Remember my Don’t Drop that Duccio! post, where I poked fun at the publicity image, below, of the Metropolitan Museum’s then director, Philippe de Montebello, caressing the mega-million Duccio with his bare hands?
Well, now that the museum has initiated the “It’s Time We Met” advertising campaign, it’s time Philippe met Chris Canahui, who posted this photo on the museum’s own Flickr page:
Photo by Chris Canahui
If you follow the links from today’s online NY Times piece by Carol Vogel about the Met’s promotional contest for its Flickr-inspired advertising campaign, you will see that the photos favored by the Met’s web talent scouts are those where visitors try to imitate the artworks. I just hope that competitors for the $250 prize don’t start striking silly reenactment poses all over the Met. This could get really annoying:
Photo by Ellen Wright
It’s bad enough when tourists insist on standing in front of a masterpiece for souvenir photos, when you’re actually trying to look at it. Have you ever attempted to gaze at the Museum of Modern Art’s big Jackson Pollock on a weekend? It cannot be done:
I just hope no one at the Met is going to try to impersonate this:
Mangaaka Power Figure (Nkisi N’Kondi), second half of 19th century
Democratic Republic of Congo or Angola, Chiloango River Region; Kongo
Democratic Republic of Congo or Angola, Chiloango River Region; Kongo