Look Harder. Be More Curious.

On Monday, Arianna Huffington wrote a provocative piece entitled "Museums 2.0: What Happens When Great Art Meets New Media?" for The Huffington Post. Her basic premise is that museums "deliver what has become increasingly rare in our world: the opportunity to disconnect from our hyper-connected lives, and the possibility of wonder" and so should perhaps not be so quick to introduce extra layers of technology between visitors and their art. But as art blogger Paddy Johnson puts it in her response, and which I'd be inclined to agree with, "The fundamental problem museums are grappling with isn’t whether they should use technology, but how to make people look harder, and be more curious."

That last bit probably bears repeating: Museums must find ways "to make people look harder, and be more curious." And as you may guess, I have an answer: Reading books on art.

Over the vacation (mine spent with family in Reno and Lake Tahoe) I managed to check a few books off the reading list. One was Willem de Kooning: The Artist's Materials by Susan F. Lake (Getty Conservation Institute, 2010). As the back cover puts it, the book is "the first systematic study of de Kooning's creative process that applies comprehensive scientific examinations of the artist's pigments, binders, and supports to art historical interpretations." If this description sounds a bit dubious or dry, don't be putt off, it's not.

Lake is the Director of Collection Management and Chief Conservator at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington DC and it is the Hirshhorn's de Kooning collection that is her focus. The resulting book is smart, lively and engaging in a way too few serious books on art (especially scientific art conservation) are. And most importantly, after reading it, I wanted nothing more than to run as fast as possible to the Hirshhorn and see the de Kooning works up close and in person. Thus bringing us back to Johnson's "look harder, and be more curious" statement and my proposed solution.

If museums could get people to go home and read about art, to be engaged in interesting and enjoyable narratives about it, and to be gently educated about it along the way, they would surely discover those same people coming back to the galleries more often and looking in more detail. Instead, by way of their publishing programs, their store merchandising and their didactic materials, museum's send visitors home with expensive souvenirs for their coffee tables and spiffy brochures for their trash and recycling bins.

To get back to the de Kooning book, Tyler Green, of Modern Art Notes, has been evangelizing the book as well (part one, part two), and complained recently that the Hirshhorn itself has done little to embrace the title despite it having been written by a staff member and tying so specifically into the museum's collection and interests. From where I sit, I can't be sure about what they have or haven't done in the museum or with their members, but looking at the Hirshhorn website at least confirms his complaint.

Though the site's Shop page isn't much more than a placeholder, they do manage to highlight a couple books, but with no mention of the de Kooning book. (I called the museum and they do carry the book in the store.) On the Collection In Depth section, de Kooning is highlighted, and there is a four-paragraph overview of his life and work and a few select images from the collection. This would be a perfect place to highlight the book as well, but there is no mention. Finally, on the Podcasts page, we do find an audio recording of a lecture on the book Lake gave at the museum on November 17, 2010. A nice feature, but ultimately the one and only mention of the book on the website. Overall, this is definitely a missed opportunity for the museum and its visitors. And a missed opportunity that is unfortunately not limited to the Hirshhorn or this particular de Kooning book, but typical rather of art museums just about everywhere.

I'll be talking about this a lot more in the coming months, but in short, great books on art drive us to go see the work itself, answer our questions about what we're seeing, and peak our curiosity to ask more. This in mind, perhaps our mantra for 2011 should be, "Look harder. Be more curious."