Actually, yesterday I was in Philadelphia for a visit to the Barnes Foundation At The Barnes Collection (I wrote the first post while on the Bolt Bus coming back to NYC) and put up footage from my visit At The Barnes Foundation - 2 (I'm pretty lousy at making videos, I've decided - though some of the charm of taking video this way is it's authentic, which plays into Social Media, and the authenticity of unrehearsed conversations).
In a way, both Art and Analytics could use more Social Media - Art - Albert Barnes and the collection he formed don't really care much about what visitors want - they impose what and how you should see the work (that is not how social media works - but then, his ideas were formed 70-80 years ago).
In Web Analytics, we ought to have Social Media as part of our practice, but right now no one seems to know here Social Media belongs (is it in Communications, PR, Marketing, etc)? I've maintained, it ought to be in Web Analytics too, since there's a strong measurement component.
Anyway, back to my thoughts about The Barnes Collection.
I went to The Barnes Collection because I didn't go to LeWeb this year, or even Chicago Search Engine Strategies - figured I'd have visited Art in both places - and I wanted to give myself something different - even if it was just for a day.
A couple of things struck me about this visit - seeing the Barnes Collection is always a fantastic experience - but the "blinders" that Albert Barnes put on himself and required others to adopt to see his collection of masterpieces reminds me that often it's difficult to appreciate many things without knowing the background of why something is done a certain way. It reminds me that the same "theories" and "blinders" exist in all realms, including Analytics - sometimes we have to get past some "dogma" in order to see things for yourself and make a decision on what works and doesn't, regardless of what any authority says.
But, If there's anything I've learned in my life - it's to not trust authority too much - it's precisely that - which doesn't survive - today few care about Albert Barnes theories on how paintings ought to be arranged on a wall (any more than we really care what theories the Impressions and Pre impressionists used to arrange the colors in their paintings and outdoor studies- what they care more about is the actual paintings themselves and their authenticity of experience - many which are hard to see, well, in the cramped mansion where they remain.
One of my favorite paintings at the Barnes is this Toulouse Lautrec though it's hard to see it well with all the other work cluttered around it - again, because Barnes wanted it that way.
Of the many Cezanne's in the Barnes Collection - few which there are an image on line I can pull - this one stands out of Mont St. Victorie - from a view similar to where I walked last year when I visited Aix.
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Both the Largest Georges Seurat painting he ever painted (but placed too high up on the wall to see up close) where most of the fine brushwork could be seen, but can't at distance of 15 feet away at closest view) and the Large Cezanne Card Players painting (Not shown here for there is no web image of it I can grab)
In this case, I can actually enjoy the painting better from this image I posted on the Web, than I can, in person.
What I wanted to convey in this post is that it's important (and I tell this to myself not often enough) to see past theories - to see things for yourself, form your own opinions about what works and what doesn't - not because someone else thinks it should be this way or that way.
Sure, it's Albert Barnes collection of paintings and he could do whatever he wanted with the paintings - including putting them in poorly lit mansion and making it really hard to get in to see the collection (you have to buy tickets in advance and go up to Marion to see the collection). Unfortunately, when the paintings move to Philadelphia in 2012, the paintings may be much better lit, but the wall arrangements will be duplicated exactly as they are, today.
At the Barnes Collection there's Matisse Murals that were done near the ceilings of the main hall - Henri-Matisse came to the Barnes Mansion in Marion, PA, in 1931 to supervise the installation of his murals and make notes as well as study Albert Barnes fantastic collection of art (he ran a school from the collection and the school still operates, today).
The Art School at the Barnes doesn't really interest me - nor do the theories really work - nor do the Matisse Murals work for me - yes, I see what he was trying to do - but it didn't work. The funny thing about theories, like why the walls at the Barnes are arraigned the way they are - is the work starts looking better once you hear what the arrangement is supposed to do - but that arrangement is imposed from without.
There were many other ways to hang that collection that would have worked better - but no one was listening. At one one time, that would have worked and did work for alot of people.
But today, it's different. Because of Social Media and the Internet - the bar has been raised quite a bit - and I wrote about it the other day in a post on how The Web and Social Media speeds up choice.
Now people want to be engaged with the content - Social Media for Engagement - for the most part, what theories people have/had, don't really matter, today, any more than Albert Durer's absolute measurements for human proportions really matter - maybe the Golden Mean of human proportions mattered to the Artist -500 years ago, and maybe they even help some people who will study the ideas mentioned above and then look at the works cited above, again.
But for the most part, you should not need to have to fully adopt a "blinder" or "filter" to understand and appreciate anything - the work ought to stand on it's own.
The fact that I needed to "learn" about the wall arrangement paradigm to fully appreciate the paintings on the wall at The Barnes Collection - I view as something of an obstacle to enjoyment - something that people would have accepted 70 years ago - but doesn't work today - because we've changed - humanity has been "growing up".
And we need to factor that into all our Brand Communications - we need two way conversations - the ability to have opinions and someone who will listen to them.
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