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museums are for the people (right?)

I have always loved the Tate Modern in London. I haven't had the opportunity to visit in a while, but back when I had a real job, one of the perks was occassional business travel to cool places. On each London trip, I would make sure I had time to at least spend a few hours wandering through the seemingly endless galleries and soaking in Turbine Hall. There was something about the combination of architecture and accompanying art which made me feel both inspired and filled with almost juvenile awe. The space would force me to sit down to simply observe and exist. Thankfully, one of the most favorable aspects of the design of the Tate Modern is that there are plenty of places to do this, a feature often overlooked in contemporary museums it seems.

Though I have not been to the newly expanded MoMA specifically, I have found that the vast majority of the other art museums I have been to leave me feeling more annoyed than fulfilled. There is an air of superiority and imposed control which does much more to increase the distance between curator and visitor, teacher and student, 'educated' from 'uneducated', than to actually help experience the art, which is, afterall, what should be the mission of an art museum.

Roberta Smiths' astute comments do a much better job than my rambles at diving into this topic a bit more:

Tate Modern's Rightness vs. MoMA's Wrongs

There shouldn't be anything wrong with simply hanging out with art. The formality of intentional observation can sometimes be a distraction.