Monday, June 01, 2015

MUSEUMS - A Different Gift Shop

"This museum gift shop sells art you can’t hang on the wall" PBS NewsHour 5/27/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  In Minneapolis, the Walker Art Center is offering art lovers a new thing to collect: intangible experience, direct from artist to consumer.  Jeffrey Brown reports on how customers can purchase personal dances, ringtones, even the chance to stage their own art exhibit.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Next, an experiment in personalized intangible art, direct from the artist to a consumer like you.

Jeffrey Brown has the story from Minneapolis.

WOMAN:  I’m going to have you walk towards the bridge.  And when you see a person in an orange shirt, the show has begun.

(CROSSTALK)

JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour):  The show has begun.

I’m just going?

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.  I had been told to meet with performers from the dance group BodyCartography at Loring Park in downtown Minneapolis.

I think I have arrived at the performance.

But it was all very mysterious, especially when this man in an orange shirt began to dance, and he seemed to be dancing just for me.  Was I supposed to join in?  Confusing me a bit, it turned out, was intentional.

WOMAN:  There’s a lot of playing with your comfort and your discomfort to kind of engage you physically in what’s happening.

JEFFREY BROWN:  Yes.  There is discomfort, right, I’m sure, for a lot of people.

WOMAN:  Yes.

JEFFREY BROWN:  This personal one-on-one dance is part of what’s touted as a new kind of art commerce, e-commerce, to be precise.  The seller is a very prominent museum, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.  Emmet Byrne is the Walker’s design director and one of the creators of this so-called Intangible shopping experience.

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