Museum mutterings

A day ago , by Richard Lutz

RICHARD LUTZ is exhausted

I always admired an English teacher in high school called Larry Hayden. He was from Ohio and he talked up a storm about cornfields, endless skies and the dreams of country boys fishing in big rivers.

He also pointed us to a late night radio jock called Jean Shepherd who continued the Midwest musings about the so-called flyover states and many times when we should have been taught the joys of Keats or Hemingway we would be discussing what Shepherd had said about the inner life of Indiana or hunting squirrels. It opened up alot of our sleepy urban eyes in Brooklyn way back in the 1960’s.

The thing is I don’t think Mr Hayden liked me. Even a slightly dozey teenager not much engaged with academics intuitively knows these things. No matter what I did, what I said, he shrugged them off. In a short story exercise, which I sweated over and actually put some effort into, he asked me if I really wrote it or just stole the idea. You don’t forget those things.

Despite that, I admired him anyway. Didn’t like him that much. But admired him. And one thing Mr Hayden taught in composition, amid his tall Ohio tales, was never to start an essay with a question.

Why?

Well, he would say as he paced and looked into space while probably pondering a split rail fence or fishing for bullfrogs or something equally rural: ‘Because the whole point of writing,’ he would say, ‘is to find answers. So what good is a question? It’s a weak way to start an essay.’ It’s unnecessary, he’d point out very necessarily.

Fair point Mr Hayden and bless your midwest peppery soul after all these decades. But I’m going to break your rule and dive into the point of this piece and ask: ‘How come we all get so tired when roaming around a museum? Huh…how come?’

Your legs are cement, your brain devolves to a bowl of yesterday’s porridge, you’d rather curl up and sleep in a corner under a van Gogh than look at it, you couldn’t care less about another Tracey Emin moment or a squiggle from Miro. You’re exhausted. And you’ve only been in the museum for three minutes.

The Chinese porcelain, the bold post war expressionism, the Roman sculptures, the miniature prayer books from the 11thC whizz by. You crave a chair, a corner of a cafe, maybe even a bench to catch a snooze like these eager British Museum sightseers:

Plenty of theories, of course, from Professor Wikipedia.

One online suggestion is the stress on muscles and joints. Museum visitors walk at an uneven pace on hard floors, stop, contemplate an item, crick their necks to check out a piece hung on a wall, awkwardly twist their bodies to read long screeds in tiny print, ascend staircases, wait in queues, descend staircases, and just plain wear out fragile joints in badly ventilated rooms with questionable light. You can get beat up just thinking it. And, it goes without saying, many times you pay for the pleasure of being exhausted by the time you hit room 4.

Plus, no matter how brainy you all are, you are pushing your minds to jam a lot of unfamiliar detail into your head as you walk on those unforgiving floors, read those labels, obsess about a coffee jolt, the state of aching feet, the glory of a chair or the next bus home.

All this adds up to Museum Fatigue, a term first suggested in 1916 by psychologist Benjamin Gilman.

The time spent in front of a painting is 27 seconds

He said that visiting an exhibition is reduced to a burden because of all the problems associated with trekking through gallery after gallery. Chief among the crimes committed by museums is boring displays which dull the senses.

Further studies found that interest usually fades within 30 minutes of entering a museum. And the average time spent in front of a single item, according to a Canadian analysis, is a mere 27 seconds.

So, is there a solution?

Like all normal lazy people, I refer to AI which knows everything and understands nothing and reduces even the most simple declarative sentence to a drool of drivel. Here’s what it says of how exhibitors can lessen exhaustion. I include its fine use of bold typeface:

“Multiple factors of museum fatigue, such as object competition, limited attention capacity or the decision-making process can be alleviated by lower object density and the limitation of distractions, especially in the form of loud noises or flashing lights.”

Thank AI for telling me something I didn’t want to know.

Other more basic solutions to help trek through that next must-see exhibition without dying is to take long breaks; find a good place to have a drink; stick to a designated route to avoid needless meandering; wear comfy shoes; join a tour that’ll hold your interest; and (I especially like this one), leave early if…and when…you get bored.