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I’m too opinionated for the Clyfford Still Museum

…they’ve unfollowed me on Twitter.

You’d think that working in a museum dedicated to the most headstrong and difficult American artist ever would make them immune to such things. Apparently not. Either that, or they’ve groked that I don’t work in a museum and am not important or influential in the art world (yet; I have still to build my dark empire) , so I am not worth their attention.

Too Cool For You

It’s a total blackout: the museum hasn’t even answered my emails.

Well, okay. I can’t make them interested in my tweets, just because I talk about Clyfford Still a lot and and that’s who their museum is about. If anything, that seems to be a liability, because they spend most of their time tweeting about topics that have nothing to do with Clyfford Still.

Such as in the following examples:

(Are they making fun of Sundays with Clyfford Still? Who knows? …At least they’re talking about an artist?)

Um. Yes. Thanks for taking the time to let everybody know what kind of music you personally like. But since you’re operating a Twitter account which is supposed to represent a cultural institution, would it be too much to ask to stay remotely on topic? If you can’t tweet about Still or about the museum, can you at least stick to art?

Other museums do this too: SFMoMA’s Twitter is notoriously chatty but only to certain well-connected folks and personal friends.

Do these people have any idea what kind of impression this makes on the public? “Hey everyone! We’re unprofessional snobs! Come buy an expensive museum ticket!”

Clyfford would be pissed. You know if he had foreseen there’d be a Twitter his will would have left specific instructions about what the tweets would say and the museum would never be allowed to tweet about anyone or anything else, ever.

Museum staff, please keep the personal chat on your personal Twitter. And though I know better than to ask you to reply to tweets from mere mortals, try answering your emails sometime. You do want the unwashed masses to visit your museums, right? Don’t be rude to us.

5 thoughts on “I’m too opinionated for the Clyfford Still Museum”

  1. I don’t know,, but it causes on to wonder if those involved are more focused on a pay check than the passion in which the museum was founded on. Me thinks you (and the Empire) pointed your prod and pitch fork at the right ass behind the Tweets. Just my humble, quietly stated impression (too).

    Reply

    • Call me naive or something, but I just don’t understand how any museum could operate like this. If these people were working for a business, they would have been fired by now for wasting the company’s time and ignoring the customers.

      I still wonder, was it some mistake? But it’s not a single incident, it’s a pattern of incidents.

      Reply

      • I don’t think so; they do occasionally tweet on topic. And as I said, other museums are doing it too. Not all of them, thankfully, but enough to make me think this must be common behavior among art snobs working in the public sector. A little too confident in their job security, methinks.

      • True. An goes to point. Once the artist is done making his art, that which follows has its on agenda and sometimes has little to do the finished art of the artist. Sadly that is the way the ball bounces. Maybe we should just take our balls and go play somewhere else.

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