Pet Peeve

(As you might have been able to tell, not alliteration.)

When people get all up in my grill at museums.

I love museums. Some find them static. I just find myself getting worked up (in a good way). Unless the people around me have bad museum manners.

Bad museum manners are often born out of wanting to have good museum manners. If you're exploring marble hall after marble hall, you don't want to lose your cultured companion. You can't rely on a cell phone to reunite you. Cell phones are very bad for museum manners. (Duh.) So you stick close. Too close.

There's also the dilemma of how much time to spend at which works. You don't want your cultured companion(s) to think you unappreciative of art, historical documents, old buildings. Solution: Lurk slightly behind, tuning in to how interested they are. Keep them in your peripheral vision, so you know when you can move on (not too quickly or obviously after they have). To appear learned, be sure to give more time to the works by famous artists (Caitlin's default museum = art museum). To appear alternative, pay attention to the obscure.

It seems to me that this self-conscious tagging-along method of museum-going happens most often when you're with people you don't know super well. It's awkward, and irritating. Class visits to museums can, if you're not with the right class, be exponentially more frustrating. They breed a chain of shuffling and breathing down necks to read the next plaque on the wall.

Today for my Art in Czech Lands class, we visited the Stone Bell House, a part of the City Gallery of Prague. The professor spoke which was fine because I love him and he gave us some context (which may or may not be all that important, but that is a discussion for another time). But of course, silly museum group dynamics ensued. Some people comment just to comment. Some speak just to appear arty and wise. Etc.

Even so, it was very cool. The building was in many ways still authentically Gothic (rare). And the exhibition we saw was from the Prinzhorn Collection. The works were all done by 'the mentally ill,' and were absolutely fascinating. I would say more about them, but I need a revisit, and, being visual works of art, they largely speak for themselves. [See above: Bitten by Johann Knopf.]

So please don't drown them out; don't speak for the paint, the pottery, with a lean, a thoughtful frown, an artistic vocabulary. Just let them state their own cases. Just let me look. Mind your museum manners.