The internet and contemporary visual culture: balancing aesthetics and politics in museums during the global era

• Main Author: Christine Bernier
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Universidade Federal de Goiás 2013-06-01
• Series: Visualidades
• Subjects: Visual Culture; museums; internet
• Online Access: https://revistas.ufg.emnuvens.com.br/VISUAL/article/view/28189

This essay looks at the use made by several museums of highly advanced technological and communication tools. An examination of a number of recent media events highlights the important place assigned by museums to new exhibition platforms and techniques, such as virtual exhibitions and extremely high-resolution reproductions. Through an analysis of several recent cases that illustrate how controversies sparked by contemporary artworks are handled, I consider how museums deal with politics and aesthetics in their mediation of artworks in the global era. Particular attention is paid to the Internet presentation of a work by the contemporary artist Chris Ofili entitled No Woman, No Cry , which was selected by Tate Britain to be part of the Google Art Project. A review of several other events dating from 2011 reveals how in the context of the Internet museums pursue the same principles they have long been applying in their exhibition galleries and communications with the public. This essay also casts light on the fundamentally new methods that can be employed by websites in the presentation of images in general and artworks in particular.