Re: Mechanical Brides

I'm so bad a recording proper references, but, I referred to the Andrea
Fraser piece in October (somewhere between issues 55-58) entitled "Museum
Highlights: A Gallery Talk."  It is the transcription of a performance piece
she did at the Philadelphia Museum of Fine Arts in 1989.  The work consisted
of her taking the role of a docent and leading a gallery talk.  What she
wanted to expose was the role of museums of 'educating' or enculturating
attendees.   She quotes old texts about the intent of patrons who funded
these institutions, such as:

"The Municipal Art Gallery 'that really serves its purpose gives an
opportunity for enjoying the highest privilieges of wealth and leisure to all
those people who have cultivated tastes but not the means of gratifying
them.'  And for those who have not yet cultivated taste, the muesuem will
provide 'a training in taste.'"  (pp 110)

At other points she appropriates 'critical' descriptions of works in the
museum guides and applies them to such things as water fountains, exit signs
and the cafeteria.

The text is substantially footnoted and provides a good deal of social
background to the formation and intent of museums.  What is unclear from the
text is if those she gave tours to were unaware that she was not an
'authentic' docent, or if those who 'attended' came explicitly for her
'performance.'

(two asides:  also in the issue is a piece by Scott Burkatman "There's Always
Tomorrowland: Disney and the Hypercinematic Experience" which predates
Sorkin's piece in Varitations on a Theme Park by a few years, and is an
excellent 'early' discussion of the Disneyfiacation of america.  And, it you
like the Fraser peice and have experience with academic theory conferences,
find "The V-Girls" in another October issue that I have no idea when it might
be.  Fraser and several others take the roles of feminist theorists in a
panel discussion.  It is an incredible 'satire' in that all the women on the
panel are 'feminist theorists' and they do indeed give a panel discussion.)

Dougals Crimp has a book length study called "On the Museums Ruins" which had
its origins in an article of the same name in "The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on
Postmodern Culture" Hal Foster, ed (Bay Press) and in a October 13.  Now, The
Anti-Aesthetic, in hip intellectual circles, has had its day (it was even
used as a prop in Linklater's _Slacker_ ), but is still an excellent reader.
 Crimp gives a brief discussion of the effect of photography on painting and
the advent of postmoderism in the work of Rauschenberg.  His framework is the
difficulty of identifying 'masterpieces,' in the age of mechanical
reproduction, which undermines the role of museums as the repository of
cultural icons and arbiter of distinctions of taste.

nic
subject907@xxxxxxx