Noise or silence: who decides?

[ahinton]

That's a pretty contemptuous way of addressing someone.

I'm sure I am not quite alone in my reading.

I don't know about that but have to say that I didn't even understand Bryn's meaning, intended or otherwise.

[Bryn]

I don't know about that but have to say that I didn't even understand Bryn's meaning, intended or otherwise.

My first thought was to refer to the "to and fro" of the discussion, but then thought "ping-pong" would be more apposite. That lead to whiff-whaff, which was the name used by the table tennis team I was a member of back when operating as a Research Assistant at the then Heating and Ventilating Research Association. I also played in the Croquet team there. I did very much enjoy listening to The Life Scientific this morning, and thought it bore linking to here. The "light" pun was after the manner of "Charles the First had his head chopped off, making England's shortest reigning monarch shorter still".

[jean]

I made no mention of the recently appointed Foreign Secretary. You might consider stopping your excavation activities.

It was Boris Johnson who declared that whiff-whaff was exactly the same game as ping -pong. Others disagree.

But having posted that I decided the point was that it's insulting to refer to a discussion by either term, so I deletd the reference.

[MrGongGong]

But I don't think that it's this simple division of "baddies" and "goodies", MrGG.

I wasn't dividing folks in that way
Some of the time i'm very firmly in the group that absolutely hates music with other things (I remember going to see Pina Bausch and loving the dance while detesting the music) and at others I love it (as with the Monet projections) which is why I think it's more a case of talking about what works rather than the kind of absolutist statements we get from the boy in the Lederhosen.

What do the people who would love to see the artefacts but at the same time hate the curators' "creation"? For them, they have the choice either of having their immediate connection with the artefacts distorted by the creation, rather than (as is the presumed intention) enhanced by it or not seeing the artefacts at all - for them, the experience is like having somebody standing between them and a painting they wish to see - a painting that they have come miles to see - a painting that they can only see in that gallery. Are they simply to be told to go and ... enjoy ... themselves somewhere else? Do they not matter? Are they evil people to be eliminated from centres where such artefacts are on display - unworthy of the privilege of being in the presence of the artefacts?

Good question
What about them?
Should they be the one to choose the manner of presentation?
Maybe it's more a case of having more exhibitions AND having a greater variety of ways of them happening.

Put another way - imagine the thing (painting, sculpture, tribal helmet, manuscript ... whatever) that you have always wanted to see, but, because it's in a museum in a part of the world which is difficult to get to, you've never managed to see it other than in photographs. It's coming to a centre not ten miles from you - and it's going to be shown in a curated event in which Paul McCartney will be singing Andrew Lloyd Webber's arrangement of DoG in the nude (and behind bulletproof glass, so you can't even get a decent punch thrown in). That's what you seem to be demanding others put up with - take it or leave it in the name of creativity - isn't it?

I'd pay good money to see that and spend many happy years deconstructing it based on the well known phrase.... "you can't polish a t*rd"

I'm not demanding anyone "puts up" with anything any more than what happens when one goes to see a movie with a soundtrack or even a concert with music you don't like.

From the people who HAVE been to this BM show I imagine I would really hate it as well BUT still respect the curatorial decisions that go into it.
Also, as a long time enthusiast for musics that are widely derided or dismissed i'm perfectly happy for other people to hate what I love and don't really want to impose my own aesthetic. It might well be that this is an unimaginative use of sound (though from the reviews it would seem to me that the folks writing them don't know much about it anyway) but that doesn't negate the whole idea of sound in exhibitions EVEN in ones where the artists involved are long since dead!