Writing for the Guardian Unlimited Arts Blog, a rather crochety Nicholas Blincoe complains about the “infantalization” of British museums. He writes,
“I used to take pleasure visiting museums on trips around Britain, but now I am so clearly out-of-place: like Godzilla, a huge hulking man looming above the children. Our galleries and museums have been turned into playgrounds, with activity sheets and treasure trails, interactive video games and coloured signs that tell you about the exhibits in a few simple sentences, but nothing that an educated adult would not already know.”
Here’s the link to the article. What do you think? I appreciate it when museums have stuff for kids, in part because gallery activities and kid-friendly information in the galleries make visits more bearable for the whole family (and any hulking Godzillas who happen to be in the vicinity), but I agree that not everything needs to be turned into a cartoon character. And I love visiting what he calls “unmodernised museums: the museums that look like museums. I like them Victorian, cranky and encyclopedic,” (and so do my kids!) We promise not to swamp the place.
I have to wonder if this push to draw children into museums isn’t another side effect of the slow opening of the giant umbrella of consumer choice’s effect on traditional civic institutions.
I enjoy my didactic wall text, too. I get a thrill when I can visit the impressive Neo-Classical architecture and wide open, well-lit spaces filled with visual wonder and no scent of playground that is the museum archetype of my mind. The sad truth is that in the UK, funding for these institutions is beginning to dwindle as a cost-benefit analysis method of management (likely adopted from the US) is applied to NGO’s. US museums are becoming famous for their “edutainment”. Rather than bemoan this fact, it provides an opportunity for traditional museum visitors to recognize a mild symptom of an epidemic found in many non-profit organizations. Museums are simply shifting their programming to keep the numbers of visitors high so they don’t disappear into obscurity as an “outdated” form of cultural understanding. Many non-profit organizations have not been as adaptable as museums. Smaller, more site specific non-profits or non-profits that depend on specialized audiences or funding are becoming less and less capable of competing for the media-saturated young demographic. Why go to the symphony when you can go to the movies for less money? Museums are a complex community consisting of many stakeholders. This complex community of the museum parallels what society suffers in its chameleonic changes. Lucky (or unlucky as the case may be) for museums, this diversity in stakeholders provides many sources for monetary input. Thus, the net must be cast wider.
In that light, I think I can find a way to enjoy the toddler art corners and what-not. I prefer babies in the galleries to no museum at all.