Well, Phoenix Art Museum doesn’t prevent photography, and I have the photos to prove it.
I think they say “no flash” but with modern cameras you don’t need flash anyway.
But I thought that was the typical rule. Or at least it is at the Art Institute of Chicago. And I’m pretty sure when I visited the Louvre in the 90s, that was the rule, too. I’m sure I’ve seen it at other art museums enough to think of it as the standard rule.
Many museums do say, “no flash photography”. I have photos from many museums, taken openly, within view of the guards. A docent at the Dali museum even pointed out good places to photograph some of the exhibits.
Yeah, I can’t think of a single art museum I’ve been to where I was not allowed to take photos. I often take pictures of stuff to inspire me, or to look up later. I was more thinking to myself where I know the signage specified flash photography. I could swear I’ve been places where they didn’t even care about that, but that one I’m not as sure of.
We recently went to a small town where there was a minor display in the community center of some very local semi-talented pottery. My partner went to take a photo, and the volunteer docent flipped out. “No pictures! NO PICTURES!” It was pretty shrill.
We just smilled and nodded.
I attend a lot of art / craft festivals where a bunch of pro- and semi-pro artists / crafters assemble with their tents to sell their stuff. Much of which is quite good from a technical POV even if I don’t much care for their specific style or genre. Often they have signs saying where they’re from and it could be 10 miles away or 1500.
A very hefty fraction of them have “no photography” signs as part of their normal booth dress. Trying to manage the art / craft equivalent of plagiarism is apparently quite an issue. Though I’ve never had one complain if I took a pic of their business card or postcard or whatever give-away they had. That they rather liked.
True… but it’s pretty hard to plagiarize a ceramic thrown bowl with a specific type of clay and a glaze that has been created specifically by the artist, and fired in a certain type of kiln (gas, electric, wood etc.)
I had a goldsmith friend who did not sell her original designs on the internet, as she said that there would be knock-off copies coming from overseas within days.
Not gonna happen with hand-thrown ceramics.
I don’t disagree with anything you’ve said.
And yet I see “no photos” signs at hand-thrown pottery booths too. The other potters at the show have plenty of ability to recreate similar-enough products if they’re allowed to study the others’ work in enough detail.
Although I also suspect an element of bravado is in there too. A “No pix” sign says “My work is so good / special / saleable that people want to pirate it.” Which is boastful oneupsmanship aimed at the other artists and is also puffery aimed at the customers.
I’ve been to several museums with a “no photos” rule, one being the California State Mining and Mineral Museum. They said it was a security issue to prevent people “casing” the collection.
I was also asked not to photograph items at an antique store. The owner was nice about it, he explained that people were posting images of collectible items and advertising them for sale at a higher price without actually buying them. When the item sold, they would come back to the store to buy it for resale.
I suspect that one of the reasons to not allow it (other than pride and oneupsmanship mentioned upthread) is that in the day and age of internet buying, anyone can find that pic you may have put online (or they took themselves) and put it up as their “for sale” image, then sell some third rate piece of drek that only vaguely looks like the image after putting up some tiny print that says “individual pieces may vary in appearance”.
Lots of skeevy sellers do this for branded products, much less artsy ones - so show an image of a quality “hand crafted” object, and sell a product of some child-labor pottery factory somewhere as the actual source and figure they’ll sell enough to profit despite any (limited if any) consequences.
To quote the OP: “This is why we can’t have nice things” I can’t always imagine how scummy some people are.
I’ve seen specific exhibits with no photography rules inside of museums that do not have blanket policies. I remember a guard posted next to the Nefertiti Bust to keep people from snapping photos, for example.
Did it sing and dance?
It did, but not well enough to win a role in the Disney musical Beauty and the Beast.
I agree in my experience the issue has been flash photography with one exception. The Museu Picasso in Barcelona did not allow any photography at all. I know because I missed the notice and was admonished by a guard when I tried to take a picture of one of the paintings.
I don’t understand taking pictures of paintings in museum. I can’t think of any museum painting that can’t be found with an image search, and at better quality than you’d get yourself. Just write down the name and Google it when you get home.
Write down? What kind of ancient technology is that? It’s much faster for me to take a quick shot with the phone, and a shot of the title/artist plate on my phone than writing anything down or even using the phone for notetaking. Plus I’m visually reminded of what painting and artist it is I’m looking into exploring further than finding some random note that says “A.R. Penck, The Rebelliion of the Gamblers.”
It’s difficult to find very high quality images of a lot of large paintings, so in theory if I took very up-close pictures of the spots I’d like to study up-close later, it would be time efficient to do that rather than looking for good quality pictures online. But then again, I usually only want to look at technique once for a picture, so an even more efficient use of my time would be to just get up close to it and look at it while I’m there.
An exception is if the picture is if the details are not merely technique but actual figures/objects, like some Hieronymous Bosch paintings which have relevant but small details. For some of those details, it is easy to find blown-up pictures, but harder to find for others.
Yeah. A snap as a memory jogger, not a snap as a definitive recording for posterity or later careful study.
I’m still learning the former habit vice hand-pecked notes. But it is a useful habit.
OMG I forgot that Lawson is a big thing in Japan! It was a Cleveland staple for decades, and most of us are obsessed with their Chip Dip which can thankfully still be found at Circle K stores.
Apparently they don’t sell the Chip Dip in Japan. Good thing, it’d probably blow people’s minds.