The Right Answer Is: I Would Run
March 24, 2017 11:56 AM   Subscribe

What happens if you break an artwork? Cautionary tales have been covered in countless articles and immortalized in videos of surveillance footage, though it’s not often told what happens next — or what to do if this happens to you. So what happens when you break a work of art? What would (or should) you do?
posted by JoeZydeco (72 comments total) 22 users marked this as a favorite
 
my kid could break that
posted by beerperson at 12:18 PM on March 24, 2017 [35 favorites]


Grab the nearest intact work of art, shove it into the arms of the nearest stranger, and shout THAT'S RIGHT, ONE MILLION IN SMALL BILLS OR THE BOSS DROPS IT!

THEN run like a mad bastard.
posted by delfin at 12:18 PM on March 24, 2017 [8 favorites]


Always carry a biro. That way, if you break anything, you can just add your signature and call it a collaboration.
posted by Emma May Smith at 12:29 PM on March 24, 2017 [11 favorites]


All I can think of is the "Full House Reviewed" blog post about the "Full House" episode where Michelle breaks the dinosaur skeleton.
posted by Melismata at 12:29 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


Well, as my knees don't work well enough to be able to actually run, I guess I would prolly panic and pass out, prolly splitting my scalp open on the inevitable hard floor.
posted by Samizdata at 12:30 PM on March 24, 2017


I work museums, so my first thought was "insurance!" Glad the article covered it. If you wanted to be a classy person about it, a donation to the museum and note expressing sadness would be nice. I wouldn't sweat it too much. It's the responsibility of the museum staff to see the art is protected.
posted by Miko at 12:37 PM on March 24, 2017 [13 favorites]


A number of years ago, when I was still active in the local arts community, I attended a launch party for an arts-support organization in the home of a local donor/collector. The home is effectively a museum; there's little free space, on the wall or otherwise. I think it's reasonable to categorize the collection as well into the seven figures -- I mean, he owns more than one Cornell box, and more than one Basquiat, and the living room is dominated by an enormous Anselm Kiefer painting, and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

So it's a mildly nerve-wracking place to be for a certain kind of personality. What if I trip and break the Dan Flavin installation in the stairwell? That sort of thing.

Well, an unnamed someone (literally unknown; I'm not being coy) actually DID knock a small ceramic sculpture off the wall just outside the kitchen; I forget the artist, but since it was in $collector's house, I assume it was someone interesting.

It shattered into a gazillion bits on the floor. I'm sure someone must've seen it happen, but since $collector wasn't nearby, I don't think anyone Officially Knew.

And so the party continued. But, I'll note, I'm not sure that $collector has had any such gatherings back in his home since, at least not at that scale.
posted by uberchet at 12:39 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


When my son was little, we were at the deCordova Museum trying to get him some culture in those years before he discovered video games. I was holding him and we were looking at a painting. I was trying to point out the texture of the brush strokes (which is the only thing I can point out about a painting) when he punched the painting. Just flat out clocked the thing like he was Buzz Aldrin and the painting had accused him of faking the Moon landing. Things turned to slow motion as I saw the canvas flex an inch or two and imagined his fist going right through it. Luckily, the canvas bounced back without tearing.

I pulled his hand back, gently scolded him, and then turned around to see about 20 people giving me the "we're judging you and we have decided you are a Bad Parent" look and then we got the hell out of there.

We have gone back a few times but we always stick to the sculpture garden.
posted by bondcliff at 12:41 PM on March 24, 2017 [56 favorites]


This is why I always wear a beret to art museums.

If I fuck something up, I will simply take a step back, survey the damage, do one of those *MWAH* kissy-finger dealies, and then boldly sashay my way to the nearest exit.
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:41 PM on March 24, 2017 [14 favorites]


Oh man, this happened at a local museum a few years ago. I'd wondered how they dealt with it.

My overriding memory of that museum though is how good the catering was when we hired out the gallery for a work event. The guy with the manchego platter kept giving me the stink eye for taking so many pieces but damn it I organised that party and what was he expecting being the manchego guy anyway.
posted by terretu at 12:42 PM on March 24, 2017 [7 favorites]


I wanted to know if the 91-yr old woman won her case.
posted by storybored at 12:45 PM on March 24, 2017


There was this incident at the National Clock Museum.
posted by lagomorphius at 1:01 PM on March 24, 2017 [8 favorites]


I wanted to know if the 91-yr old woman won her case.

When I researched this last year, my understanding was that the museum's legal action was strictly pro forma, and that neither the suit nor the counter-suit was seriously expected to go anywhere.
posted by Shmuel510 at 1:03 PM on March 24, 2017


If you wanted to be a classy person about it, a donation to the museum and note expressing sadness would be nice.

Sorry :( Here's 10 bucks, it's all I've got. Remorsefully Yours, Greg_Ace
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:05 PM on March 24, 2017 [6 favorites]


--But that was a priceless Steinway!

--Not anymore.
posted by Wolfdog at 1:12 PM on March 24, 2017 [11 favorites]


I feel really bad for the guy who fell into the vases. He tripped and fell, which is something that happens to people sometimes, there were no handrails, and the vases were just sitting there on a ledge. He's probably the least at fault party of every incident I've heard of, but the pictures are so dramatic that he's the face of art destruction.

Meanwhile, these jerkwads languish in obscurity. (Sure, they apparently managed to not damage the art in that case, but not for want of trying.)
posted by ernielundquist at 1:26 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


Honestly? I'd probably try to act like nothing had happened. THIS IS FINE.
posted by thelonius at 1:27 PM on March 24, 2017


I used to work the front desk at an art museum. If righteous indignation was rocket fuel, all the Huffs and puffs and gasps of mortal offence that I got for pointing out that giant bags and backpacks sometimes accidentally brush up against things and knock them over; that water bottles and coffee cups sometimes fall or spill without the carrier's intending them to; that large dogs don't always have perfect control of what their wagging tails beat against; and that our insurance company required us to take reasonable measures to protect our collection as a condition of our policy would have sent me to Jupiter and back by now.

There was a long, explainy sign about the effect of repeated artwork-touching in the elevator, but by the time they got there, most guests had already reached past four big DO NOT TOUCH signs and groped four sculptures.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:27 PM on March 24, 2017 [16 favorites]


There was this incident at the National Clock Museum.

That's not fair!
Mom didn't touch clock until the jerk who kept screwing with it knocked it down.

Way to go, museum. What was she supposed to do, tackle him or tattle-tale?
posted by BlueHorse at 1:29 PM on March 24, 2017


Great, now I'm going to have dreams about this like I have dreams about arriving late to job interviews without pants.
posted by AFABulous at 1:48 PM on March 24, 2017 [6 favorites]


I broke an artwork this afternoon. I was moving things about in the storage space in our office. There is a collection of framed art work. These are posters, prints, and original paintings and drawings. They came from other offices that were closed and have been gathering dust. I moved an ugly 4 foot by 5 foot painting, in a gold frame, in order to get at the documents behind it. Unfortunately, it is very large and I banged it against the corner of another painting. There is now a three corner tear in the canvas. I quickly placed it in the corner of the storage area and piled up another dozen gold framed paintings against it.

I don't feel good about this. However, if they cared about these they would not be storing them with the archived documents. Right, guys?
posted by Midnight Skulker at 1:50 PM on March 24, 2017 [3 favorites]


Meanwhile, these jerkwads languish in obscurity. (Sure, they apparently managed to not damage the art in that case, but not for want of trying.

Yeah, I mean, those parents are real assholes, but perhaps a certain indignation can also be levied against the art world here. $10 million for this sculpture? Say the kid climbing on it breaks the bottom rung. What's it gonna take, couple thousand bucks to replace?

*checks art page*

Judd began making stacks in the 1960s. Most consist of ten elements, although there is variation in the materials used. The stacks are all ordered according to strict principles: the gap between each unit, and between the first unit and the floor, should be equal to the height of a single unit. Since the units are all identical, their significance derives from this pre-determined geometric order rather than from any individual features. However, Judd’s attention to the sensuous qualities of his materials prevents Untitled from being cold or clinical.

This is ridiculously pretentious.

(To wit: I am not in any way an expert in art appraisal, and I understand value is a very subjective matter.)

I'm rather curious the distinction between decisions such as (in this sculpture's case) constructing a new block to replace a broken piece and modern touch-ups performed on classic art pieces (The Last Supper, Sistine Chapel, etc.). All the original artists in question are dead. What effect does that have on value?
posted by Christ, what an asshole at 2:01 PM on March 24, 2017 [3 favorites]


I would posit that breaking pretentious, expensive, abstract art is a gift to the art world that should be welcomed.
posted by bracems at 2:16 PM on March 24, 2017 [3 favorites]


That's specifically in response "Untitled" in the comment right above mine I understand many of the other artworks mentioned in this thread are... actually good.
posted by bracems at 2:18 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


Meanwhile, these jerkwads languish in obscurity. (Sure, they apparently managed to not damage the art in that case, but not for want of trying.

Yeah, that's absolutely typical. I remember one mother in particular. I pointed out the sign that said, "No Touching Allowed," and that it was actually quite dangerous for her daughter to be up on the sculpture where she was because it was all bronze and pointy on a concrete base, behind an aluminum rail, and that she could get seriously hurt if she fell.

The mother just shrugged and said, "Yeah, we just came from the science center, and all the exhibits there are Interactive." What, was that supposed to change the current reality? Was I supposed to say, "Oh, well, that's completely different. Carry on, then!" She accused me of hating children - *I* was the one trying to keep her daughter from getting her skull smashed on the concrete.

Eventually, a guard came over and helped me, but she left angry.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 2:30 PM on March 24, 2017 [12 favorites]


You're really angry that some people like things you don't.
posted by ernielundquist at 2:30 PM on March 24, 2017 [11 favorites]


When my son was little, we were at the deCordova Museum trying to get him some culture in those years before he discovered video games. I was holding him and we were looking at a painting. I was trying to point out the texture of the brush strokes (which is the only thing I can point out about a painting) when he punched the painting. Just flat out clocked the thing like he was Buzz Aldrin and the painting had accused him of faking the Moon landing. Things turned to slow motion as I saw the canvas flex an inch or two and imagined his fist going right through it. Luckily, the canvas bounced back without tearing.

I pulled his hand back, gently scolded him, and then turned around to see about 20 people giving me the "we're judging you and we have decided you are a Bad Parent" look and then we got the hell out of there.


My nephew, who was 5 years old at the time, ran around a corner and palm slapped a Picasso at MOMA. They didn't kick us out. They did make us hold his hand and for the entire rest of the visit an usher walked just behind us. I could not stop laughing. It probably helped that we were there on donor passes.

The kid did slap the best thing on display in the whole museum though.
posted by srboisvert at 2:41 PM on March 24, 2017 [13 favorites]


I once saw a group of (maybe) Japanese tourists step into the elevator at the Guggenheim, and then all shriek and jump off again when the doors started to close.
posted by lagomorphius at 2:44 PM on March 24, 2017


I really have to feel for Alison Kinney. I mean, who in their right (or even in their wrong) mind puts a flimsy sculpture of a bench in a place where someone might possibly expect a real bench to be? That's like making a sculpture of a water fountain in sugar, putting real water fountain works in it, and then being all shocked and vindictive when someone takes a drink out of it and dissolves it. (Unless that's the point.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:46 PM on March 24, 2017 [8 favorites]


I love that water fountain idea! I wonder if I could get that installed...
posted by evilDoug at 2:54 PM on March 24, 2017 [7 favorites]


A beloved family member came hilariously close to backing into a Giacometti once -- honestly, given their proportions I'm shocked more of them haven't gone harp-six over the years. My initial instinct would definitely have been to flee so I'm glad to find I'm in pretty good company.
posted by en forme de poire at 3:00 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


I really have to feel for Alison Kinney. I mean, who in their right (or even in their wrong) mind puts a flimsy sculpture of a bench in a place where someone might possibly expect a real bench to be?

In Whitworth Park in Manchester there is a sculpture which looks a lot like a climbing frame. "This is not a climbing frame," a sign declares Magritteanly. There happens to be a real climbing frame only 50 metres away, though I have not checked whether or no it bears a sign, "This is not art."
posted by Emma May Smith at 3:10 PM on March 24, 2017 [18 favorites]


Wouldn't it be entertaining for all involved if a docent followed the offender through the museum ringing a bell and crying "Shame!" for the rest of their visit?
posted by lagomorphius at 3:16 PM on March 24, 2017 [9 favorites]




I feel really bad for the guy who fell into the vases

Yeah, I don't know whether your sympathy is wasted. I remember reading about that at the time and it seemed clear to me back then that he was an arsehole who did it deliberately. As I recall, it was hard to believe anyone could trip in the required way at all; moreover they were big, heavy vases and that much damage must have required an awful lot of shoving. About nine million people had walked past the vases over the years without anyone ever touching them.

He was actually arrested briefly because the museum did not believe it was an accident, but apparently he feels he did them a favour by attracting publicity.
posted by Segundus at 3:21 PM on March 24, 2017 [3 favorites]


The Right Answer Is: I Would Run

NEVER WALK INTO AN ART MUSEUM WITH ONLY ONE EXIT
posted by indubitable at 3:30 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


Haha, I was having trouble following along about the broken vase thread until I read the caption that went along with the top photo in the first link. Stupidly, I had glossed over it assuming I had missed some Larry David subplot of Curb Your Enthusiasm.
posted by Christ, what an asshole at 3:41 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


I sketch a lot in museums, and their policies vary so I try to find them on the websites beforehand. Generally they range from "only pencils in a notebook no bigger than this" to "no pastels or painting".

One small museum I visit has: Drawing is encouraged in the galleries, but the use of clay, paints, pastels, and chalk is not permitted.

Clay.

You know how they say "for every specific rule, there is one specific asshole?"... Who brought clay to this museum?
posted by Hypatia at 3:44 PM on March 24, 2017 [27 favorites]


the old lady who did the crossword puzzle that was actually art is Extremely Me and i love her
posted by burgerrr at 3:47 PM on March 24, 2017 [7 favorites]



This happens a lot, and from my experience the damage to work is mainly an "inside job". That's to say it takes place while in the hands of art handlers/technicians/warehouse staff. Art is just stuff, and like all stuff, it's going bad over time. Furthermore, it's often badly made from a conservation point of view. Also the weight, size or fragility of it when faced with hard demands from curators/collectors/institutions loaning the art work, means that the object has a tough time of it.
I worked full time doing installation and technician work for a contemporary art gallery and large collection until recently, and still do quite a lot of freelance work for galleries and curators. At the Frieze art fair in London (the biggest commercial art fair in the UK held in Regent's Park) you are given stickers which read "This is rubbish". This is to help the cleaning staff who circulate the airport terminal sized marquee distinguish art (which may well look like rubbish) from rubbish (which may well look like art.)
I have been in situations in which the artist who made the work is attending an installation of the work which is owned by the collection I worked for and the artist, while handling the work, breaks it. Then there's an awkward filling in of a form and maybe a chat with the insurance people.
The funny thing is that the world of ownership of these objects- at least in the private sphere- consists entirely of the super rich; everyone else involved - those actually dealing with the practicalities of the work's install/storage/handling is, more often than not, underpaid and trying to finish their shift. This 200kg crate looks a lot like that one, the access is bad, and the tail-lift on the truck is broken. But we'll ride it over those cobbles and lift it on anyway. Maybe a damage report 6 months later will find something wrong with the work. But when you're moving these things around you're talking about big big crates, that would take three people minimum and half a day to safely unpack, condition check and re-pack. So the truth is is doesn't work like that.
Stuff breaks.
Guess the public shouldn't worry too much!
posted by multivalent at 3:57 PM on March 24, 2017 [13 favorites]


He's probably the least at fault party of every incident I've heard of, but the pictures are so dramatic that he's the face of art destruction.

That's when you declare yourself to be Ai Weiwei in disguise and cheese it before anybody can take a picture.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:57 PM on March 24, 2017 [5 favorites]


Hypatia, you would be amazed. We had a student whip out a can of spray fixative to seal her (not permitted) pastel sketch while she was still in the museum.
posted by Mouse Army at 3:59 PM on March 24, 2017 [6 favorites]


welp, there we go, successfully added to the mental bank of random shit about which I'll surely have a terrifying nightmare. YAY
posted by bologna on wry at 4:20 PM on March 24, 2017


This is why it's necessary to bring a smoke bomb, a wig, and a fake nose when visiting art museums. In case of a catastrophic accident, set off the bomb, don the disguise inside the purple cloud, and walk away as though nothing had ever happened.

Now if you go to a natural history museum, the proper "just in case of a whoopsy" gear is a roman candle, swim goggles, and a can of WD-40...
posted by Harvey Jerkwater at 4:32 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


At the Frieze art fair in London (the biggest commercial art fair in the UK held in Regent's Park) you are given stickers which read "This is rubbish". This is to help the cleaning staff who circulate the airport terminal sized marquee distinguish art (which may well look like rubbish) from rubbish (which may well look like art.)

I made exactly this kind of mistake at the Whitney once, no word of a lie. I spent a good minute and a half carefully studying a couple of boards and some twine propped against a wall and searching in vain for a plaque with the artist's name before I realized that "oh, this was just some random stuff that the cleaning crew forgot to clear up".
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:50 PM on March 24, 2017 [6 favorites]


As I recall, it was hard to believe anyone could trip in the required way at all; moreover they were big, heavy vases and that much damage must have required an awful lot of shoving.

It does seem a little puzzling how he could manage to sweep three fairly widely separated vases six feet or so into a single heap. Especially given that they were raised and and in a window niche. And certainly his explanation of how they must have 'shot into each other' isn't true, since they were all in a heap at one end with him on top in the picture, so it's not like he jogged one and it tumbled into the others as he stood by. Impossible to prove either way, but he's definitely an asshole going by the Guardian article. 'I forgot all about it as soon as I left the museum!' 'It was so offensive that they actually tracked me down and arrested me.'
posted by tavella at 5:00 PM on March 24, 2017 [1 favorite]


I'm terrible about keeping my hands off art, but I've tried hard over the years to be an adult about it and to control my impulses and mostly I keep my hands to myself unless invited. So one time my wife and I happened into the Temporary in LA not knowing what the show was and there in bold letters on a placard stuck to the entryway door was a sign that read, "PATRONS ADVISED TO TOUCH THE INTERACTIVE EXHIBITS AT THEIR OWN RISK" and I turned to my wife and said "Oh! Let's go in. Hurry up!"

While she dealt with the tickets and paying I climbed the little staircase up into the exhibit space and saw my first victim -- a big chunk of stone or concrete, maybe 5 x 5 x 5 with colorful aggregate jammed in it, indentations, grooves, divots, rough patches, shiny smooth patches, a thing so clearly meant to be caressed and fondled. Look at it. It's like a cliche of interactive art. Maybe that was the commentary? The apparentness of touch. The only thing possibly more obvious and tired would be a big wooden box with cutouts and black velvet pockets holding acorns and feathers and maybe broken glass (given the warning on the door). There was only one way to find out.

Atop the stairs there's a ten foot landing, then another four or five steps down into the gallery and the Touching Stone. I picked up the pace as I descended, grinning so hard my cheeks ached and I reached out with both arms. With about eight feet to go I noticed in my peripheral vision a movement in red, and turning toward it as I lunged ahead, I saw that the movement was a docent or guard in a red blazer reaching out toward me and taking the first step or leap toward me from his position against the wall, his face contorted. At that same moment I heard from behind my wife yelling out, "Notyou! Staaaaahp" but by then it was very very late in my progress toward the Touching Stone, it was then only inches away from my outstretched fingers, all that kinetic energy from my descent down the stairs pushing me forward, all that potential energy from years of keeping my hands off the art coming unwound leading me to this moment. I pulled my arms away from the stone and made wild backward circles, their centripetal force thrown into fight against the inertia of the rest of my body while I broke my stride from forward leaps to stuttering toe stops, like Tom does when chasing Jerry around the corner, jiggita-jiggita-jiggita. I came to rest with my toes pressed against the dais, my chest, shoulders, and nose inches from the sculpture, my arms and hands flapping their tight backward circles, me caught on the edge of teetering forward and knowing it was inevitable I'd gone too far I was doomed by physics and couldn't stop I was still falling forward so slowly forward when a firm hand grasped my collar and set my weight back on my heels and I stepped back from the precipice.

"Sir! The sign says 'Do not Touch.'" I looked in the direction he pointed, and sure enough, a few feet to the left of the art was the sign.

"Oh. But the other sign...? On the door?"

My wife caught up, finally, and smiled up at the docent. "Can you tell us where the interactive exhibit is?"
posted by notyou at 5:04 PM on March 24, 2017 [35 favorites]


At the Frieze art fair in London (the biggest commercial art fair in the UK held in Regent's Park) you are given stickers which read "This is rubbish". This is to help the cleaning staff who circulate the airport terminal sized marquee distinguish art (which may well look like rubbish) from rubbish (which may well look like art.)

But how do they keep would-be critics from doing the obvious?
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:38 PM on March 24, 2017 [12 favorites]


Having just visited Dia: Beacon and seen Richard Serra's steel monoliths, I find the idea of being able to actually damage art quite amusing.
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 7:54 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


Damn, notyou, you won the Marriage Lottery!
posted by wenestvedt at 7:55 PM on March 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


A couple years ago at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY there was a huge, tall totem pole-type sculpture and somehow, for whatever reason, my somewhat spacy friend decided to lean on it, like it was a wall. OH MY GOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING the rest of us shrieked. Thank God it didn't fall completely over and shatter. We couldn't believe what we saw.
posted by bleep at 7:56 PM on March 24, 2017


I was at the residence of an artist who was having an in-home exhibition. He worked a lot with resin and plexiglass. One or his pieces was a knee-high transparent plexiglass table thing with, I might add, no protective rope around it. Predictably, I bumped into it and knocked it over. This was not a large residence being a salient detail at this point.

So I looked around, determined (inaccurately) that nobody had noticed, and righted the fallen piece which, as far as I could tell, had suffered no damage.

Later on I was informed that the artist had, in fact, noticed, and wanted me to pay market price for the work. I did not reply to that email.
posted by grumpybear69 at 9:02 PM on March 24, 2017 [5 favorites]


I work at a major art museum. I'm new, and new to museums, so this week I had a 1.5 hour meeting with the head of security to better understand his responsibilities. Keeping art safe is such a nuanced job! He takes the visitor experience very seriously - it's how and why we keep our doors open. He's been in his role for decades, and he says social media has initiated a profound, rapid change in museum interaction and visitor behavior. Damage to art is caused by accident; very rarely is something damaged by malice. He says visitor behavior associated with using camera phones is vastly different than that of digital cameras, and people are comfortable making crazy poses in public spaces and acting goofy in a way that was, until very recently, taboo in spaces like art museums. He says between wacky poses and backing up for the best shot, people bump into art much more frequently, and it takes well-trained guards to communicate with guests in a friendly, but authoritative manner and react to guests with nuance, deciding when to intervene and what behavior is acceptable and safe. Sometimes, lending requirements means prohibiting photography in certain exhibitions, and he says guest interaction in those galleries is completely different. The museum has a complicated matrix of reporting when damage occurs. It's a terrifying flow chart of many, many departments and people. It was an illuminating meeting. As an art lover, it's easy to think of art as this untouchable, venerated thing, but it's really just stuff, out in the open, in a crowded space. It's pretty darn fragile.
posted by missmary6 at 9:52 PM on March 24, 2017 [26 favorites]


All I can think of is the "Full House Reviewed" blog post about the "Full House" episode where Michelle breaks the dinosaur skeleton.

I felt compelled to look up the clip for some reason. That's...very sitcom.
posted by zachlipton at 12:46 AM on March 25, 2017 [2 favorites]


"This is not a climbing frame," a sign declares Magritteanly.

I walk through Whitworth Park a few times a day and rare is the time when a young fella isn't hanging off it.

I had a sneezing fit in the Sistine Chapel once. Hopefully it will remain the only time I have two guns pointed at my face. They take that shit seriously.
posted by threetwentytwo at 1:31 AM on March 25, 2017 [8 favorites]


I backed up into a sculpture at the Art Institute in Chicago. I was trying to get perspective on some painting. I nearly had a panic attack (really). Fortunately it was bolted to the floor well. But I was horrified and left the museum immediately.
posted by persona au gratin at 3:00 AM on March 25, 2017


it was actually a work of art (made of styrofoam and chicken wire to look like a bench).

Come along, that art work was just asking for it.
posted by IndigoJones at 6:07 AM on March 25, 2017 [2 favorites]


I have some experience with this issue, discussed here previously.
posted by thivaia at 7:01 AM on March 25, 2017 [2 favorites]


I miss Ray Johnson. He's the guy who, when hired to create some art for a party, flew over the guests in a helicopter and dropped hot dogs on them.
posted by lagomorphius at 7:54 AM on March 25, 2017 [5 favorites]


As far as damage by malice is concerned, the Cleveland Museum of Art has an original casting of Rodin's The Thinker which was bombed in 1970. It now sits in front of the Museum, unrestored.
posted by photomusic86 at 10:03 AM on March 25, 2017 [2 favorites]


They pulled guns on you for... sneezing?
posted by radicalawyer at 10:31 AM on March 25, 2017 [4 favorites]


That unrestored The Thinker is one of my favorite things in the world.

I am continually horrified at the people who purposely touch things -- for some reason, this is particularly endemic in London museums. I was at the V&A about a year ago, hanging out while I waited for a friend to join me, and I spend the whole time texting him in a state of horror. The bestworst I saw was a woman in front of a medieval religious statue who felt the need to reach out and rub her hand along a reclining Jesus' arm. The statue was, as I recall, a low-fired ceramic and the pigment was hanging on through habit and not much else. It is the closest I have come to having an aneurysm in public.

In the sculpture hall I asked a guard if it was ok to take pictures, and I don't think I've ever seen someone look so surprised and happy to say yes. I assume his life is a difficult one, to say the least.

(As a professionally trained conservator, when I am queen of the world, I shall be permitted to take a cattle prod into museums and use it on members of the public as required.)
posted by kalimac at 11:59 AM on March 25, 2017 [9 favorites]


I have just remembered a story that a friend told once. It does not involve broken artwork, but it does involve physical contact with a work of art that most likely will make every art historian in here recoil in horror.

He was one of the honor students at his Jesuit boys' school, and as such was brought on a class trip to the Vatican; which, since it was being lead by one of the Jesuit Fathers, came with some perks. Such as - when they went to St. Peter's Basilica, instead of having to stay behind all the barriers set up around the artworks, they could investigate the artwork upclose. At first they just amused themselves by walking riiiiiiight up to the barrier, behind which the rest of the crowds were standing, and then turn around, standing right in front of everyone, and pretend to be studying the artwork intently, to the frustration of the tourists behind them. With the statues, this also turned into childish stuff like "ooh, we can go around behind and see what their butts look like" and such.

It was when they were reviewing the Pieta from behind that the Father chaperoning them started rounding them up and herding them away, chiding them a bit. My friend says that he was directly behind the Pieta, where none of the other crowd could see him - and that in the bustle of leaving, he actually passed quite close to it.

So - he licked it.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:00 PM on March 25, 2017 [4 favorites]


My name is frend
And in St Pete's
Whenn herded by
Sum Jesuits

And whenn the Father's
Path is set, I
sneek behind
I lik Pieta
posted by moonmilk at 1:24 PM on March 25, 2017 [14 favorites]






And if they don't already know it, I would just like to inform every sculptor in the world, living and dead, that if their statue happens to sport such an appendage as a breast or penis, it will have Americans' grubby, grabby hands - young and old, rich and poor, educated and un- - all races, creeds, and genders - on it all day. ALL DAY. EVERY DAY.

Noses and single fingers tend to be chipped off human figures first because of their delicacy, but I swear the dicks have to get rubbed away next just from sheer overuse.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 3:41 PM on March 25, 2017 [4 favorites]


I am weirdly charmed by the woman who started filling in the art piece. There's something delightful about that. if I were the artist, I'd be tempted to update the bio to make it a work by two artists instead of fixing it.
posted by Deoridhe at 4:38 PM on March 25, 2017


I am a bit of an art wonk, have worked as a conservator for a smallish museum and make art myself, sometimes. I am also very proud of my sister for being kicked out of an art museum. Let me explain... it was an exhibition of chairs, and she, being all of 11 decided to see if they were actually comfortable. A fair question, I suggest. After all if you can't design a chair to reasonably hold up an 11 year old girl, how can you claim your chair has any place in an exhibition about the design of furniture? She apparently sat in at least two of them before being escorted out.

To balance this lighthearted tale, I have actually managed to destroy some of my own collection when I snagged a shirt sleeve on a favorite ceramic sculpture one morning while getting dressed sending it three feet down to floor to shatter into many small pieces. The work was valued in the thousands, but I still have to mentally block it into the "Oh well" category, as I was too poor to have any insurance on my collection at the time.

And to end on a fun note, I also have a Felix Gonzalez-Torrez work in my collection, one that my friend grabbed off the stack to the horrified gasps of the other patrons who didn't realize that was the whole point of the exhibit. So sometimes, touching is its own reward.
posted by 1f2frfbf at 5:23 PM on March 25, 2017 [2 favorites]


I tend to carry a note against such eventualities. It reads:
Sorry :( Here's 10 bucks, it's all I've got. Remorsefully Yours, Greg_Ace
As far as damage by malice is concerned, the Cleveland Museum of Art has an original casting of Rodin's The Thinker which was bombed in 1970.

There were a lot of original casts of Rodin's pieces. France had eventually pass a law that foundries could only do 12 or so, plus one artist's proof. Or something.

http://www.cantorfoundation.org/resources/laws-that-govern-the-casting-of-rodins-work/
3.2. The tax originality or an original work as seen by the tax authority

The legislature relied on its technical findings to provide, in 1968, a limit to copies considered to be originals in order to determine what VAT rate should be applied to copies(2). Works up to 8 copies, stamped in Arabic numbers, were considered to be originals, subsequent copying was mass production. The first 8 copies then benefited from the reduced 5% VAT rate attributed to artists, compared to the current 19.6%. The legislature then, in the same regime, allowed a supplementary, non-negotiable, 4 copies, known as ‘artists’ copies’ (Administrative VAT documentation, 3-k 213). Artists and foundries rapidly benefited from this extension, marking ‘H.C.’ (non-commercial) or ‘E.A.’ (artist’s copy) followed by a number up to 4 in Roman numbers. The extension led to a number of excesses. The successors did not hesitate to increase the number of works produced by the artist while still alive by producing a post-mortem original copy without taking into account copies produced before 1968.

After the Second World War, to alleviate a lack of clarity in casts produced, the Rodin Museum, as the artist’s successor, had already instituted a limit of 12 copies described as commercial and numbered from 1 to 12, to which it added the number 0 as a reserved copy for its collections. It was only from 1982 that the Rodin Museum followed the line of conduct imposed by Decree 81-255 of 3 March 1981 (3), casting no more than 8 ‘original’, tradable, bronzes numbered from 1/8 to 8/8 and four artist’s copies numbered from I/IV to IV/IV destined for French and foreign cultural institutions, including its own copy.

Other than this Museum, which has been trying for the past 90 years to resolve the issue of the originality of bronzes and at the same time respect the artist’s testament, various fraudsters have produced non-numbered copies, referring to them as trial copies offered by the foundries! Remember that founders, unless clearly stated otherwise, cannot and have never been able to freely use the models that are given to them by the artists. They cannot either commercialize workshop plasters or bronze copies for their own benefit without specific agreement from the artist or his successors.

Original copies, limited to 200 or even considerably more, can be found in other materials than bronze and released with false advertising. Their original aspects are only in the material used or the dimensions. The use of such descriptive often leads the ordinary customer making an error because he thinks that he possesses a rare work. He is also surprised to see works entitled ‘H.C.’ or ‘E.A.’ up for auction. But, certain successors who produce artists’ copies consider that they can offer or even sell them to others who then dispose of them as they wish(4).

Because once the foundry has the mold for the piece ...
posted by sebastienbailard at 2:26 AM on March 26, 2017 [4 favorites]


OMG the stories from the museums where I work. Parents letting kids race between the stanchions and the art. Selfies (allowed) up on the platforms while wearing the Carnivale headdress taken off the body form (most definitely NOT allowed). The ONE chair that had to be tethered to the platform after opening because, despite the barrier rail, and the "DO NOT TOUCH" sign, and the guards telling people to stop, visitors kept picking it up "to see how much it weighs." The school kids who break the label rails BY SITTING ON THEM. The bored guards who peel vinyl letters off didactic panels and rearrange them to spell out naughty words. SMFH.
posted by mon-ma-tron at 11:49 AM on March 26, 2017 [2 favorites]


Hello, I've worked security in art museums since 2001 (which 478 in feelings years.)

This article and this thread are giving me the howling fucking fantods.


I have lots of stories (really REALLY bad ones about Donald Judd and chairs and everything) but I can't tell them right at this moment because GODDAMMIT.


If you think your oopsie bad museum habits are cute, they are not, please stop doing those things. Please. Stop.

Even if you hate/ don't understand the art. Maybe even especially if you don't understand the art. It's not "sticking it to the man" and nobody thinks it's cool. Stop. STOP. STOP DOING THAT SHIT OK.


Look, I've worked in museums for 628 years. The people who behave the worst in museums are the people who think they couldn't possibly behave badly in museums, or people who think that somehow their bad behavior doesn't count. Those things. Stop doing them.
posted by louche mustachio at 2:22 AM on March 27, 2017 [8 favorites]


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