clifton - christian art in secular museums

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The President and Fellows of Harvard College

Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology

Truly a Worship Experience? Christian Art in Secular MuseumsAuthor(s): James CliftonSource: RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics, No. 52, Museums: Crossing Boundaries (Autumn,2007), pp. 107-115Published by: The President and Fellows of Harvard College acting through the Peabody Museum ofArchaeology and EthnologyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20167746 .

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Truly a worship experience?Christian art in secular museumsJAMESCLIFTON

In the flood of critical and self-critical literature sincethe advent of the so-called "new museology" thirty-fiveyears ago, scant attention has been given to the role ofreligion inmuseums or the exhibition of religious

objects, whether Christian (the focus of this paper) or ofother creeds, with some notable exceptions, such asessays in volumes edited by Crispin Paine and EnaHeller.1 Already in 1980, Carol Duncan and Alan

Wallach took the "museum as temple" trope beyond itsusual metaphorical use, describing the visitorexperience in art museums as ritual, but not in directrelation to any lived religions.2 There is an assumption,in the new museology as in the old, that religion per sehas no place in secular museums; its presence isallowed as a byproduct of the cultures that produced theobjects but not as the raison d'?tre of either thatproduction in the past or the objects' display in thepresent.

Joshua Reynolds had already arrived at that point ofview in his eleventh discourse to the Royal Academy in1782. He considered how painting might transcend itsostensible subject, adducing as examples works byVeronese and Rubens:[OJfhalf the pictures that are in theworld, the subject canbe valued only as an occasion which set the artist towork;and yet, our high estimation of such pictures, without

considering or perhaps without knowing the subject, shewshow much our attention is engaged by the art alone.

We cannot refuse the character of Genius to themarriage of Paulo Veronese ... or to the altar of St.Augustine at Antwerp, by Rubens, which equally deservesthat title. . . .Neither of those pictures have any interestingstory to support them. . . . [T]he subject of Rubens, if itmaybe called a subject where nothing isdoing, isan assemblyof various Saints that lived indifferent ages.3Indeed, there have been relatively few temporary

exhibitions or permanent installations of Christian art toprovide the focus of museological analysis, especially inAmerican museums: Christian art usually appears inAmerican museums inone of two ways. First, it isghettoized, seen as the purview of museums or gallerieswith explicit Christian associations. Here we might thinkof the Loyola University Museum of Art inChicago, orthe Museum of Biblical Art (MoBiA) inNew York, or theSaint Louis University Museum of ContemporaryReligious Art (MOCRA). Or, second, Christian art issubsumed into a narrative of the history of style, withlittle regard to its subject matter and initial function. Thelegitimating metanarrative isone of the triumph not justof form over content but also of the secular over thesacred, or the displacement of the sacred by theaesthetic. North American art collecting and museumexhibitions are the heritage of Enlightenment secularism,nineteenth-century aestheticism, and a canonical historyof art. Most museums with substantial collections andencyclopedic pretensions divide those collectionsaccording to culture and arrange each group*?especiallyEuropean and American art?chronologically, so thatworks of different subject matter, including religious,

might be exhibited next to each other, and works ofChristian subjects might well be seen in isolation fromworks of similar or even identical subjects in the samemuseum.4 Temporary exhibitions are usually inflations of

This essay is based on a paper Igave at the College Art Associationannual meeting in 2006; I am grateful to Jeffrey Abt and Ivan Gaskell,organizer and respondent, respectively, of the session, as well as toFrancesco Pellizzi and an anonymous reader for RES, for theircomments. All ego- and eccentricities remain, of course, my own.

1. Godly Things: Museums, Objects, and Religion, ed. C Raine(London and New York: Leicester University Press, 2000); Reluctant

Partners: Art and Religion in Dialogue, ed. E. G. Heller (New York: TheGallery at the American Bible Society, 2004). See also R. Grimes,"Sacred Objects inMuseum Spaces," Studies in Religion/SciencesReligieuses 21, no. 4 (1992):419-430.

2. C. Duncan and A. Wallach, "The Universal Survey Museum,"Art History 3, no. 4 (1980):448-469; the notion was elaborated byC. Duncan, Civilizing Rituals: Inside Public Art Museums (London andNew York: Routledge, 1995).

3. J. Reynolds, Discourses on Art, ed. R.Wark (New Haven: YaleUniversity Press, 1975), pp. 200-201.

4. Called the "universal survey museum" by Duncan and Wallach(see note 2), and the "comprehensive anthological collections" by N.Harris in "The Divided House of the American Art Museum," see

America's Museums, special issue of Daedalus 128, no. 3 (1999):36.For the role of museums in the triumph of the aesthetic and the


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108 RES 52 AUTUMN 2007

small units of this system: They include exhibitionsconsisting of the work of a single artist or of objectsfrom a single place within narrower chronologicalparameters. The objects in some exhibitions may beoverwhelmingly religious?as in, to choose a fewexamples from many possible, a number of exhibitionsat the Metropolitan Museum of Art inNew York:"Painting in Renaissance Siena, 1420-1500" (1988); orthe great pair of Byzantine exhibitions?"The Glory ofByzantium: Art and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era,A.D. 843-1261 " (1997) and "Byzantium: Faith andPower (1261-1557)" (2004), as well as its precursor,"Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art,

Third to Seventh Century" (1977)?but their parametersremain fundamentally determined by place and periodrather than subject.Thematic exhibitions of Christian art in secular

museums in the United States are rare, reflecting, Iwould suggest, a certain squeamishness on the part ofexhibition organizers about entering a public discourseabout religious devotion and practice, a discourse that islikewise avoided elsewhere in the arts and media (such

as the major television networks).5 In secular Europeanmuseums such exhibitions have been more frequent, theresult of a fundamentally different attitude toward, andhistory of, both public religious expression and thecollecting and exhibition of art.6An analysis of one such exhibition in an Americanmuseum?an exhibition Icurated?and the viewerresponse to it suggest the complexity of the potentiallyconflicting professional, ethical, and political intereststhat must be negotiated in exhibiting religious art in asecular museum, at least in this country. This paper is

neither an apologia nor a mea culpa for the exhibition,but rather a postmortem and critique of it,with aconsideration of some of the general issues it raised.71take as my points of approach two issues raised(indirectly, since neither, perhaps tellingly in the second

case, addresses Christian material) by Mieke Bai in herbook Double Exposures of 1996 and the late StephenWeil in an essay published in 1999,8 and Isuggest that:First, we must recognize the extent to which what Balcalls the "expository agent" (the museum, including itscurators), whose intention is not coincident with itsagency, is complicitous in a problematic reception of anexhibition, since attempted curatorial neutrality or evencritique may be occluded by the re-presentation ofobjects; and second, if, asWeil asserts, museums mustmake "a positive difference in the quality of individualand communal lives," we must guard against anauthoritarian posture inwhich the expository agentdetermines unilaterally what constitutes a positivedifference?a difference which, given Weil's tacitexclusion, does not include a religious dimension?andwe must accept, even cultivate, viewer responses thatare potentially as richly varied as museums' audiencesare diverse.

"The Body of Christ in theArt of Europeand NewSpain, 1150-1800"

In 1997-1998, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston(MFAH), presented "The Body of Christ in the Art ofEurope and New Spain, 1150-1800," a loan exhibitionof approximately seventy-five objects from NorthAmerican collections (approximately half of the objectswere from the collections of the MFAH and the SarahCampbell Blaffer Foundation, Houston) in diversemedia: paintings, sculpture, prints, drawings, textiles,manuscript illuminations, and a feather mosaic (fig. 1).The objects were arranged in four sections, in a loosenarrative of Christ's life and afterlife. The first two

isolation of art from its cultural context, see D. Crimp, On theMuseum's Ruins (Cambridge, Mass., and London: The MIT Press,

1993); see also Duncan (note 2), pp. 16-19.5. "Divine Mirrors: The Virgin Mary in the Visual Arts" at the

Davis Museum and Cultural Center of Wellesley College in 2001 is anotable exception.

6. Itwould not be possible, and lies outside the scope of thisessay in any case, to list all the relevant exhibitions, but severalnoteworthy ones come to mind: "Wallfahrt kennt keine Grenzen"(Bayerisches National museum, Munich, 1984); "The Art of Devotion inthe Late Middle Ages in Europe, 1300-1500" (Rijksmuseum,

Amsterdam, 1994), whose title in Dutch is slightly more provocative:"Gebed in schoonheid: Schatten van priv?-devotie in Europa 13001500"; "Le Jardin clos de l'?me: L'imaginaire des religieuses dans lePays-Bas du Sud, depuis le 13e si?cle" (Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels,1994); "Seeing Salvation" (National Gallery, London, 2000); "Le Dieu

cach?: les peintres du Grand Si?cle et la vision de Dieu" (Acad?miede France, Rome, 2000); and "Baroque, vision j?suite: du Tintoret ?Rubens" (Mus?e des Beaux-Arts de Caen, 2003).

7. There have been calls in recent years for the public declarationof curatorial responsibility within exibition spaces; that is, fororganizing curators to identify themselves and explain aspects of theexhibition?organizing principles, theses, significance of the objects,and so on?in a first-person narrative, thereby explicitly subjectivizingthe presentation. This was not done in the exhibition in question herebut seems useful for the purposes of this essay.

8. M. Bal, Double Exposures: The Subject of Cultural Analysis(New York and London: Routledge, 1996); S.Weil, "From Being aboutSomething to Being for Somebody: The Ongoing Transformation of theAmerican Museum," inAmerica's Museums, special issue of Daedalus128, no. 3 (1999):229-258.


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Clifton: Truly aworship experience? 109

Figure 1. Installation view of the exhibition 'The Body of Christ in the Art of Europe andNew Spain, 1150-1800," The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, December 27, 1997, toApril 12, 1998. Photo: Tom DuBrock.

sections, "TheWord Made Flesh" and "Suffering andTriumph" recounted Christ's life from the Annunciationto the Resurrection and the post-Resurrectionappearance to the Apostles (fig. 2). Although theologicalissues were raised in the didactic matter of the first twosections?explaining the significance of the Incarnationin the economy of salvation, for example?in the thirdsection, "The Eucharistie Body," the images were, for themost part, less narrative, and the theological aspects ofthe material gained emphasis. The final section, "The

Visionary and Devotional Body," included depictions ofthe miraculous appearance of Christ to various saintsand their engagement with his body (fig. 3); as well as afew objects that were more explicitly devotional,offering the viewer Christ's body for prayer, meditation,and imitation.

Iargued in the accompanying catalogue that theexhibition of these works together should serve torecuperate for the viewer some of their religioussignificance for the culture(s) inwhich they wereproduced, that the purpose was "to introduce to anAmerican public Christian subjects not often seen in theUnited States and to recontextualize Christian imagesthat are frequently seen, but only in the aestheticized(and anaesthetized) environment of the museum, where

their original function and meaning may be obscured."9Bringing together works of diverse media separated intheir manufacture by centuries, countries, and evencontinents would demonstrate, inter alia, a persistenceof subjects and themes inChristian Europe and the NewWorld that would not be evident or at least explicit inmost museum exhibitions and permanent installations.Thus, while all the works were of what is vaguely called"museum quality," Joshua Reynolds's priorities werenonetheless reversed, and the ethnographic displacedthe aesthetic in an attempt to redress an imbalance inthe apprehension of these objects and others like them.In terms deployed by Stephen Greenblatt, the exhibitionattempted to heighten the cultural and historicalresonance of the objects rather than the visual wonderat their aesthetic uniqueness.10

9. J.Clifton, The Body of Christ in the Art of Europe and NewSpain, 1150-1800, exhibition catalogue, Museum of Fine Arts,Houston (Munich and New York: Prestel Verlag, 1997),. p. 12.

10. S. Greenblatt, "Resonance and Wonder," in ExhibitingCultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display, ed. I.Karp andS. Lavine (Washington, D.C, and London: Smithsonian InstitutionPress, 1991), pp. 42-56; as Greenblatt points out (p. 56), the two arenot mutually exclusive.


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Figure 2.Workshop of theMaster of the Berlin Triptych, Virginand Child inGlory, second quarter of the fourteenth century.Ivory, 14 x 8.3 cm, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 71.7.Museum purchase with funds provided by the Laurence H.

Favrot Bequest.

This approach is farmore common inmuseumdisplays of non-Western art. The difference in the waysWestern and non-Western objects are treated inmuseums?even in the same museum?is ofconsiderable significance, but the subject lies outsidethe scope of this paper. Iwould like, however, to pointto a distinction of a different kind: not how differentkinds of objects are treated in a museum, but rather howsimilar objects are treated in different kinds of museums;that is, how religious objects are treated in a non-artmuseum such as a museum of religion compared tohow they are treated in an art museum, including in"The Body of Christ" exhibition. In the essay "Exhibitingthe Sacred," Chris Arthur addressed a conceptualdifficulty of presenting religion in a museum: Since mostreligions have at their heart what he calls a "mysterioussilence,"11 the problem is "whether it is possible to

convey the non-material dimension of religion throughmaterial objects."12 The subject of the exhibitions ofsuch museums is, therefore, "religious meaning,"13 andthe integrity or object-ness of the exhibited objects maynot be fully respected. One of the objects Arthurdiscusses and reproduces is a nineteenth-century SouthIndian bronze sculpture of Shiva in the St. MungoMuseum of Religious Art and Life inGlasgow.14 Thereproduction is a standard museum photograph of theobject against a blank background, isolated from itsexhibited context, but the lighting on the object has,according to the light engineers for the installation, "acustom moving effect unit to simulate the oil lampsused in temples which create a flickering light!;] thismakes the shadow move and the Image of the God toseem to dance."15

The subject of art museums' exhibitions of religiousobjects, on the contrary, is not some "religious meaning"that ismanifested (albeit imperfectly) in objects, butrather objects that are informed by religious meaning.The task?or, at least, one task?of museum curators andeducators is, to use Michael Baxandall's terminology, the"historical explanation" of objects.16 Arthur, followingGeorg Schmid, refers to religious objects as "religiousdata,"17 which is not far from Baxandall's reference topictures as "material and visible deposits left behind byearlier people's activity."18 Arthur asks: "Is it legitimate topresent such data as intrinsically interesting, rather thanas referring beyond themselves?"19 In the case of theobjects in "The Body of Christ" and similar pieces, theanswer, Iwould assert, is a resounding yes. As Baxandallpoints out, "we . . .expect to attend primarily to thedeposits, the pictures. We will certainly make inferencesfrom these to the actions of man and instrument thatmade them as they are . . .but this will usually be as a

11. C. Arthur, "Exhibiting the Sacred," in Raine (see note 1), p. 2.

12. Ibid., p. 11 ; see also p. 2: "How do you picture theunpictureable; how do you mount a display about what, at root, isresistant to all forms of expression; how do you convey to visitors that

what religions themselves see as of primary importance is somethingwhich lies beyond all the carefully assembled material whichmuseums present for their scrutiny?"

13. Ibid., p. 4.14. Ibid., pp. 2-4.15. Kevan Shaw, "Theatrical Lighting in an Architectural Context:

Technical Considerations," http://www.kevan-shaw.com/articles/tech/theatre/Lightfair.html.

16. M. Baxandall, Patterns of Intention: On the HistoricalExplanation of Pictures (New Haven and London: Yale UniversityPress, 1985).

17. Arthur (see note 11 ), p. 9.18. Baxandall (see note 16), p. 13.19. Arthur (see note 11), p. 9.


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Figure 3. Petrus Nicolai Moraulus, TheMass of Saint Gregory, ca. 1530.Oil on panel, 66.1 x 77.8 cm. Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation,Houston, 1963.1.

means of thinking about their present visual character."20Itmay be a question of emphasis, but our task was toexplain the existence, appearance, and significance ofexamples of a common class of objects.The artists represented in "The Body of Christ" werenot well known to the public, and the exhibition had avery small budget for marketing, but itproved verypopular, attracting over 125,000 visitors in under fourmonths. Itseems that visitors to the exhibitioncomprised, to a great extent, a "non-traditional"audience, although not one usually identified as such.21

Many, possibly even most, had probably never been tothe museum before. Church groups abounded. Aroundtwo hundred pages of visitors' comments, the vastmajority of which were positive and religious in tenor?sometimes verging on the ecstatic?provide insight intothe reasons for its popularity but also problematize the

exhibition of religious art in a secular museum moregenerally.22

Many visitors wrote a simple "thank you." Otherselaborated; for example: "Thank you for reminding uswe have been given the greatest gift inour lives, God'sson." James Elkins's assertion that "Artmuseums . . .teach viewers to look without feeling too much"23notwithstanding, the exhibition was described as havinga religious effect on the visitors: Itwas called "moving,""inspirational," "humbling," "powerful," "inspiring,""soul stirring," "uplifting," and was said to have renewedand restored faith inChrist. Itwas "[I]ife changing, a

mystical experience," and "truly a worship experience."It functioned as witness: "A remarkable testament toChrist the man and the mysteries of Christianity"; "[a]brilliant testimony to the God who lives and reignsForever/'

Blessings rained down upon us: "Thank you, thankyou for bringing this beautiful exhibit. It is very movingand will be a highlight of my life. God bless those who0. Baxandall (see note 16), p. 13. See also Baxandall's distinctionbetween efficient causes and final causes of pictures (ibid., p. 108).

21. For a critique of museums' attempts at "inclusiveness" (albeitapparently along standard racial/ethnic lines), the practicalconsequences of which remain unclear, see I.Rogoff, "Hit and Run?

Museums and Cultural Difference," Art Journal 61, no. 3 (2002):63-73.

22. The comments are preserved in the archives of the Museum ofFine Arts, Houston.

23. J. Elkins, Pictures & Tears: A History of People Who Have Criedin Front of Paintings (New York and London: Routledge, 2001), p. 207.


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worked on this project." "Bless this museum and thewonderful people who brought this exhibit together?ithonors Jesus and Catholicism." One visitor wasparticularly generous and expansive in calling forblessing: "May God bless everyone and bring peace onthis entire earth!" And there were what Iwould call,borrowing a phrase from Emily Bront?, piousejaculations: "Jesus ismy savior"; "Glory to God";"Praise God He's risen!" "Viva Christo Rey!" "Jesus HowGreat Thou Art!" Indeed, the visitors' book wassometimes used not for comments to the museum staffbut to record prayers or exclamations for another reader:"We adore you o Christ and we praise you"; "Lord Iknow you are the Christ of all people"; "Thank you Godfor your son, Christ, blood of the Lamb."24

Removing religious objects from their originalcontexts and placing them in a museum not onlytransforms their status and radically alters theirsignificance in a producer-object-viewer communicativechain, but italso tends to isolate them from anycontemporary cultural context. Goethe worried that withNapoleon's pillaging of Italian churches and removal oftheir treasures to the Louvre "the very capacity of the

museum to frame objects as art and claim them for anew kind of ritual attention could entail the negation orobscuring of other, older meanings,"25 and, we mightadd, the foreclosure of a continued experience of thosemeanings. But such objects may continue to have aneffect that one might not be able to anticipate.26

At the recently reopened De Young Museum in SanFrancisco there is a remarkable and provocative

installation. An eighteenth-century Mexican painting ofthe Virgin and Child is exhibited with votive candles,holy cards, and tin ex-voto body parts, all of which aremodern and readily available. The painting wasoriginally created for devotional purposes, and althoughit is not displayed precisely as itwould have been by itsoriginal owner, the conjunction of objects ismeant toevoke not only itsoriginal function but also a continuingdevotional potential. Next to the installation, butaddressing that gallery as a whole, is a text, written bythe De Young's curator of American Art, TimothyBurgard, which reads in part:These objects have deep roots in history, and they reflect

personal visions and collective concerns, as well as thetime, place, and culture of their creation. However,changing perceptions of the same objects by newgenerations of viewers make itpossible to view the DeYoung's permanent collection of art as a collection of ideasthat are continually reinterpreted. The juxtaposition of theold with the new is intended to foster a dialogue betweenthe past and the present, and to remind viewers that trulyresonant cultural ideas can transcend the artwork's time and

place of origin, as well as its stylistic vocabulary. . . . [T]henew De Young aspires to provide a cultural commonground?a fertile gathering place for art, people, and ideasthat have their roots in history, flourish in the present, andwill continue to grow in the future, thus sustaining theresonance and relevance of the collections.27

Where he says "cultural," we might also read "religious"and be reminded that truly resonant religious ideas cantranscend the artwork's time and place of origin, itsstylistic vocabulary, and its tranformation into amuseum object.

Implicating the expository agentInDouble Exposures, Mieke Bal analyzes what she

calls the "complicity of critique," "the impossibility ofshowing and saying 'no' to the object in the very gesturethat shows it."28She argues that the expository agent'sintention is not coincident with the agency of

exposition; that is, that the act of exhibiting or otherwiseexposing images has in itself meaning that is separatefrom, and even inimical to, the intention in exhibiting

24. A few further examples, which could be multiplied severalfold:"An inspirational exhibit. Iam brought again to tears." "I felt God in

my presence, Beautiful and eternal. Iwas one with him." "The Christof these paintings lives within my heart and I thank God for Hisforgiveness and salvation." "A true blessing. If just one life getstouched through this, just one soul gets won to God, the angels willrejoice. May God bless you."

25. Quoted by Duncan (see note 2), p. 16. For the transformationof objects in their removal to museums, see B. Kirshenblatt-Gimblett,Destination Culture: Tourism, Museums, and Heritage (Berkeley, LosAngeles, and London: University of California Press, 1998), pp. 17-78

("Objects of Ethnography").26. Arthur (see note 11), p. 4, addresses the potential "cacophony

of response" to museum objects. For the ambiguous or shiftingmeaning of sacred objects in secular museums, see I.Gaskell, "Sacredto Profane and Back Again," in Art and Its Publics: Museum Studies atthe Millennium, ed. A. McClellan (Maiden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2003),pp. 149-162. For the museum-goers' active role in the construction ofmeaning, see M. Baxandall, "Exhibiting Intention: Some Preconditionsfo the Visual Display of Culturally Purposeful Objects," in Karp andLavine (see note 10), pp. 36-39.

27. Unidentified artist, Virgin and Child, early eighteenth century,oil on canvas, Dr. Ernest Forbes Memorial Collection, 54209. Iamgrateful to Timothy Burgard for providing me with the text of the walllabel.

28. Bal (see note 8), p. 195.


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the images. One of the objects of her metacritique is thework of Raymond Corbey on colonial postcards ofseminaked African women, which she imagines as anexhibition, although itwas not.29 She argues thatCorbey's re-presentation of the postcards underminedhis denunciation of their exploitative nature, that hisostensive critique of colonialist ideology paradoxicallyadvanced that ideology, because images have the"power to overrule other speech acts, and to neutralizeintent."30 In that case, the intent was "a critical analysis

of ideologically fraught practices of representation."31Our position with regard to the material exhibited in"The Body of Christ" was not condemnatory as in

Corbey's approach to the colonial postcards but wasintended to be neutral. Rather than "saying 'no' to theobject," we would say "maybe," or "it doesn't matterwhether the belief system inwhich you played a roleand which is still vital is acceptable or not, because youare a historical object that we are interested inexplaining." But Christian imagery is, no doubt,"ideologically fraught," perhaps even more so thancolonial photographs because it has a longer history ofcontinuous intertwining with Western culture in generaland has become naturalized, creating greater obstaclesfor d?mystification. It is even more profoundlyembedded inWestern culture on an epistemologicallevel in that belief in the Incarnation?the body of

Christ, as itwere?validated representations of thedivine and therewith had an incalculable effect on

Western theories of representation.Nonetheless, Bal's critique is easily applicable to our

exhibition, because one could argue that the worksneutralized our putatively neutral intent, that theexhibition, in fact, supported the ideology of thematerial presented. Such an argument might adduce thefollowing aspects of the exhibition: First, the exhibitionvenue extended from a few days before Christmas toEaster. The timing was obviously meant to resonate withthe subject matter and with the visitors' seasonallyheightened interest in the subject matter, like the

Metropolitan Museum's "Annual Christmas Tree andNeapolitan Baroque Cr?che." Second, in "The Body ofChrist" exhibition space, sections were marked not onlyby titles but also by epigraphs consisting exclusively of

biblical quotations silkscreened on the walls.32 Third,there were no didactic materials that could have beenconstrued as a critique of Christian doctrine, althoughmore than one visitor?misguided, inmy view?objected to my use of the term "cult" in connection withthe display of the Eucharist in the lateMiddle Ages.Fourth, the narrative structure of the exhibition, the"syntactical" form taken by the expository agent's (thatis, our) "speech act," was based on Christ's life ratherthan on the life of the objects or the history of art to

which they belong.33 Fifth, the definite article in the titleof the exhibition, typically shortened to "The Body ofChrist" orthographically and in conversation (fig. 4),"suggests] the existence of what itpresents," as Bal saidof a photographic essay by Malek Alloula called TheColonial Harem.34 Sixth, the museum is implicated inbroad terms, inwhat Bal calls an "eagerness to show."35One visitor remarked?rather snidely, I'm sure?"What a

wonderful piece of history. Ihope other cults get asmuch attention in exhibition."36 This visitor came closeto the museum's position with regard to the (art)historical import of the exhibition but seemed to beaccusing the museum of a particular "eagerness toshow" the Christian material. Regardless of theexpository agent's intent, the subtext identifiable fromthese elements would be, according to this point ofview, the secular museum's authoritative validation, and

29. See R. Corbey, Wildheid en beschaving. De Europeseverbeelding van Afrika (Baarn: Ambo, 1989); ibid., "Alterity: TheColonial Nude," Critique of Anthropology 8, no. 3 (1988):75-92.

30. Bal (see note 8), p. 198.31. Ibid., p. 199.

32. The same epigraphs were used at the beginning of sections ofthe catalogue "The Word Made Flesh": "In the beginning was the

Word, and the Word was with God, and theWord was God. . . .Andthe Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, . . . full of grace andtruth" (John 1:1, 14); "Suffering and Triumph": "He humbled Himself,becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross. For

which cause God also hath exalted Him, and hath given Him a namewhich is above all names" (Philippians 2:8-9); "The Eucharistie Body":"Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eatthe flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood, you shall not havelife in you. He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath

everlasting life: and Iwill raise him up in the last day. For My flesh ismeat indeed: and My blood is drink indeed. He that eateth My flesh,and drinketh My blood, abideth inMe, and I in him. As the livingFather hath sent Me, and I live by the father; so he that eateth Me, thesame also shall live by Me. This is the bread that came down fromheaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead. He thateateth this bread, shall live for ever" (John 6:54-59); "The Visionaryand Devotional Body": "For ifwe be dead with Him, we shall live also

with Him. Ifwe suffer, we shall also reign with Him. Ifwe deny Him,He will also deny us" (IITimothy 2:11-12).

33. On exhibitions as speech acts, see Bal (see note 8), passim.34. Ibid., p. 200.35. Ibid., p. 205.36. On the issue of parity among religions, see Arthur (note 11),

p. 11.


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Figure 4. The Body of Christ in theArt of Europe and NewSpain, 1150-1800, exhibition catalogue. Cover ?mage:Bernardino Luini, Lamentation, The Museum of Fine Arts,Houston, The Samuel H. Kress Collection, 61.68. Coverreproduced by courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

thereby endorsement, of the Christian narrative, ofChristian doctrine, and of the objects as cult objects.And the museum is thus complicitous in the religious,non-art-historical reception of the works implied by thevisitors' comments. Bal's proposal for "an alternativetreatment of Eurosexist aestherotic imagery"37 may beless applicable in this context, and the means of egressfrom this conceptual conundrum, ifeven desired, arenot readily evident. Several writers have called forvarious kinds of experimental exhibitions, but importantpractical considerations of exhibitions are oftenneglected, and "The Body of Christ" was in some mild

way already experimental, with its iconographie ratherthan chronological organization. In that sense, itmightalmost have been a response to Steven Lavine's andIvan Karp's call in 1991 for "experiments inwhich

the artwork isorganized according to the aestheticcategories of the cultures from which itderives,"38although they probably did not have inmind WesternChristian culture(s), and by specifying aestheticcategories they precluded other potentially interestingoptions.Some complicity in the perpetuation or reawakeningof an ideology through the re-presentation of objectsseems inevitable. How might we judge the acceptabilityof that complicity, especially with regard to religion?Drawing on an evaluative model of the United Way ofAmerica, Stephen Weil argued that museums should usetheir authoritative position to make "a positive differencein the quality of individual and communal lives."39 Thestatement seems uncontroversial. Few, ifany, peoplewould want museums to make a negative difference,and if they did not make any difference one way or theother, there would be no point of having them at all,except to keep a relatively few people employed atrelatively low wages.40 But who is to determine whatconstitutes a positive difference and how that differenceis to be brought about? One visitor to "The Body ofChrist" seemed to be in full agreement with Weil, atleast in principle, writing: "Bravo! Christ rules and reignsforever! Thank you for having the boldness to representsuch an exhibit! Our city needs it." It is unlikely that thisiswhat Weil had inmind. Incalling for museums tomake a positive difference, he wrote: "At the level ofinstitutional leadership, the most important new skill ofall will be the ability to envision how the community's

ongoing and/or emerging needs in all theirdimensions?physical, psychological, economic, andsocial?might potentially be served by the museum'svery particular competencies."41 Weil's listmay not have

37. Bal (see note 8), p. 221.

38. S. Lavine and I. Karp, "Introduction: Museums andMulticulturalisme in Karp and Lavine (see note 10), p. 7.

39. Weil (see note 8), pp. 241-242. Lavine and Karp (see note 38),pp. 7-8, recognize that "people are attracted by the authority ofmuseums, and audiences could lose interest if that authority is called

into question." For a critique of museum authority, see W. Boyd,"Museums as Centers of Controversy," in Americas Museums, specialissue of Daedalus, 128, no. 3 (1999):200.

40. Recognized byWeil (see note 8), p. 242, citing HaroldSkramstad. For a more nuanced view of the "good use" of objects in(art)museums, see I.Gaskell, Vermeers Wager: Speculations on Art

History, Theory and Art Museums (London: Reaktion Books, 2000), pp.197-209.

41. Weil (see note 8), p. 253; he continues "|W]hat can themuseum contribute? Can itbe a successful advocate forenvironmentally sound public policies? Inwhat ways might it helpthe community to achieve or maintain social stability? Inwhat ways

might itenergize and release the imaginative power of its individual


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Clifton: Truly a worship experience? 115

been intended to be exhaustive, but in this account,"all" the community's needs do not include a religiousdimension. Is it that individuals and communities do nothave religious needs? Can a positive value not beassigned to the addressing of a religious need? Or canmuseums not accept the religious as part of their chargefor one reason or another? Is it that a religious need isontologically different from a physical, psychological,economic, or social one? Are there legal, financial, orpolitical reasons for museums to address some needsbut not others?

"Needs" may not be the best term to use in thiscontext, in any case. We might instead think ofmuseums addressing vistors' interests in the doublemeaning of the term: as both what they are (potentially)interested in and what serves their interests. Itwas veryclear that a great many people were interested in thematerial presented in "The Body of Christ" and wereresponsive to the way itwas presented. Iam notsuggesting that museums be subject to the tyranny ofpopular opinion or towhat they perceive to be popularopinion, lest every museum exhibition be about Monetor mummies or both. Ido not lightly accept therejection of an exhibition idea because the public wouldnot be interested or would not "get it,"as museum staffand trustees sometimes suggest. In the first place, thepublic isoften surprising in its interests; in the secondplace, it isprecisely a role of a museum to share theprofessionally pondered interests of its curatorial staff,generating interest rather than merely responding to it.To what extent "The Body of Christ" may have servedthe visitors' interests?and the possibly overlapping butalso possibly mutually exclusive interests of the broadercommunity?remains much less clear. The authority thatmuseums enjoy may grant them the power but does notgrant them the ability to differentiate among thepotentially competing interests of various groups in theiraudience, which isoften not simply local, but nationaland international as well. Museums are charged?perhaps simply self-charged?with conserving andeducating the public about objects of interest and value(whether historical, aesthetic, monetary, or some otherkind of value), and there is a primary obligation in thatcharge to the objects themselves. I remain convinced ofthe validity of the generating idea behind "The Body of

Christ": not to address the religious element in religiousart?fully and unabashedly, though, where need be, alsoself-critically?is to offer a mutilated view of intrinsicallyinteresting objects and of the history of image-making.

Citizens? Can it serve as a site for strengthening family and/or otherpersonal ties? Can it trigger the desire of individuals for furthereducation or training, inspire them toward proficiency in the creativearts or the sciences?"

clifton - christian art in secular museums

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