Communities and Cooperation

At the very end of the section on the "experiment" that was the Newark Museum, Dana describes an institution with an acquisitions policy so in tune with the needs and desires of its community that it would still be considered a model example. In fact, the Newark Museum from its foundation, had a clear sense of its own circumstances-- how it should use local resources to meet local needs and its geographical relationship to very prominent museums in New York. Rather than trying to compete with the grand, seemingly comprehensive collections held in some of the New York City museums, the Newark Museum had "a policy of acquiring and using only what can be made effective in the life of its community" (181). Much of what the readers of this book have said over and over is how applicable Dana's ideas are to modern museum work, but I am forced to repeat those sentiments yet again in this post.

His embrace of the fact that the Newark Museum did not have the objects and resources of larger museums, but that there was so much value in having the city around them is quite astounding. One might laugh that his museum once staged "a showing of bathtubs made in New Jersey," (180) but it's also easy to believe that such an exhibit might have shown the people of Newark how "art and science and industry were made to seem closer to everyday life" (180). The Newark Museum tried to fill the space the community had open for it, rather than try to rival the nationally recognized museums. The Newark Museum based its collections on the principle of utility, meaning the power of its exhibits to "inspire by their beauty, stimulate creative design or creative ideas, or have educational value" (180-181). Dana also advocates for a "less is more" approach in exhibit design because a small, well-designed exhibit can convey messages more effectively than a sprawling, unfocused one. These ideas show up all over my 21st century textbooks! Today, it seems that even the largest, wealthiest museums are expected to evaluate how they measure up in terms of meeting the needs of their specific communities. In 2011, the museums Dana was determined not to struggle to imitate are working to be more like his Newark Museum was.

If this seeming model of a community museum has not already made you wish for a time machine, perhaps the prospect of visiting the 1923 exhibit on China, discussed in this section, would. According to Dana, "China: The Land and the People" was the product of an extraordinary amount of US-Chinese cooperation. I want to see this exhibit. Dana certainly makes it sound like a landmark achievement, devoted to "promoting understanding and sympathy between nations," and breaking "down hostility and open[ing] up paths to friendship" (181). Yet, it's so difficult to envision an exhibit during that time satisfying our modern requirements for collaborative work and the representation of multiple perspectives, especially given the knowledge of some of then contemporary cultural or ethnographic exhibits. I really wish I could see "China: The Land and the People," and evaluate it for myself.