The Art Museum Today

Abstract Art historians can learn a great about art from a close study of museum installations. Knowing how to do installations is implicit practical knowledge, which perhaps doesn’t need to be made explicit. Hanging is a practice mastered by gifted curators who don’t write out the rules. And so, it is unfortunate that there is too little documentation of these installations. Assembling a wide range of examples, this essay shows what art historians can learn from the practice of curators.     

The Evolving State of the Art CD-ROM: The National Museum of American Art and Les Impressionistes

The present paper analyzes two prominent art history-based CD-ROMs published in 1996 and 1997, and suggests trends in the information and interface design of cultural multimedia programs. It reviews first- and second-generation feature sets, and assesses the initial impact of object-oriented programming. Both CD-ROMs are described in detail, and their interfaces and navigational structures appraised. Other questions treated include the virtues and pitfalls of hyperlinking, the audience for such ambitious projects, the impact of market dynamics, and potential transferability to the WorldWide Web.     

The Via Media of American Museum Practice: Henry Watson Kent and the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Speculation about the character and purposes of American art museums has occasioned intense debate since their inception—never more so than today. Whether to be elitist or populist, object‐based or audience‐based forms the crux of many heated arguments. This article asserts that, in the midst of competing philosophies, the successful American art museum has in reality grown from an amalgam of ideas that form a via media or middle path, far more inclusive and pragmatic than is usually noted. This comprehensive philosophy is most effectively demonstrated in the work of Henry Watson Kent at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York during the first decades of the twentieth century. The work of Kent and his colleagues at the Metropolitan Museum is here examined as a paradigm for the via media museum practice that speaks to the aspirations of America's current art museum leadership.