Scenes from a museum - various photographers, Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, CA; Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY

Afterimage, July-August, 1999 by Kirsi Peltomaki

NOTES

1. During the three days I visited "The Museum as Muse," some guards did not interfere with people sitting on Bench #76/77, while other guards did ask people to get up, citing their supervisor's orders. A museum lecturer conducting a gallery tour was under the impression that sitting on Bench #76/77 was allowed. According to MoMA's Associate Communications Director, Graham Leggat, sitting is permitted.

2. Judd is not entirely absent from the exhibition's catalog. It includes excerpts of Judd's writings, and the penultimate image is an uncommented reproduction of Bench # 76/77. When asked about the logistics of Judd's participation through MoMA's Communications Department, McShine had "no comment." According to Judd's gallery, PaceWildenstein, and Madeleine Hoffmann, the Furniture Representative of Judd's Estate, Bench #76/77 was not meant to be part of the exhibition but rather to be used simply as furniture. Furthermore, according to Hoffmann, Bench #76/77 was designed by Judd as furniture in 1990 white "The Museum as Muse" catalog dates it 1976-77.

3. Power of Display: A History of Exhibition Installations at the Museum of Modern Art is the title of Mary Ann Staniszewski's 1998 book (Cambridge, MA and London: The MIT Press).

4. David Rimanelli, "Preview: The Museum as Muse: Artists Reflect," Artforum Vol. 37, no. 5 (January 1999), p. 35.

5. A copy of Asher's catalog could be acquired without charge from MoMA's bookstore by showing an admission ticket.

6. In recent years, such exhibitions have included "A Museum Looks at Itself: Mapping Past and Present at The Parrish Museum" at The Parrish Art Museum in Southampton, NY, in 1992, a series of exhibitions at the Museum for African Art in New York City and "The Label Show" at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts in 1994. Of these, "The Museum Looks at Itself" consisted of artists' commissioned projects, while the others were based on curated work. Individual artists who have analyzed the logic of museums include Gerald McMaster in "Savage Graces" at the University of British Columbia's Museum of Anthropology, Vancouver, Canada, in 1992. Fred Wilson's entire career has examined museums and their collecting, contextualizing and exhibiting practices. "Mining the Museum" at the Maryland Historical Society in Baltimore in 1992 and "The Museum: Mixed Metaphors" at the Seattle Art Museum in 1993 are two of his major projects.

KIRSI PELTOMAKI is an artist and Ph.D. candidate in the Program in Visual and Cultural Studies at the University of Rochester.