Between art & Art - the guards
2000 - present • page 1 of 1

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1. MMA #18

2. MMA #22

3. MMA #39

4. BvB #01

5. BvB #07a

6. BvB #17

7. V&A #03

8. V&A #23

9. V&A #24

10. SPR 04

11. SPR #08

12. SPR #23

 
selection from Between art & Art - museum guards

Description • Between art & Art - the guards

This selection of images (there are more) highlights a subtheme that developed as I worked on the larger body of work that comprises Between art & Art. Click here to return to that project.

The photographs that are part of the Between art & Art project mostly present to the viewer the "liminal" spaces of the museum - it's stairwells, corridors, hallways, foyers, entrances and exits, gift shops, courtyards, etc. These are the museum's transitional spaces. Often stationed at the borders of these spaces are the museum guards, their stations marked by their traces - their chairs - even when they are not themselves physically present. Even as they position themselves to have the best view of the galleries, they themselves are virtually invisible for museum visitors.

 

DDescription • Between art & Art - the guards

In this sense, the guards also occupy a kind of liminal space - they are there but not there, appearing in our peripheral vision as we move through the museum. Even when the guards are present they seem one of the fixtures of the museum. An empty room with a guard in it remains strangely empty. It is we, the visitors, who "complete" the room when we enter.

As I worked on Between art & Art I found myself often asking the guards to collaborate with me to try to register this curious presence/absence that is part of the existential nature of the museum. The photographs in this section are a small excerpt from a more extensive group of images that themselves are part of the larger body of work.

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