A San Francisco Museum Tackles Art's Instagram Dilemma
A woman held tightly her phone to her heart, the way a missionary might hold a Bible. She was anxious to take a picture of a stunning bouquet of flowers that sat not 10 ft away, but first she had to get through a crowd of others who were doing the same.
It’s amazing and also extremely Instagrammable, to the point that it has become a problem.
So the de Young responded with a kind of agreement: carving out “photo free” hours during the exhibition’s six-day run.
One common complaint in the ongoing debates over the effect of social media on museum culture is that people seem to be missing out on experiences because they are so busy collecting evidence of them. A study published in the journal Psychological Science suggests there is truth to this. It found that people who took photos of an exhibit rather than simply observing it had a harder time remembering what they saw.
If we removed social media and photography, she says, “we should risk becoming irrelevant”.
A.If this is a battle, signs indicate that the pro-phone crowd has already won. |
B.But rather than expressing frustration about this awkwardness, she said she felt guilty, as if she were the one challenging convention. |
C.In recent years, the de Young received more than a thousand complaints from people who felt that cell phones had spoiled their experience of the exhibit. |
D.The cause of this recent craze was Bouquets to Art, one of the most popular annual events at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. |
E.The truth is people like selfies more than the exhibits way beyond researchers' imagination. |
F.But the issue is complicated for the professionals running museums. |