Hit or Miss Accessibility at the MCA

Had a great conversation with Angela today about art, blindness, museum accessibility, and how “community building” might facilitate real solutions. I’ve been thinking a lot about the Dan Peterman show at the MCA, and how strange it was to interact with the work within an institutional setting.

The chairs made from grocery carts? “Why, yes you can sit on those!” the museum guard assured me. The same went for the house of foam and the outdoor classroom tree stumps. I’d almost made my way through the entire exhibit without incident when the guard came over to inspect the monocular I use to read the titles of artworks and other inaccessible signage.
“Just as long as you aren’t taking pictures with it…” she warned, visibly concerned, even after I’d explained its function. I realized I was looking at a piece that belongs to someone that I in fact know- the dean of the art school where I’m currently working towards an MFA in Studio Art. An additional sign read, “Please do not touch.” The piece was a customized Swiss army knife, complete with a small tin cup. Nothing too fragile. Still, I wonder if Judith would mind if a couple of blind people handled her Peterman while wearing curator’s gloves. Not that this was an option, because in the U.S. people with disabilities have access to only a fraction of the cultural products on display in public institutions.

I left the MCA that day marveling at the complex negotiations that artists like Dan are engaging in. Angela said something to me today about museums functioning as the mausoleums for dead art. I do think that when people are discouraged from engaging with work in an intuitive way that, well, the smell of rot must creep in.