Guldalderkunst for alle? Et råb om hjælp fra et heterotopisk museum i krise

Sammanfattning: This study investigates The National Gallery of Denmark (SMK) and how its’ own pronounced aim to be open accessible “to everyone” is functioning in their everyday praxis. Through a walking phenomenological reportage-analysis (inspired by Michel De Certeau) in the exhibition room of the museums’ latest special exhibiton “Goldenage – World Class Art Between Two Catastrophes”, it is discovered how the exhibition room is in fact not for everyone at all. The walking reportage-analysis is deepened and driven forward by the constant involvement of relevant theories such as the Danish art historian Rune Gade with his model for exhibition analysis, the American architecture philosopher Stanley Abercrombie with his theory of the transition from exterior to interior and finally the French sociologist and anthropologist Pierre Bourdieu with his theory of the cultural field of production. It is brought to the attention, that the exhibition room is, through a complex network of aspects, framing the creation of user identity (users and non-users) along with a hierarchy among them. Among these room aspects that are influencing the inclusion some and exclusion of others are: topos, interior, exterior, curating, furnishing, doxa, habitus, user-hierarchy, the common devotion to the existence of the specific cultural capital in the room: The possession of the one and final truth that lies within the art. It is discussed how SMK has challenged the traditional habitus and doxa with central exhibition lounge and succeeded in opening up the room to non-users in a new and relaxed way. However it is argued that this initiative is drowning in too many other aspects creating the excluded non-user identity. The analysis then opens up to a discussion of why this aim of being “for everyone” even exists in the praxis of the museum. It is interoperated as what the French philosopher Michel Foucault would call a crisis heterotopia, crying for help and for money in a world where art is highly under prioritized politically as well as socially in society. And finally it is argued, using the theory of the Italian philosopher Georgio Agamben and his theory of including exclusion, that it might be impossible to even make art accessible to “everyone”. However it is concluded how there is lots of room for improvement to make the exhibition room accessible for more people in the future, suggesting starting with the replacement of the specific cultural capital into being the ability to reflect openly and independently about the art.