Exhibiting Culture... (Cultures?)

Last week, I read a chapter out of the book Exhibiting Cultures: They Poetics ad Politics of Museum Display that was titled “Exhibiting Intention: Some Preconditions of the Visual Display of Culturally Purposeful Objects.” This chapter touched on many of the problems surrounding museum didactics (labels for exhibits). The author addresses the “space between object and label.” There are three participants in the museum exhibition of cultural artifacts: the original maker of the object, the exhibitor, and the viewer. The space between label and object is where these roles converge. While I was reading this article, I could appreciate the viewpoints that the author was creating, that labeling and exhibiting an object may lead to a problematic representation of a culture, and his proposed solution was compelling. Labels are interpretive rather than descriptive; they do not describe the physical properties of an object, but rather create a story around the object by making a curatorial decision about what facts are appropriate to accompany the object. While we are conditioned to see museums as temples of knowledge and truth, the fact of the matter is that the information that is provided was selected and edited by an exhibitor. They have decided what information is best to tell about the object as an outsider to that culture, unable to truly understand the nuances of that object’s role. The author goes on to point out that when a viewer is surrounded by an exhibit displaying the artifacts of one culture, they are left to construct (with the guidance of the exhibitor) an incomplete story of otherness. This is problematic because it does not draw attention to the cultural uniqueness of the viewer’s own experience. Others have cultures, the viewer’s own culture is the norm. Instead, the author proposes showing artifacts from several different cultures that are similar in function or are put in relevant context. This cues the viewer to acknowledge their own cultural bias and is less alienating to other groups. I believe that this is a compelling argument, and I surely would enjoy an exhibit that put Picasso’s paintings next to the African masks that they were inspired by. This would provide a truer version of history. It does make me wonder, however, how one would “correctly” go about learning about a specific people. Is there no place in a fair world for a culturally specific exhibition? While there are clearly problematic aspects to this concept, it seems as though there is no ideal way to learn about a group of people’s way of life without living there for extended periods of time. I would be interested in hearing a proposed solution of how to approach this in a way that is feasible and reasonable.