Imagined & Fictional Museums — Art, Narratives, and Institutional Critique
Imaginary museums both ask and answer several important questions about the art world. One of such movements is found in the concept of ‘Institutional Critique’, an ideology that seeks to redefine traditional institutions by demanding political soundness.
Institutional Critique forces to the forefront, the idea that systems involved in art purchase, display and exchange must be as politically honest as the art in question. In situations where an artwork centers political struggles, ideologies, or oppression, Institutional Critique demands that such artworks are not distributed and circulated by a system that reinforces that which is being criticised.
Art displayed via Institutional Critique performs the heavy duty of pulling the audience’s attention closer to the systems around them; the systems that perpetuate ideologies being critiqued by said artworks. They force the audience to think critically about the art creation process, not just about the finished artwork they can see. This forces viewers to think about how, why and who funds art, as well as the unseen systems that perpetuate the kind of bias seen in art institutions.
Institutional Critique is essentially a conceptual movement because its artists ask their audience to actively think about alternative means and institutions of curation and display.
The viewers may think about a place that already exists or create something entirely imaginary. They are encouraged to rearrange artwork on display in their minds’ eyes and critically challenge the biases that may dictate the choice of said display. They may even create entirely new artworks by going against what is traditionally acceptable.
Through this, Institutional Critique serves as an important vehicle through which fictional art plays a role in shaping art narratives. It also gives some sort of voice to audiences by allowing them to have control over their ideas of art and value. In its own way, the Institutional Critique movement serves as a form of cultural record by preserving the ideas that were significant or pressing at a given moment in history.
Some popular examples of artwork that fit into the Institutional Critique school of thought include:
- Affichages Sauvages by Daniel Buren
- Musée d’Art Moderne (Museum of Modern Art) by Marcel Broodthaers
- MoMA Poll by Hans Haacke
- Jean-Antoine Houdon’s George Washington by Michael Asher
- Everything You’ve Heard is Wrong by Carey Young
Literary Driven Museums
Apart from making us question political ideologies, imaginary museums inadvertently make us think critically about artists, writers and their intentions. When faced with a piece of written work with great detail about a fictitious museum, we are forced to try to dive into the writers’ mind to unearth their intentions.
We want to know if the museum is a metaphor for something, what that metaphor means and what the artist is trying to say? We want to visualize and see the kind of picture being created and we want to understand what made the writer choose the imaginary museum as a means of expression. It also forces us to wonder if real museums are also trying to tell a specific story and how to go about unearthing said stories.
Fictional museums also make it possible for both artists and viewers to ignore the constraints of traditional museums and get creative with what may or may not be allowed to be represented.
Are Museums and Fiction Similar?
The easy answer is yes, novels and museums aren’t as different from each other as one may be inclined to believe at first glance. They have myriad similarities, one of which is that they both give us a chance to immerse ourselves in carefully curated worlds. They allow us to fully enjoy the process of entering into different worlds and forget ourselves for some time.
Another similarity that novels and museums share is that they create miniature versions of the world and allow us to experience places that are far removed from our physical realm. The most immersive museums are simply collections from different corners of the world, creating a smaller version of a bigger universe. This quality is one thing that novels embody perfectly.
A novel is essentially an entire world, solar system, universe, contained within the palm of our hands. Novels allow us to entire fictional worlds and interact with imaginary characters or ideals. The popularity of the novel as an artform is proof of the relevance of imaginary museums. They are proof that human beings are capable of being a part of imaginary worlds and grasping tangible meaning.
Many fictional works have been known to not just create fictional worlds but to also create functional museums complete with fully described art pieces.
For example, Thomas Browne, an English philosopher from the 17th century, penned down a museum known as the ‘Musaeum Clausum’. This was a ‘secret’ museum and in his writing, he described several imaginary works in great detail. The detail with which he described these imaginary objects makes one have a tangible picture of the objects in our minds’ eye.
The Museum of Innocence
The Museum of Innocence was created by Orhan Pamuk, a Turkish novelist who built the museum as an accompaniment to his novel ‘The Museum of Innocence’. Both the museum and the novel were created together and are about the stories of two families in Istanbul.
The two art works act as a gateway into upper-class Istanbul life. The museum collection consists of various items detailed in the book such as clothing, objects and dreams.
Virtual and Alternative Museums
Our imaginations aren’t the only places museums can exist outside traditional institutions. There are now virtual reality and alternative museums that offer a unique experience for art lovers. One of such examples is the Museum of the Phantom City.
The Museum of the Phantom City was created by two artists; Irene Cheng and Brett Snyder in 2009. This creation is an app that provides means for users to display and share images, texts or information about revolutionary architectural works that were never created. One of such works is the Buckminster-Fuller’s dome over Manhattan. Archigram’s pop-futurist vision project and Gaudi’s cathedral are other examples of such works.
When users move around the city, the app immediately alerts them when they are around any relevant imaginary structures. It then makes it possible for them to superimpose the imaginary structures on their physical view of the city and see them created through special Augmented Reality (AR) technology. It also allows users to contribute towards the creation of these alternative images.
The app serves as a virtual museum that utilizes AR technology to build imaginary objects and architectural projects using information that can be found within the virtual space. This way, it serves as a cultural archive that can’t be found in a single remote, physical location. It serves as an archive of dreams of what architects and artists once hoped to create in a city.
Temporary Museums and Nomadic Museums
Most people have the traditional view that a museum is only valid if it has a single location where it can always be found. This is due to the fact museums serve as stores that people can trust to hold information about the past. However, there are quite a few pop-up museums and temporary museums that serve these purposes.
The Empathy Museum
The Empathy Museum began in 2015 and is a collection of art installations that is dedicated towards helping viewers understand the world through the eyes of other people. It does this by using storytelling and interactive dialogue. Its goal is to help people approach and interact with systemic global issues like inequality and prejudice using empathy to help people reach a tangible understanding. The creator of the project is Roman Krznaric and the artist, Clare Patey, directs it.
One of its most significant initiatives, A Mile in My Shoes, was started in May 2018. It’s a podcast where people can listen to different stories from the lives of diverse people from all over the world.
The Empathy Museum isn’t confined to a single location as it doesn’t have a permanent address. Each project is a temporary event and it travels worldwide for its installations. It has offices located in London.
The Empathy Museum also features projects like:
- From Where I’m Standing
- Human Library
- A Thousand and One Books
Projects such as these serve as a means of sharing stories and experiences with people who may never have interacted with these stories otherwise. It fulfills some of the goals of a museum which is to expose people to diverse situations and environments that broaden their worldview.
Ashes and Snow
Gregory Colbert, a Canadian artist, is responsible for conceiving of the Ashes and Snow project. It is an installation that consists of a myriad of artistic presentations. Some of the items displayed include photographic artworks, films and even a novel in letters. To house and transport the exhibition effectively, he uses a special structure called the Nomadic Museum. The collection seeks to look deeper into the poetic sensibilities that human beings may share with animals.
Ashes and Snow has been received at several locations all over the world, including Tokyo, Venice, Mexico City and New York City. Since its creation till now, Ashes and Snow has accumulated over 10 million viewers. No other living artist has ever been able to achieve such a feat.
Ashes and Snow is an exhibition that contains over fifty large-scale photographic artworks. It also contains three film installations. The name, Ashes and Snow, is derived from the literary part of the exhibition. It is a fictional story of a man who writes 360 letters to his wife during a yearlong journey. The narrative element of the films is anchored by fragments of the letters. The project was first published by Gregory Colbert in 2004.
Ashes and Snow curated an experience that allows its viewers to immerse themselves in visual storytelling, just like any museum would be able to do. The temperature nature of the installations does little to remove from the impactful effects of each of the artistic presentations.
Museums and the Illusion of Permanence
Part of the main power of museums lies in their ability to sell a story or an experience. Museums offer history, narratives, science and logic that help to frame our understanding of the world and its offerings. Museums help to shape our reality by telling us what we need to know about the past and sometimes the future.
Can’t it then be said then that even the physical, permanent museum contributes towards shaping our imaginations? The museum itself is built on performance. To take away performance from a museum would be to take away its magical ability to tell stories.
When we understand that art institutions themselves are not exempt from the attempt to sell a story, to capture the imagination, we start to understand that imaginary and fictional museums have their own roles to play in how we interact with art and museums.