In many ways, each video helps us to gain a better understanding of the issues surrounding the art world, and in particular the curators of museum who decide what to display. The video Lowdown on Lowbrow highlights this point, as certain artistic movements may be stimulated from the seemingly arrogant or "highbrow" nature of the intellectuals in the art world, or those, like the curators, who decide what artworks should be widely viewed by a particular audience. In this case the lowbrow form of art, also dubbed pop-surrealism, was influenced by the returning veterans of WWII and the artwork painted on their planes or seen with the development of hotrods and motorbikes. The leaders of this movement, including Big Daddy Roth, Robert Williams, and Robert Crumb, would inspire a new generation of comic book and album cover artists continuing to enjoy their free-thinking, anti conceptualist rebellion against the intellectuals of the art world. The growth of the internet would eventually help to liberate these liberators from obscurity, and give this "uncultured" movement a valid appreciation and respect among the highbrows.
The video that most directly related to the current project is Display of Modern Art: The Tate Approach, which discusses in some detail the ideas behind the arragement or organization of exhibits within the museum. The thematic approach of Tate, where works were organized into four sections of landscape, history, still life, and nudes, differed from the chronological approach of the MOMA. Grouping together numerous works of varying styles helped to give those viewers who were not educated in the history of art a better undersatanding of what they were looking at. In this sense the Tate Museum, like the lowbrows, were helping to break down that intellectual barrier that turns many people away from appreciating works of art. The simple, thematic approach of the Tate may be why the museum has attracted huge crowds since its opening and has become the most popular modern art museum in the world.
George Eastman House: Picture Perfect celebrates the history of art, technology, photography, and motion pictures. The house is the mansion of George Eastman, developer of the Kodak camera, and today serves as the oldest photography museum in the world. The innovative and forward looking spirit of Eastman led to the creation of a portable and easily accessable camera that transformed photography, and which would eventually lead to the development of film at the heart of motion pictures. The museum is a collection of 14,000 photographs which show an evolution from the camera used as a means of documentation to its limitless uses of the imagination. The video relates to this project in that it joins together an appreciation of a specific medium as art with a respect for the visionaries like George Eastman and the technological advancements throughout history which helped to make these works possible.
This sense of history to be considered by the curator is seen in the video Bones of Contention: Native American Archeology. This powerful video discusses the ongoing battle between Native Americans and scientists over the display and research of the bones of Indian descendants. Tribal leaders see this act of recovering Indian skulls and bones as a form of desecration and disrespect, while the scientists argue that the subsequent research may help to understand medical problems of the past and more effectively treat the diseases of the future. The curators of museums which exhibit these bones as artifacts of history are caught in the middle of a revival of Native American cultural identity and affiliation. As history shows the racial overtones and usage in collecting skulls from tribal terrirtory, I found it easy to be swayed by the argument against the collection of such remains, especially when there still exists tribal factions and organizations throughout the country which are willing and able by custom to accept these remains and bury them with the respect they deserve. It reminded me a bit of the Parthenon debate we had discussed earlier, and I think this relates to our current project as we need to be mindful of these issues of cultural identity and history in our presentations.
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