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Several windows were broken and five original artworks sustained “significant, possibly irreparable damage,” when a riot broke out after a constituents’ meeting at the Golga Gallery, the art museum of Wye Sprite University. The Dimvers police also report that two people were taken to the university hospital for treatment—one a 68-year-old professor emeritus who sustained a fractured hand while allegedly punching a hole in an abstract expressionist canvas; the other a 42-year-old homemaker and philanthropist who threw out her back while attempting to push over a sculpture that turned out to be welded to the floor.

The fracas ironically grew out of an effort to placate disgruntled museum patrons and donors. According to several witness accounts, passions rose and eventually boiled over as the museum’s executive director, Herman Liftskid, tried to explain why he had agreed to participate in a study that many patrons felt made them look like fools. Anger had been rising for several weeks, since the study, which looked at ideas of originality and value among art viewers, was reported in the local media and on a number of art blogs. The open meeting followed apologies from Mr. Liftskid in the form of a letter to the Dimvers Inquirer and a video posted to the gallery’s YouTube channel failed to appease incensed museumgoers.

The controversial study was run by Professor Arturo Callado, from the university’s psychology department, and Professor Mary Gingham, from the art history department. With the cooperation of Mr. Liftskid, over the course of a year, Callado and Gingham replaced selected paintings in the museum with hand-painted replicas, and then used cameras above the paintings to observe how patrons discussed and interacted with the art. The Golga Gallery is particularly known for its “Three Little Treasures,” paintings by Rembrandt, Manet, and Van Gogh that draw visitors from all over the world and are cherished by the museum’s local supporters and friends. The fact that these three works were included in the study became the flashpoint when the news became public.

In the first phase of the study, the researchers rotated the real paintings with replicas unbeknownst to visitors. They noted no significant differences between the comments made about originals and replicas. “People offered the same banalities of appreciation, almost verbatim, especially males accompanying young females,” the researchers reported. [Read more…]