The museum should take this moment to install a series of mirrors so that when you walk in you are exposed to all the different vantage points and can see it the right way, the wrong way and all other ways in between.<p>I bet that would get a lot of extra coverage in the news leading to extra money for the museum.<p>Also, they should advertise that one lucky person will be met by a dastardly villain who emerges from the house of mirrors and then murders them. That would also earn a lot of publicity and more money for the museum. When the villain emerges, they should say "I'm with the Pantone company, and you are looking at illegal colors, prepare to die."
When I was in high school AV, one of the favorite projects we were involved in was a short doc/trailer for an abstract exhibit in a local museum.<p>We interviewed several people. The artistic director. Some people from our school who were painting a Sol LeWitt performance piece on the wall.<p>All in all pretty generic stuff. People describing what abstract art meant to them, how people could interact with it.<p>And then we interviewed the janitor (I was behind the camera observing).<p>He talked about how he hung paintings.<p>How there is a standard wire they put on the back of frames to ensure it was easy to hang frames level.<p>What the typical height of a hung artwork was. Based on how tall the average visitor was, and from how far away they would observe the painting.<p>It was the absolute highlight of that trailer.
This a common problem with abstract art. I have seen examples of rotations over various angles. I also have seen mirrored reproductions in catalogues and even the wrong work being reproduced in publications, especially when the works are from a series of similar works or when the final work differs but slightly from a study and a photograph of the study is used as a reproduction. Sometimes it is even not possible anymore to establish the original title of the work due all the confusion and mismatches. I know of two art museums in the Netherlands who both claim to posses the same art work from a series, while the works are clearly distinct. I think I know which one is incorrect, and I did point it out to them, but they simply refuse to correct the title.
As a part-time artist who prints abstract digital art, I’ve had this happen to me - had my art hung upside-down from what I intended in a gallery show. It’s one reason I started signing the bottom right corner of the work, and framing with hanging wire well offset vertically from the center. But in at least one case I remember, I discussed the orientation with a buyer of the work and we agreed that the upside-down mistake actually looked better, and I endorsed them hanging it that way. Sometimes the orientation may be critical to the intent, and sometimes it’s not particularly relevant. It’s too bad we can’t ask Mondrian himself. I don’t know anything about his history or personality, anyone have any idea if orientation really mattered to him or whether he’s the kind of artist that would be open to someone preferring an upside-down version?
Funnily enough, this parody news article from De Speld (like The Onion, but Dutch) describes the same thing! <a href="https://speld.nl/2013/04/16/schilderij-mondriaan-hing-jarenlang-op-de-kop/" rel="nofollow">https://speld.nl/2013/04/16/schilderij-mondriaan-hing-jarenl...</a>
I've often seen reproductions of Marcel Duchamp's Fountain hung on walls at 90 degrees to how the artist originally presented his "sculpture"... ;)<p><a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/duchamp-fountain-t07573" rel="nofollow">https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/duchamp-fountain-t07573</a>
This strikes me as interesting in terms of the question of how important artist intent is.<p>It seems to me that for many pieces of abstract art it doesn't really matter which side the artist intended to be the top. It might matter if the orientation has an impact on the work's message (e.g. if the author intended abstract shapes at the top to in some way represent Heaven while those on the bottom represent earth). However, I'd suggest that "this is what the artist intended" is not on it's own enough to make the orientation important.
A restorer would certainly be able to correct the loose-tape problem. I'm shocked the curator is content to leave it in the compromised state.<p>Watch Baumgartner Restoration to see examples of extreme restoration.
So they can't turn it the right way up, because M. Mondrian chose to make the thing out of sticky-tape, and the stickiness has dried up over the years.<p>I guess there's a reason the masters made their own paint, out of linseed oil and pigments.
Next time someone invites me to a modern art gallery, I'm going to stare at one of the paintings for a couple minutes then say, "You know, I think this one is upside down.."
I think I shall never be aesthetically inclined enough to know what this painting means, it doesn't mean anything more to me no matter which side is right side up. I really wish I could see it, but I never do. I (think) I can see it when I see other abstract stuff that at least has a "form" that exists in nature but stuff like this I just don't get it and I wish that I could.
Theory: modern art was promoted by the wealthy art world because it eliminates the ability of the artist to engage in potentially threatening or disturbing social or political commentary.<p>Case example (relevant to our current world) - Henri Rousseau's War (1984 - oops, 1894), depicting a girl/woman riding a horse across a field of bodies with a sword in one hand and a torch in the other. There's nothing signifying nobility and glory; it's mostly madness and lunacy. It has historical significance, as wars had ravaged Europe for centuries and the 20th century, with industrialized warfare on a new scale, was about to break new records for battlefield savagery and violence against civilian populations.<p><a href="https://www.henrirousseau.net/war.jsp" rel="nofollow">https://www.henrirousseau.net/war.jsp</a><p>What would be the 'modern art' version of 'War'?