Museum-itis

My cold is better today, and I was up to reading the Sunday NY Times over soup at lunch (that would be last Sunday's Times and soup I sent Jerry out to buy).  There's an article by art critic Edward Rothstein called "Extreme Museum: The Rigors of Contemplation," about his experience with "Museum Mind," which he describes as "when I couldn't really pay attention to da Vinci at the Louvre or Rembrandt at the Rijksmuseum...the evidence can be seen in every museum as people rush through galleries, seeming to seek relief from something in hot pursuit."

God, do I know what he means!  The worst attack of Museum Mind I ever had was last May during my first visit to Florence.  We were in the Uffizi Gallery,  where  every last painting was iconic, something I'd seen in art history classes,  The Real Deal, thinking, "Oh, no!  Not another one!" Afterward,  I wrote in my trip journal, "I feel a bit guilty for not being enraptured.  Went to roof cafe and watched a small boy chase pigeons."

An antidote to Museum Mind can be museum gift shops, which, Rothstein says, "often function as decompression chambers," to prolonged submersion in art.   True for me.   When Museum Mind strikes, I begin to think of having to look at art as the price I pay for getting to the gift shop.  Very, very bad.

What to do?  Rothstein says Museum Mind can be controlled by careful rationing, limiting exposure to the most demanding and consuming forms of contemplation.  Exhibits that are not art--historical or natural history exhibits--are less demanding, he says, and I agree.

But I want to look at art!  Who gives permission to skip some masterpieces and concentrate on only one?  To call it a day when you're thinking more about the gift shop than what's in front of you on the wall?  This takes more discipline than I have.  Afflicted by Museum Mind,  I've rushed through the galleries get to the gift shop, where I buy postcards of masterpieces I strode by.  It's nuts, but I get a lot of pleasure from postcards of paintings I was too overwhelmed by to  look at on the wall and ended up pasting into my trip journal.  What the hell.