Museums will not vanish in the flood of technology. Even with the fast development of technology and increasingly various use of technology, the function of the museum will not be weakened. The museum is the palace of aesthetics, history and culture. It is the core node in the web of society, connecting the history and the future, connecting the progress of beauty, connecting the public and the privileged class.

“We live and think in interpretive communities, and ‘use’information represented in symbolic form so that we can build ‘cognitive maps’ in which meanings and values become interpretable.” The museum helps to form the symbolic meaning and decide what is beauty. It is an interface to the cultural aesthetic.

Wherever and whenever, Museums have their specific meanings.

1) A certain beauty in a certain environment

Just like what we have seen in the Hirshhorn Museum, Pickett’s Charge was installed  in America’s Capitol connects history back to present day, and brings time full circle, much like the shape of the Hirshhorn. It’s so big, which makes me feel like what it has described and depicted was just happened around me. Only by experiencing in the Hirshhorn Museum can we better learn the history and the meaning that it wants to convey.

Took in the field trip Andrea

https://hirshhorn.si.edu/exhibitions/mark-bradford-picketts-charge/

To this extent, the museum works as the interface to the history. The beauty of such a work can only be appreciate in such a museum. You can have a general view of works of Mark Bradford, however, you may not experience the carriage of history is coming.

2) Understand the artist through the dialogue created by the museum

This winter, I visited the Shanghai biennale. There is an oval hall, with 360 mechanical clocks arcing in a circle, each 4 seconds faster than the previous one, adding up to 24 hours a day. When I entered the bright hall, I could only hear the ticking of the second hand. There is a feeling of breaking into the future world. The oval exhibition hall not only shows the cycle of time, but also highlights the infinite elongation of time. Bright lights and white walls make visitors feel as if they are in a time tunnel and can feel the power of time.When I immerse yourself in the space field of clockwise, I could perceive a synchronicity of everything and a fluid modernity.

Took by Andrea

According to the artist Cristina Lucas , she focuses on dividing and ordering time, thus highlighting the spatialization and standardization of time. She is not telling the audience that time is fleeting, but trying to reveal the modernity and political nature of the rationalized “time” under the background of the development of the mechanical age and information age with this poetic visual expression.

The resonance between ordinary people and works of art is mostly derived from the intuitive visual experience. Seeing the original works in the art museum brings a touch that cannot be reached by reading books or looking at pictures.

3) an interface for the public  to the “uniqueness,” “authenticity,” and scarcity

Why do we visit the museum? To have a luxury experience and luxury enjoyment. Although without art we can still live in the society, we need art to educate ourselves. In the museum, we are the same regarless of our social status, race, gender, age. An ordinary person can have the same power to appreciate art as the richest person in the world. We even have more time and opportunities.

In the art museum, you can participate in a variety of Tours and activities. The instructors include the staff of the art museum, professors and students of the school. Under the guidance of these people, you can complete an art tour and get a lot of new knowledge and ideas.

You’ll also see a variety of children’s projects. Even a 4-year child can have an interesting art trip in the museum. Museum breaks the boundary. The museum allows the public to enjoy the art once only can be appreciated by the privileged class.

References:

• Martin Irvine  “Making an Interface”: on the next step: kinds of interfaces for artworks and how to design one.
• Beil, K. (2013). Seeing syntax: Google art project and the twenty-first-century period eye. Afterimage: The Journal of Media Arts and Cultural Criticism, 40(4), 22-27.
• Proctor, N. (2011). The google art project: A new generation of museums on the web? Curator: The Museum Journal, 54(2), 215-221.