we talk about it."
Across the room, we interviewed this man’s friend. She was a petite woman dressed in a white wool coat, who revealed that she is an art professor and museum curator in France. When asked about her visit, she said that she came specifically for the Baldessari exhibit. "The art is [kisses fingers] exquisite!" said the art professor with French accent, “But the space is awful. It should have been...eh...it should have been shown in its original context." The woman then asked if one of our group members is an art student, to which she responded no. When asked about her trip, and she said that she came to New York to visit her friend, but will no doubt also visit the major art museums in New York.
Prior to approaching them for interviews, we observed this man and his friend, the art professor, from a distance. The two of them rarely conversed and often looked at different pieces. Both of them, on their own and in different paces, gazed at the pieces, read the text descriptions, and occasionally took a step back, gasping or sighing. The purpose of a visit to an art museum is usually for art, and both of them were absorbed by their appreciation of the pieces hanging on the walls. But for both this man and his friend, the art professor, observation and the appreciation of art also served a social function that allowed them to spend time with each other. The appreciation of art became a mode of connection in their friendship, so in each piece observed (and likely discussed later), and in each sigh of exhilaration, a social relationship between two art observers was established and maintained. The idea of "going to see art" gives structure to a visit with a friend. "Talking about it" later outside the museum extends the boundary of this exhibit into daily life.In short, for this man ad his friend the art professor, art and life are blurred together.
In our group’s observation, art and life co-exist in the pieces exhibited in the museum, in the souvenirs and reflections people can bring home from the museum and into their individual lives, and in the way people engage with the museum. Thus the boundary between art and life is blurred. For us, the question of "where does the exhibit end?" became unanswerable in a very real sense.
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