‘Click!’: Bean-Counting in Brooklyn

In his book “The Wisdom of Crowds,” James Surowiecki, the New Yorker magazine’s business columnist, relates a story about the British scientist Francis Galton. In 1906, Galton attended a county fair, where he participated in a weight-judging competition of a fat ox. Galton believed that, among the 800 participants, the livestock experts at the fair would generally guess the animal’s weight correctly and the amateurs would be way off the mark. When Galton did a statistical test on the contestants’ estimates, averaging them, he came up with a startling conclusion: The “crowd” had guessed that the ox, after it had been slaughtered and dressed, would weigh 1,197 pounds. The actual weight of the ox, after it had been slaughtered and dressed, was 1,198 pounds.Eureka — the wisdom of crowds.The wisdom of crowds, or of “crowdsourcing,” is the impetus behind the Brooklyn Museum’s experimental “Click! A Crowd-Curated Exhibition.” The show, which fosters the notion that in art, “best” and “most popular” are synonymous, was organized not by a curator but, in consultation with Mr. Surowiecki, by Shelly Bernstein, the Brooklyn Museum’s manager of information systems.The exhibition’s diversity-friendly theme is “Changing Faces of Brooklyn.” Ms. Bernstein began with an open invitation to photographers, professional and amateur alike, to show their Brooklyn photographs. Each photographer could submit one image, which was displayed anonymously on the museum’s Web site. During a six-week period, the general public could log on, look at the images, read the artists’ 100-word statements, and judge the photographs one by one on a scale from “least effective” to “most effective.”Here are a few of the facts: 389 images were submitted. Looking an average of 22 seconds at each photograph, 3,344 people left 3,098 comments and cast 410,089 votes. The top 20%, or 78 images, were printed on foam core in four sizes, from 20 by 30 inches to 5 by 7 inches, with the larger sizes for the most popular photographs. They are installed (in the Brooklyn Museum’s increasingly typical trade-show fashion) unframed and without mats, salon-style, in a small, temporary exhibition alcove sandwiched between the Islamic and Chinese galleries on the museum’s second floor. A large cushioned bench, outfitted with paperback copies of Mr. Surowiecki’s book and laptops — so that you can look at the photographs online, as well as read and post comments — fills out the gallery.The show has one memorable photograph, “Dubrow’s Cafeteria” (1979), taken by Marcia Bricker Halperin (it made the top 5%). Shot from the street, “Dubrow’s Cafeteria,” a frank view of a Brooklyn diner window, is a layered, watery montage of patrons and street reflections — passersby, automobiles, signage, a Checker cab — anchored by a pensive old woman who, sitting alone in a booth by the window, clutching her check, stares directly at the camera.Mostly, though, “Click!” gives us what we would expect: We see competent journalism-style images of people, streets, and abandoned buildings waiting for demolition; recognizable views of Park Slope, Crown Heights, Red Hook, the Promenade, Coney Island, and the Brooklyn Bridge, as well as views of Manhattan from Brooklyn’s shores. Blacks, whites, Jews, Muslims, and Puerto Ricans are all represented. The Steeplechase, garbage, graffiti, the East River, and the Cyclone, no less than children and old people, are popular subjects. Some of the images have subtle political messages. Tubby Lambergini’s not-so-subtle “Full Moon Over the East River” (2008) — in which “GENTRIFY THIS!!” is written across a man’s bare, white buttocks — although it is a popular discussion topic on the Web site, did not make it onto the Brooklyn Museum’s walls.“Click!” generally feels like a well-executed, though artistically pedestrian, introductory college photography assignment. The basic idea behind most of the photographs is that of a collage aesthetic, the acknowledgement of the inherent power of juxtaposing two unlike things — a hardhatted construction worker wearing a T-shirt from an Avon breast cancer walkathon; a ship’s prow overwhelming a city street; a boat parked on Myrtle Avenue and an MTA bus whizzing past. One of the most poignant of these is Jeremy Dillahunt’s “Fisherman” (2001), in which an old man, either without interest or unaware, fiddles with his line in the East River, as the World Trade Center towers billow smoke in the distance. Or there is the odd view: Coney Island’s ferris wheel is framed by a diamond-shaped hole in a fence; the Statue of Liberty is seen through an arc of barbed wire.The problem with “Click!,” however, is not the photographs but the fact that the Brooklyn Museum would undertake such a project in the first place. If you believe that a museum’s purpose is to mirror the lowest common denominator of public interest and to get the neighborhood involved with things “artistic” — no matter what the cost — then “Click!” may be your thing. If you believe, as I do, that a museum’s mission is to offer us cultures’ highest artistic achievements (regardless of whether or not the general public takes notice), then “Click!” will feel like a wholehearted surrender to populist taste.One could argue that anything to get viewers through the museum’s doors is positive — even if those “doors” are merely clicks on the museum’s Web site (and museum visitors to “Click!” do have to pass through galleries of outstanding works of art). But I would argue that, in this case, the Brooklyn Museum is sending a dangerously mixed message, one that suggests that the museum and its curators, not trusting the inherent power of their own collection, are scrambling; running out of ideas; counting receipts; counting beans.“Click!” is a show about community outreach, not about art. Its high-school-pep-rally-meets-high-school-science-project mentality, its Come-on-gang, we-can-do-it spirit suggests that next we could see an art-related raffle, cakewalk, Sadie Hawkins dance, carnival, or bake sale. It suggests that anything to boost ticket sales — and to make the public feel as if, more than anything else, they are artistically involved and their opinions matter — is more important than what gets hung on the Brooklyn Museum’s walls. It suggests that the Brooklyn Museum believes that art is worth sacrificing, as long as the museum caters to the public’s short-term interests.I see nothing wrong with mixing it up. When the Morgan Library & Museum recently invited Ellsworth Kelly to curate a gallery wall, the results were a breathtaking burst of fresh air. And I am the first to admit that a lot of what the so-called experts are bringing us in our galleries and museums is often much worse than ridiculous, insulting, or banal. But often the experts are right — or at least partially so. Taste and expertise take time to cultivate. The language of art takes effort to learn.There is about as much logic to the “crowdsourcing” premise behind “Click!” as there is to the notion that — because McDonald’s can boast more diners than Chanterelle and basketball can boast more viewers than the New York City Ballet — McDonald’s is the better restaurant and the NBA offers a greater experience than the NYCB. Reflecting the public’s taste and cultivating the public’s taste are two very different things — two different missions — entirely.Art is not easily accessible. That is the point. As with any extremely worthwhile relationship, it takes work. What “Click!” ignores is that the experience of art is not about likes and dislikes; numbers or averages. It is not a popularity contest or a platform in which the viewer gets to be heard. The experience of art is about very deep, personal, and, dare I say, spiritual encounters with man-made objects.“Click!” ignores how art works its magic. It ignores that art opens you up to other art. Art tests and challenges your abilities to perceive, compare, explore, and move further into art. “Click!,” in its attempt to bring art to the masses — and the masses to art — honors the quantifiable group experience over that of the individual, essentially denying art its fundamental power. As a sociological experiment, “Click!” may be of interest. As an art exhibit, it is way off the mark. In terms of what the Brooklyn Museum has been bringing us lately, however, “Click!” is right on target.Until August 10 (200 Eastern Parkway, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, 718-638-5000).

‘Click!’: Bean-Counting in Brooklyn

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