Arts-Blogging

(I am healthy again, BTW. Even Cooper's feeling better today)

I'm all immersed in the arts this morning, having just learned of this web site that rounds up arts-related stories on a daily basis. A few interesting things:

-- The recovery of this Goya gives me hope that the police will find The Scream. It also makes me think of how cool it would be to be a part of the international art police. Totally a role I could see played by Catherine Zeta-Jones. Who I sort of want to be, of course.

-- I found this article about the intersection of pop culture and the traditional museum mission very interesting, especially given my obsession with pop culture. Thing is, if museums are, as the article suggests, the "custodians of cultural heritage", isn't there a place for pop culture? Shouldn't there be?

I think the answer is yes. Shakespeare, after all, as we all learned sometime around ninth grade, was entertainment for the masses, not something confined to within the palace walls. More akin to today's Lord of the Rings trilogy than to a critically acclaimed, but narrowly released play. And what, really, is the difference between a Princess Di exhibit and one focused on King Tut? Several thousand years, yes, and possibly a slightly more approachable voice, but content-wise, they're the same.

As research institutions and cultural custodians, museums should be doing everything they can to document what happens today as early as tomorrow morning. What better way is there to preserve history than to remember it as it occurs? Instead, many museum professionals turn up their noses to anything current. What a shame.