Has anyone ever written a book about small talk between random people while traveling? If not: between my encounters with a Dutch politician who lectured me on the need for Americans to depose the Bush administration and the sheer pandemonium I caused with three Scottish men when I innocently questioned, “But isn’t Scottish the same as English?”, I think there may be a fantastic book proposal in my future (Copyright © 20XX Meg!)! Outwardly a lackluster example in comparison with the Dutch don and Scottish diehards though equally noteworthy for me, I met a businesswoman from Philadelphia in August on a flight back from Mississippi. We exchanged standard pleasantries, which included her asking if I had visited the art venues in Philadelphia. “Unfortunately, no” was my reply. Then she proceeded to tell me about the city’s museums, centers, and galleries. Of course, this meant she sufficiently peaked my curiosity about this “Philadelphia” place.
Fast-forward a month and half: Speaking of quotes in seminar this past week, I love this statement from William Pickens: “Living together is an art.” Indeed it is, and, concurrently, art is capable of fostering collectivity, open-mindedness, and awareness—all valuable qualities for peaceful cohabitation. With aesthetics and society being so mutually dependent, no wonder museum studies frequently concentrate on the relationship between museums and the community. In “Mastering Civic Engagement,” Ellen Hirzy writes,
Civic engagement occurs when museum and community intersect…. The museum becomes a center where people gather to meet and converse, a place that celebrates the richness of individual and collective experience, and a participant in collaborative problem solving. It is an active, visible player in civic life, a safe haven, and a trusted incubation of change…. (9)
Wanting to conduct my own case study on civic engagement, I thought back on my informant from the airplane and chose Philadelphia.
Handily, Randy Kennedy wrote the article “Art to Make You Laugh (and Cry)” about Philadelphia last month in the New York Times. He described the Philadelphian artistic ethos as a “hardy, low-budget, do-it-yourself, do-it-for-love creativeness,” and he showcased several art institutions throughout the city, a great starting point. First, the Museum of Mourning Art resides in a cemetery and contains a local collection of art as quirky as the name implies: relics from over the last century that together create narratives about death, grief, and remembrance. The Fabric Workshop and Museum serves to expose locals to both the importance of and trends in contemporary art, and they enjoy a distinctive collection of 25 years of accumulated works from artists who have benefited from the organization’s residency program. Another venue—Fluxspace—also offers local artists and curators lodging facilities along with exhibition room for “unrestricted and uncensored experimentation,” which they may not find in other areas of Philadelphia. Then there is the Mural Arts Program, which boasts the designation of “the nation’s largest public arts initiatives of its kind.” The epitome of an institution implanted in civic engagement, the Program provides work for hundreds of artists, fashions murals to exhibit the varying strains of culture in Philadelphia’s neighborhoods, and binds its aesthetic tasks with tasks of other local institutions striving to thrust community development. Kennedy goes even further with details about the Fleisher/Ollman Gallery and Pifas (Philadelphia Institute for Advanced Study), but his journey through Philadelphia’s art scene only skims the surface! The city also harbors local artist spaces like Supermarket, Space 1026, Philadelphia Open Studio Tours, and the Artists’ House Gallery. This list could go on and on, especially if including traditional museums like the acclaimed Philadelphia Museum of Art.
What binds all these institutions together is one pervasive force, and that force is the community. In 2002, Christine Pfister, the Pentimenti Galleries director, said "I have seen major growth of Philadelphia's art scene during the past 10 years, both in terms of the number of artists and in the number of sales." Subsequently, she notes, "The
community here is very vibrant." In a New York Times article from 2006, journalist Steven Stern identifies Philadelphia as a relief from “overheated scenes, unwelcoming galleries and the economy of the latest thing” by instead offering a “community of generosity.” Likewise, the aforementioned Kennedy weaves in and out of the Philadelphian art scene, noting the peculiarities of the city scene along the way. Conclusion? The art scene can denote the joie de vivre in the community, display the character of a community, and organically intertwine with other facets of community life. Perhaps it is also profitable to view the relationship between communities and their museums in the same way John H. Falk and Lynn D. Dierking propose to study ‘learning’ in museums: “holistically” (9)Call me naïve in terms of American art scenes, call me romantic in my reverence for institutions that heavily emphasize community, but I am impressed with Philadelphia. Now I feel that old familiar itch—the travel bug.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HMU/is_7_29/ai_88577422/
http://travel2.nytimes.com/2006/11/19/travel/tmagazine/19liberal.html
No comments:
Post a Comment