According to the tutorial, I found that the original topic covered such a wide range of areas that it was hard to read the research objectives clearly into the subject. For example, the social contract can cover many kinds of behaviour in an art museum. However, it is unclear from this that my research is mainly about those who take photos “with” artworks in museums and influence other visitors.
When trying to re-arrange all the thoughts and information into it, the topic becomes like “How can the action of intrusive multiple photo-taking behavior in gallery spaces be explored to minimize disruption and distraction for art spectators in Asian art spaces?”. However, “be explored” means that I will continue to delve into the behaviour of those who take pictures in the museums, where my motives and further directions are not visible. Also, it’s a bit complicated that when I asked people around me if they could understand it, they all said it would take time.
Therefore, in order to shorten the question and make it more accurate, through the discussion during the tutorial. “How can photo-taking visitors to Asian art galleries be aware of the impact of their behavior on art spectators?” be recommended. However, I found that the big group I wanted to explore were Asians rather than art galleries in Asia, because these people who love to taking photographs can do so anywhere around the world. People usually see this phenomenon more often in Asian galleries because there are more Asians there. Finally, I modified it to “How can Asian photo-taking visitors to contemporary gallery spaces be aware of the impact of their behavior on art spectators?”
Standard exploration of the social contract and in-depth analysis of visitor perspective in art museum
As a result of the last tutorial, I was advised to try to find out the criteria for social contracts in museums. I wanted to explore what the standards were and how visitors reacted and really felt when they were disturbed by someone. Do they express this directly or do they look annoyed?
In order to be more intuitive and allow the stakeholder to actually participate in the situation, to get the most realistic feedback. I decided to play the role of taking selfies with the artwork in front of people who were seriously looking at the exhibition, to see how they reacted and to get their opinion afterwards.
When I simulated the photo taker trying to disturb people, most people simply walked away to see the next piece. When I stood in front of a painting that someone was already looking at, they also chose to leave and no one came up to stop me.
After that I interviewed a total of seven people who had seen what I was doing. As usual, I first asked them if they usually took photos in exhibitions and if they took photos with the exhibits. If yes, what is the purpose? If not, why not? Then I asked them what they thought when they saw me using the museum as a photo booth. And What else did they think was inappropriate and might affect them in the museum?
Most of the respondents were not people who like to take photos with artworks, but some of them would occasionally take out their mobile phones to take photos of their favourite pieces. When I asked why they didn’t take photos with the artwork, some replied that they thought it was weird, some replied that they didn’t need to because they didn’t have requirements like sharing it with others, and some thought that they came to the museum to enjoy the art atmosphere and that they wouldn’t be able to do so if they kept taking photos. Others felt that they came to the museum to learn from the artworks, to understand one piece and then move on to another and that there was no need to take photos unless they felt the need to record them to check them out then.
Moreover, when I asked what they thought of people who used the museum as a studio or did what I just did, most of them said they understood because nowadays, with the development of social media, they would respect it even if some of them didn’t like it. I then asked curiously what kind of behaviour would they find unacceptable. Is there a standard? They answered, for example, if they want to see a piece of artwork and someone keeps getting in the way, they would find it disturbing. Others said that a few people taking pictures quietly was acceptable, but too many people taking pictures would spoil the atmosphere of the exhibition.
There are a few people who took photos with the exhibits said they wouldn’t take photos in a normal exhibition, but they had taken photos with famous paintings before and they did feel a bit disturbed by my action, they said they would try to take fewer photos next time or take them as soon as possible without blocking others.
In addition, I also asked what other behaviours they thought were inappropriate in a museum and the answers were bringing food indoors, drinking, talking too loudly, not keeping a proper distance from others, etc. I also asked them what their ideal museum environment would be and most of them thought it would be a place where people take their time to look at the works, a quiet and tranquil space, appropriate privacy and a distance between people.
//Reflective report//
One of the important points I discovered from this intervention is that whether people take photographs or not seems to depend on whether there is value in doing so. If they think it’s worth taking a photo, perhaps of a famous artist’s work, etc., they will take it. This explains why there aren’t many people taking photos in ordinary art museums, but people at the Van Gogh exhibition are taking photos with their mobile phones. And if the photograph is useful afterwards, that is, if it has a purpose, then people like to take photographs, for example, to share on social media, to do research, to gather inspiration for their work, and so on.
So why do some people have these specific needs and others don’t? And why do some people find an exhibition ‘worth photographing’ and others don’t? Since the intervention was aimed at people from Western countries, as I had originally observed, most of them did not take photographs with the exhibits. If we divide the visitors into those who like to take pictures with the exhibits and those who don’t like them but simply to experience the artworks, next time I will look for those who like to take pictures and find out what they want and why.
To summarise previous research, it is clear that in the early days, many museums banned photography due to possible damage to artefacts, copyright issues, bottlenecks and traffic jams… etc. It was also thought that this was to increase the sales of souvenir shops.
Nevertheless, with the development of social media platforms, the restriction of photography has caused much discontent among the public. As a result, most museums are now open to general photography for personal, non-commercial use, as long as visitors do not record, or use flash, tripods, self-timer or other assistive devices.
However, it is often difficult to effectively restrain selfish visitors by relying solely on written regulations and the social contract of the general public. There are still many accidents, such as damaging artworks in order to take photos, or, more often than not, blocking aisles and causing inconvenience to others. Including the results of a previous survey, more than half of the people felt that taking photos or selfies with the exhibits in the museum would ruin their visiting experience.
In order to strike a balance between personal benefits and the visiting experience, there are several suitable ways for different museums. Depending on the different situations and themes of the exhibition, museums have their own way to adopt.
In addition, another way is to guide and encourage people to follow the social contract. It was also been mentioned in the 21st July tutorial, I think I can try to understand more about the thoughts of stakeholders. What do they really want from the exhibition? and what people think is the standard of the social contract? Therefore, my next step is to reach out to the stakeholder in more depth to get the most realistic view of them.
The Van Gogh Museum is located in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The museum is by appointment only and usually has to book a few days in advance to enter the museum. As soon as I entered the ground floor of the gallery, I was shocked by the number of people taking photos, which was different from any other exhibition I had seen before, probably because the artists were so famous.
Not only did many people take pictures of each painting with their mobile phones or professional cameras, but many visitors also queued up to take photos and selfies with the exhibition. However, instead of crowding in front of the paintings, they lined up at the photo wall to take pictures. A photo wall was set up on each floor of the exhibition, based on the most famous works on each floor.
This way not only satisfies the desire of visitors to take photographs but also effectively enhances the atmosphere of the exhibition and avoids crowding in the aisles. I think this approach is suitable for exhibitions with a clear theme, or even to encourage participants to post photos taken on the photo wall as a trend to guide people to take photos in the right places, or to help the museum attract more interested visitors with online promotion.
Sir John Soane’s Museum is a relatively small museum, but there are many valuable exhibits and heritage items inside. Is one of the greatest English architects, who built and lived in it two centuries ago. Because of the narrow space inside, the staff started giving out transparent plastic bags to everyone outside. We were asked to load everything in and were specifically instructed not to record but the photo is acceptable.
I found that everyone was very quiet and serious when they went in, and although there were no other staff to watch over them, they did not take anything out of the bags. I think that dictation to visitors at the entrance of the exhibition hall would be one of the effective ways to enhance the social contract in the museum. Moreover, the provision of plastic bags also effectively keeps visitors’ belongings from touching the artwork. Maybe small museums that do not have as many visitors can learn from this approach to effectively improve the quality of their visiting experience.
After the first intervention, I discussed the process and feedback with a professional curator. We agreed that it was unlikely that we could completely change a person’s habits and behaviours, but with some slogans we could try to guide and remind them, to prevent other participants’ experiences from being ruined in advance.
I am also curious about what curators usually do to help enhance the visitor’s experience. He said that different exhibitions have different approaches, for example, some have interactive installations to allow visitors to immerse themselves in the exhibition, while others have static olfactory and tactile experiences to give visitors more than just a visual experience. He suggested that I should go to more art exhibitions of different nature to see how they improve the experience and atmosphere in the exhibition.
After the last study, I found that there are many differences in the behaviour of photographers at the exhibition. This time I have tried to change the behaviour of ‘taking pictures with exhibits in museums’, which most people are more concerned about according to the previous research.
“How can we refine the social contract around contemporary gallery spaces?”
Nowadays, people go to art galleries or exhibitions just to take pictures and post them on social media, rather than being interested in the artworks or seeing the exhibitions. These actions interfere with other visitors who want to enjoy the art space. Therefore, to raise their awareness of the social contract, my intervention was to hold up a board with the sarcastic slogan “People looking at the exhibition, please don’t disturb the people taking photos” and stand at the entrance to the exhibition for about 20 minutes. Some people stopped to read it, others just passed by.
Then I interviewed those who had read the slogan. I started by asking them, are you people who like to take pictures with the artworks in the museum? I found that those who enjoyed taking photos with the exhibits did not see these actions as a problem and were not affected by the slogans. Sarcasm is a relatively strong expression and some of the subjects felt it was inappropriate. However, those who don’t normally take photos of exhibitions generally found these behaviours annoying and agreed with the slogans.
It seems difficult to change people’s minds, so I am thinking of changing another way, such as encouraging them, and I will need to read more about how to raise people’s awareness of the social contract.
A survey was conducted by asking 80 people who often visit art museums or exhibitions. The participants came from five different nations which are China, UK, Thailand, Brazil and Russia. The purpose of this questionnaire is to assess personal preferences and experiences in museums.
The online questionnaire was collected from a total of 80 participants via the Google Survey platform from the 8th to the 15th of June. There are 68% of females and 32% of males, between 22 to 32 years old.
In order to obtain the obvious amount of quantitive data, the below questions are designed in just a few options and in a straightforward way to make it easier for subjects to answer efficiently.
Gender/ Nation/ Age
Do you usually like to take photos in museums?
Do you feel disturbed when someone takes photos with the artworks or selfies in the museum?
What usually attracts you to an exhibition? (Multiple)
According to the research result, there are 57.5% of participants like to take photos in the museum, and 42.5% don’t like it. However, there are nearly two-thirds of people(65%) felt that when someone takes photos with the artworks or selfies in the museum was disturbing to them.
In addition, the research also observes that the major reason for attracting people to visit the art museum or exhibition is to enjoy the art atmosphere, and the second one is to gain inspiration.
//Reflective report//
In order to quickly get a broad understanding of what the stakeholders think, the questions were not designed with enough detail and precision. For instance, I discovered that more than half of the participants like to take photos in museums, but at the same time, many of them feel that taking selfies at exhibitions is annoying. This made me realize that there are many different ways of taking photos in an exhibition and that perhaps most people are accepting of taking pictures of the works with their phones as documenting them but not posing in front of the exhibits or taking selfies. Next time I would like to investigate that different behaviour in more detail.
Moreover, as the data on Asians is still more readily available to me, the majority of the subjects in this questionnaire were from China and Taiwan. This may have resulted in a lack of diversity in the questionnaire respondents. Perhaps next time I should try another way to get more ideas from people in different parts of the world.
On this field trip, I had planned to interview people who were posing with the artworks and behaving in an exaggerated manner, but instead of seeing disrespectful photographers, I saw mostly Westerners who were carefully looking at the exhibition and reading the information cards next to the works. They looked so serious that I didn’t bother them. However, I noticed that most of the people who enjoyed taking photos with the works were Asian, a phenomenon that is obviously more common in Asia countries. As Western countries have been educated in art and culture earlier, art has been integrated into their lives and has become a normal thing. On the contrary, Asians tend to think of art as a rare and precious thing, and therefore want to take photographs to document and have a record of it. Although I did not see anyone taking photos with the artworks in this exhibition, I did see people taking photos of the artworks with their mobile phones to record them, and most of these people were Asian.
Moreover, I find that the act is not so absolute. Some people may seem to be taking pictures of the artwork, but they may go home and review each work and its information. So the question is, How do we know if someone respects art or not? For example, it’s common (especially in Asia) to see people who post photos of an exhibition on social media saying they love it, but end up spelling the artist’s name wrong, or happily smiling and taking photos with the exhibits in a serious exhibition theme, or using the museum as a photo booth for their own outfit photos, etc. We can see that the reason they go to an exhibition is not only to learn about the artworks. However, taking photographs is only one of the manifestations of disrespect for art, copying and destroying artworks can also be regarded as disrespectful behaviour. The root of the problem is not whether to take pictures or not, but whether to respect art from the bottom of one’s heart. Yet, taking pictures does not mean that one does not respect art. People can take pictures in many different ways, and there are many invisible parts. It all depends on the real attitude of the person, which is not standardized, varies from person to person and can change from time to time.
How can the artwork in exhibition earn more respect?
WHAT
Photographing and selfies in the art museum have increasingly become a cultural phenomenon in recent years. However, a large proportion of people go to art galleries or exhibitions just for taking pictures to post on social media, rather than being interested in the artworks or wanting to learn about them. Apparently, museums are no longer a place to see art or exhibits, but a place to create identity materials for Instagram posts. The two main motivations for taking photographs in museums are as a building material for self-identity and as an art form in its own right (Theopisti, 2017). Consequently, the research examines how attitudes and opportunities have changed in relation to this phenomenon.
WHY
The intention of the self-business program in establish a comprehensive concept store based on a contemporary fashion select shop combined with an art space inside. It will conduct exhibitions by cooperating with different artists in each period to assist lesser-known artists in having a performance space to exhibit their work. Therefore, this change is entirely meaningful to me that only by creating an environment that respects art and artists, that I can be qualified to operate such a space. Moreover, through talking with those who love arts and often went to the museum, I have observed that people who really want to understand the exhibition are bothered by this behaviour. Furthermore, the artists are unable to effectively communicate their ideas to the audience. This process results in the artwork becoming a photo set, which has lost its essential meaning.
HOW
After reviewing one of the early intervention examples it inspired me to use sarcastic ways to convey this idea as an exhibition. Sarcasm leads to clearer and more creative thinking (Francesc, 2015). There will be some blank paintings (white and black canvas) and also the green ones hung on the wall at the exhibition, as a sign of irony that shows those who take pictures at the exhibition have no concern for what they see, in their eyes or minds, every painting is blank. Furthermore, the green canvas can be a metaphor for the green screen such as the background wall used by the film industry for photoshop, as well as the exhibition area has become the retouching background for those “photographers”. Additionally, I will set up some photo spots in the exhibition hall, and when the audience stands there, the exhibits will block the photo angle to simulate the mood when the exhibits are normally blocked with people. The exhibition is named “untitled”, because for those who only visit the exhibition to take pictures, the name of it is no longer important to them, and the works become an “untitled” art. The location will be at Chamberlayne Road, 99, London, NW10 3ND, on July 9th (Saturday) and 10th (Sunday).
WHAT IF
By recording exhibition material using a virtual reality 360° camera, I can spread it in various forms and affect more people without limitations of time and place. The change can have a positive impact on people’s thoughts and behaviours over time in the form of a chain of communication. Through the output of ideas, they will become aware of this phenomenon, which is also the first and most significant step toward change. Furthermore, completing this project will put me one step closer to my future goals. It will allow me to gain a deeper understanding of the planning and creation process of an art gallery. The basis of changing public attitudes is cognition, and people can only change the possibility once they realize it.
