Madrid's Reina Sofia Museum has reversed a ban on the public taking photographs with Picasso's famous 'Guernica' in an attempt to control crowds.
Want to take a selfie with one of the greatest masterpieces of modern art? Until now, visitors to Picasso's Guernica (1937) at Madrid's Reina Sofia have had these aspirations quashed by eagle-eyed guards shouting “NO PHOTOS!”
One of the first actions of the museum's new director, Manuel Segade, was to reverse this ban, which predates iPhone selfies and has been in place since the painting was installed in 1992. The change was introduced quietly and took effect on September 1 . Selfie sticks are still banned, as is the use of flash photography, to protect paintings from possible damage.
Picasso's gigantic black and white canvas evokes the multiple atrocities of the Spanish Civil War and is one of the most famous paintings of all time. Unsurprisingly, it never fails to attract crowds and it was necessary to impose a capacity limit of 70 people on the gallery. Now, museum officials have decided that allowing people to take a photograph might be the best way to reduce the time spent at the work.
“It only takes a few seconds to take a selfie and so the audience’s rhythm will flow more,” a spokesperson told The Times.
Shortly after Segade was announced as the Reina Sofia's new director in June, he told Artnet News that he saw “contemporary art as a way of producing social transformation” and was interested in “softening the institutionality of the museum to make it easier for people to local communities participate in the program.”
It appears that your new policy of taking photographs of Picasso is in keeping with this ethos. Segade told Euronews that he aims to “achieve one hundred percent photographic accessibility, especially for a young audience that lives filtered by a screen. I think it’s also important to pay attention to how they approach reality.”
Source: Artnet News