I've taken to visiting the museum to see anything but the art. Any good-sized municipality can put some art on the walls, but to have walls empty of art - well that's extravagant, baroque. Then the experience is all about the viewer moving through the space. Someone's put this space here and you can pay money to walk around. The gNasher at Duke was my favorite example of this phenomenon - all riveting architectural statement, unspoiled by anything to look at - the space just swallows sculpture and painting whole. That must make critics who say that painting is no longer possible very happy. "Here, do as many paintings as you like, this space will swallow them without so much as a burp." I know at some point tastes will change and some curator in the future will arrive and decorate it all in velvet and gold tessera, maybe even putting a large Christ Pantokrator in the dome. I know, here in Atlanta, one day they'll fill in this atrium - probably with glass floors - thus preserving the notion of space, but creating more room and walls to hang things on and place objects against.
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