New York: Museums
Tue, Sep. 2nd, 2008 10:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterNote: Not in New York, just incredibly behind in writing stuff up!
This time visiting New York, I actually had time to go around and explore, as opposed to trying to grab everyone and socialize (which is also fun! And I did that too!). Since I've been to NY quite a few times before and seen some of the more well-known museums, I decided to go to slightly less famous ones this time around.
(Though I still went to the Met for the superhero exhibition.)
Museum of Sex:
This was rather odd. The special exhibit was on the world of animal sex, with the political bent that it's silly to label human sexuality as "natural" or "unnatural" given the range of animal sexuality. I particularly liked the display on the matriarchal primates though! Mostly, I liked it, only I didn't learn that much, as a lot of the information I've either gathered from the internet or from books like Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation.
Upstairs was a special exhibit on sex in US films, from early Hollywood to the porn industry. Let me just say, it was awkward standing around reading placards while hearing tons of film-people moaning their way to orgasm around. Also, a lot of the visitors that day (or in general, who knows?) were couples. And though the write-ups tried to contextualize everything and though the museum seems to have a fairly progressive standpoint with regard to sexual orientation, cis/transgender issues and sexism, it was still a very depressing exhibit. Because it was an overview of Hollywood, it was very white, very male, and very heterosexual; while there were a few examples of transgendered people or gay and lesbian people being treated like actual people, mostly it felt very exploitative. Ditto with the emphasis of the sexiness of the "foreign" and "exotic."
I found the porn industry stuff even more depressing for the same reasons. Again, though there were some counterexamples, and though the museum was quite obviously making a comment, it made me feel really filthy watching image after image of stereotyped women, black men, Asian women, gay men, lesbian women, MTFs and FTMs. Blech.
The bits from the museum's collection also felt the same. There was a little film on robot sex, in which the female robots were literally getting screwed (I winced as I watched), to machines that have dildos hammering into women. The message seemed to be that guys get life-like dolls with expressions and soft skin and hair while women get painful-looking, industrial machines; women are objects either way.
National Museum of the American Indian:
This is in a really beautiful building, although the museum itself is fairly small (probably because it's an offshoot of the main Smithsonian museum). Also, a lot of galleries were closed in preparation of a coming exhibit on women and clothes (want to see!). My favorite part here was the remix one: people from different tribes and racial backgrounds (all Native, but many multiracial people) redefining what "American Indian" or "Native American" means. My favorite was a thirty-minute home video of a Native woman learning 30 different dances; none of the dancers looked professional, but they were having so much fun. Another favorite was a display of European pastel figurines dressed in Georgian-style clothing, only their heads were knocked off and replaced with Native figurines.
Museum of Jewish Heritage:
Like the Museum of Sex, this museum, which is specifically on the Holocaust, didn't have much information that I didn't already know, but seeing it laid out again was still painful and moving—pain at watching almost everyone in the world turn a blind eye, save Denmark and individuals acting out, moving to see the anger and the pride. The opening piece in the exhibit is of a torah recovered from the Nazis: they had planned on using it as a museum display of the wiped out Jewish race, and instead, it is part of a museum display celebrating Jewish survival.
It's not a museum that grants you peace of mind, but it's necessary, especially the details. I was also thinking that we need museums like this for slavery, for the attempted (and still being attempted) genocide of American Indians, for what is going on today with Muslims and Middle Eastern people. Which is not a critique of the Museum of the American Indian; I think both a celebration of a culture and a highlighting of oppression are needed.
Museum of the Fashion Institute of Technology:
I have nothing really insightful to say about this, except, hey, clothes! Also, people were much shorter and thinner in the Victorian era, which we all knew. I'm not sure the exhibition accomplished its goal in going for influential women in fashion, particularly for those who weren't designers, but that may just be my own ignorance about the industry. Part of it was the non-designer women were frequently people who bought haute couture, and I felt there wasn't a very good explanation as to how that influenced fashion per se.
And then, on my way out, some jerk decided to randomly konnichiwa/ni hao/annyeong me. And I couldn't think of what to do, and I wasn't sure if I should even do anything. I was trying to calculate if I could run, if anyone would help me if the guy didn't back down, if if if, and in the end, I didn't look at him and went the subway. I hate that SO MUCH, the helplessness and the anger and the fear. And while this is irrational, I was even more pissed off because there was an E. Asian guy next to the white guy harassing me, and he didn't say a thing, and I felt so betrayed.
Which makes three for New York. Last Thanksgiving some white guy babbled at me, and when I thought he didn't know English and was trying to figure out how to say "croissant," he asked me if I knew Chinese. "Uh. Yes," I said, then quickly wished I hadn't answered. "Well, so do I," he said proudly. "So?" I said back to him, and he looked so affronted that I didn't want to help him practice. Neither of these were as scary as when a guy on the street yelled at my sister, her friend and I to get out of the US, but still. And it makes me sad that the first reaction is: "At least it wasn't as scary as..."
This time visiting New York, I actually had time to go around and explore, as opposed to trying to grab everyone and socialize (which is also fun! And I did that too!). Since I've been to NY quite a few times before and seen some of the more well-known museums, I decided to go to slightly less famous ones this time around.
(Though I still went to the Met for the superhero exhibition.)
Museum of Sex:
This was rather odd. The special exhibit was on the world of animal sex, with the political bent that it's silly to label human sexuality as "natural" or "unnatural" given the range of animal sexuality. I particularly liked the display on the matriarchal primates though! Mostly, I liked it, only I didn't learn that much, as a lot of the information I've either gathered from the internet or from books like Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation.
Upstairs was a special exhibit on sex in US films, from early Hollywood to the porn industry. Let me just say, it was awkward standing around reading placards while hearing tons of film-people moaning their way to orgasm around. Also, a lot of the visitors that day (or in general, who knows?) were couples. And though the write-ups tried to contextualize everything and though the museum seems to have a fairly progressive standpoint with regard to sexual orientation, cis/transgender issues and sexism, it was still a very depressing exhibit. Because it was an overview of Hollywood, it was very white, very male, and very heterosexual; while there were a few examples of transgendered people or gay and lesbian people being treated like actual people, mostly it felt very exploitative. Ditto with the emphasis of the sexiness of the "foreign" and "exotic."
I found the porn industry stuff even more depressing for the same reasons. Again, though there were some counterexamples, and though the museum was quite obviously making a comment, it made me feel really filthy watching image after image of stereotyped women, black men, Asian women, gay men, lesbian women, MTFs and FTMs. Blech.
The bits from the museum's collection also felt the same. There was a little film on robot sex, in which the female robots were literally getting screwed (I winced as I watched), to machines that have dildos hammering into women. The message seemed to be that guys get life-like dolls with expressions and soft skin and hair while women get painful-looking, industrial machines; women are objects either way.
National Museum of the American Indian:
This is in a really beautiful building, although the museum itself is fairly small (probably because it's an offshoot of the main Smithsonian museum). Also, a lot of galleries were closed in preparation of a coming exhibit on women and clothes (want to see!). My favorite part here was the remix one: people from different tribes and racial backgrounds (all Native, but many multiracial people) redefining what "American Indian" or "Native American" means. My favorite was a thirty-minute home video of a Native woman learning 30 different dances; none of the dancers looked professional, but they were having so much fun. Another favorite was a display of European pastel figurines dressed in Georgian-style clothing, only their heads were knocked off and replaced with Native figurines.
Museum of Jewish Heritage:
Like the Museum of Sex, this museum, which is specifically on the Holocaust, didn't have much information that I didn't already know, but seeing it laid out again was still painful and moving—pain at watching almost everyone in the world turn a blind eye, save Denmark and individuals acting out, moving to see the anger and the pride. The opening piece in the exhibit is of a torah recovered from the Nazis: they had planned on using it as a museum display of the wiped out Jewish race, and instead, it is part of a museum display celebrating Jewish survival.
It's not a museum that grants you peace of mind, but it's necessary, especially the details. I was also thinking that we need museums like this for slavery, for the attempted (and still being attempted) genocide of American Indians, for what is going on today with Muslims and Middle Eastern people. Which is not a critique of the Museum of the American Indian; I think both a celebration of a culture and a highlighting of oppression are needed.
Museum of the Fashion Institute of Technology:
I have nothing really insightful to say about this, except, hey, clothes! Also, people were much shorter and thinner in the Victorian era, which we all knew. I'm not sure the exhibition accomplished its goal in going for influential women in fashion, particularly for those who weren't designers, but that may just be my own ignorance about the industry. Part of it was the non-designer women were frequently people who bought haute couture, and I felt there wasn't a very good explanation as to how that influenced fashion per se.
And then, on my way out, some jerk decided to randomly konnichiwa/ni hao/annyeong me. And I couldn't think of what to do, and I wasn't sure if I should even do anything. I was trying to calculate if I could run, if anyone would help me if the guy didn't back down, if if if, and in the end, I didn't look at him and went the subway. I hate that SO MUCH, the helplessness and the anger and the fear. And while this is irrational, I was even more pissed off because there was an E. Asian guy next to the white guy harassing me, and he didn't say a thing, and I felt so betrayed.
Which makes three for New York. Last Thanksgiving some white guy babbled at me, and when I thought he didn't know English and was trying to figure out how to say "croissant," he asked me if I knew Chinese. "Uh. Yes," I said, then quickly wished I hadn't answered. "Well, so do I," he said proudly. "So?" I said back to him, and he looked so affronted that I didn't want to help him practice. Neither of these were as scary as when a guy on the street yelled at my sister, her friend and I to get out of the US, but still. And it makes me sad that the first reaction is: "At least it wasn't as scary as..."