ok72076
Jacksonville, AR
56, joined Jan. 2008
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| 1. boring? |
| 2. public apathy? |
| 3. Not changed enough |
| 4. All the above |
| 5. unknown? |
The brass at the Arkansas Arts Center may be right that they need more room (instead of just putting more paintings at different levels on the walls) but the art center and the Little Rock area museums have a bigger problem that they are the main cause of: public apathy.
I walk around the art center and the museums whenever they have a new exhibit. But the only time they have much of a crowd is at special events, such as the second Friday art night monthly and the Museum of Discovery's $1 admission on the first Sunday of the month. I don't know about during the week but on the weekend attendance seems very sparse!
Their main problem is permanent exhibits that never change, are boring and don't have a tie to current events. Plus they have temporary exhibits that hang around more than three or four months. Does the art center really have to keep boring Paul Signac artwork for nearly a year?
The Old Statehouse Museum's exhibit on famous Arkansans in Hollywood has been hanging around for 15 months. The Indian and knife exhibits at Historic Arkansas Museum have never been changed, not even temporarily to focus on descendants of white men who married Indian women and Indians who "passed" as white, or displaying Civil War swords and guns with the knife exhibit.
When they don't have anything new, the only way they get people to come down to the museums is for free things, like the free beer, free wine, music and snacks at the second Friday art night.
The leaders of the art center and museums need to realize frequent changes and special events, even co-sponsoring 5K races and fund-raisers, are needed to keep people interested in what they offer. Otherwise they will continue to lose the public apathy fight.
But, the state does need a museum of contemporary Arkansas and U.S. cultural history since World War II along with the museums and art center sharing their exhibits temporarily around the state and locally. Why should North Little Rock's Laman Library pay to put on an out-of-state exhibit for 60- to 90- days when local museums have exhibits in storage? At least the exhibits at Laman Library change frequently enough to avoid apathy by frequent library patrons.
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