The writing is on the wall – paragraphs of black letters across white boards mounted on white walls, confronting viewers with a dense wall of words that they struggle to read and understand.
It’s not that they don’t make sense or that they don’t contain useful, even interesting, information – they’re just not reader-friendly. They’re dull and worthy, trying to distil too much into too little space, using the language of textbooks rather than speech.
Maybe they’ve gone the opposite way, saying too little, leaving the visitor with no sense of the significance of what they are looking at. They lack an opening sentence that packs a punch and frequently trail away into a wordy list of acknowledgements and logos.
This is the stuff that my book, The Interpretation Matters Handbook, is about – the writing that galleries and museums produce for public information.
I’ve approached the subject from a range of professional perspectives, exploring the views of curators who compose texts; of artists who are being written about; of educationalists who are concerned with learning and access. I’ve also tried to include a sense of the visitor experience of labelling since it’s for their benefit that this text is produced.
Penelope Curtis, the director of Tate Britain, talks with passion about her Walk Through British Art display and two arts professionals give their response to it.
I've interviewed Richard Wilson, David Blandy and Emily Speed – three artists at different stages of their careers – about how they negotiate how their work is presented.
Curators Lewis Biggs, Omar Kholeif and Gerardo Mosquera reveal their approaches to exhibition interpretation in an international context. Two essays touch on how fine art and art curating is taught at university level.
Abigail Harrison Moore, from the University of Leeds, and Amanda Phillips, the learning and access officer at Leeds Art Gallery, talk about how they have collaborated to teach a master’s module called Interpreting Cultures. In some ways, the book can be seen as a series of conversations, interspersed with commentary and satire.
Written interpretation is a niche area that punches way above its weight, providing an immediate interface between the visitor and the display. In the process of putting this book together, I’ve learned that everyone has strong opinions about it.
By necessity, every institution does it differently – there is no right answer. But good writing matters, and thinking about what makes writing poor, indifferent or excellent is important. I’m hoping that I’ve produced a useful critique of an area of our work that encourages just that.
For more about the project: interpretationmatters.com
It’s not that they don’t make sense or that they don’t contain useful, even interesting, information – they’re just not reader-friendly. They’re dull and worthy, trying to distil too much into too little space, using the language of textbooks rather than speech.
Maybe they’ve gone the opposite way, saying too little, leaving the visitor with no sense of the significance of what they are looking at. They lack an opening sentence that packs a punch and frequently trail away into a wordy list of acknowledgements and logos.
This is the stuff that my book, The Interpretation Matters Handbook, is about – the writing that galleries and museums produce for public information.
I’ve approached the subject from a range of professional perspectives, exploring the views of curators who compose texts; of artists who are being written about; of educationalists who are concerned with learning and access. I’ve also tried to include a sense of the visitor experience of labelling since it’s for their benefit that this text is produced.
Penelope Curtis, the director of Tate Britain, talks with passion about her Walk Through British Art display and two arts professionals give their response to it.
I've interviewed Richard Wilson, David Blandy and Emily Speed – three artists at different stages of their careers – about how they negotiate how their work is presented.
Curators Lewis Biggs, Omar Kholeif and Gerardo Mosquera reveal their approaches to exhibition interpretation in an international context. Two essays touch on how fine art and art curating is taught at university level.
Abigail Harrison Moore, from the University of Leeds, and Amanda Phillips, the learning and access officer at Leeds Art Gallery, talk about how they have collaborated to teach a master’s module called Interpreting Cultures. In some ways, the book can be seen as a series of conversations, interspersed with commentary and satire.
Written interpretation is a niche area that punches way above its weight, providing an immediate interface between the visitor and the display. In the process of putting this book together, I’ve learned that everyone has strong opinions about it.
By necessity, every institution does it differently – there is no right answer. But good writing matters, and thinking about what makes writing poor, indifferent or excellent is important. I’m hoping that I’ve produced a useful critique of an area of our work that encourages just that.
For more about the project: interpretationmatters.com
Dany Louise is a visual arts specialist and writer
