Dallas Museum makes art free for all [View all]

[xchrom]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/nov/30/dallas-museum-art-free-for-all


Jason Farago: '[W]hen parents can take their children without having to budget for it, the museum takes on a societal function.' Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty

Texas has been getting some bad press lately, what with its boneheaded governor and Obamaphobic secession petition. So it was good to be reminded this week that the Lone Star State is still a cultural force to be reckoned with. The Dallas Museum of Art, one of the leading lights in a region with excellent arts institutions, is dropping its $10 admission fee and throwing the doors open to all comers starting in January. Admission to small or more scholarly temporary exhibitions will also cost nothing. Only big shows will require paid tickets, and these will have variable pricing.

It's great news. For a long two decades, museums strove to outdo one another with outlandish architecture and blockbuster exhibitions, pumping up admissions costs along the way. But the last few years have seen a welcome shift, especially in cities and neighborhoods beyond the international art circuit. One of the country's most beautiful museums, the Nelson-Atkins in Kansas City, has been free for a while now. Baltimore's two major museums went free in 2006. St Louis and Indianapolis recently joined the roster of free institutions; as did the Bronx Museum of Art, which went free this spring.

And a free museum – a truly free one, not just one where you can beat the admission price at a certain hour by standing in line – is a totally different beast from one you have to pay to visit. When you can slip into a gallery for just 15 minutes to see a favorite painting, or when parents can take their children without having to budget for it, the museum takes on a societal function.

It's no longer just a fortress or an amusement: it's a civic platform, where education and citizenship go hand in hand. People begin to value their museums in ways they don't when you have to pay – so much so that the current British government, while gleefully slashing everything else in sight, can't bring itself to reintroduce admissions charges to national museums.