Artists Vs. Museum: The Funk Shall Prevail

Artists Vs. Museum: The Funk Shall Prevail

SFAI’s contemporary practice class was given the opportunity to install an art piece at the

Berkeley Art Museum for the Spring 2014 semester. The students chose to pursue an

installation based on Funk culture. Though the students shared a passion for the inspiration for the piece, they faced many challenges in executing a piece reflective of this love for all things funky, due to typical collaboration misunderstandings and mostly, the controlling looming presence of the museum staff. Many students wanted to create a piece displaying the insane, glam, and explosive side of Funk culture. Whereas, many students wanted to explore the more intimate, “just got home from work,” groove side of Funk culture. Through many rough patches, outbursts, and clarification of common communication based misunderstandings, the students were able to create a funkadelic contraption of an installation, which merged the best of both sides of Funk. An explosion of hanging colorful, shiny fabrics were muted by a plain white tarp hiding the path of the suspended fabric.

Though the satisfaction of completing the collaborative project, with so many diverse and

outspoken minds, was one to bask in, the experience as a whole raised many questions about the credibility of the museum industry. BAM is located in an elaborate, massive architectural masterpiece. The museum consumes so much space, with great potential for experimentation and exploration in curatorial projections. However, the museum policies are overly strict. For example, one project director was scolded for simply making a charcoal drawing on one of the walls, and great turmoil arose with plainly trying to find a ladder to use. These bureaucratic museum policies severely hindered progress with the collaboration. One is led to question the true motifs of the museum’s administration: Is their mission really to educate and engage people with the art world? Do they really possess the power to define the artistic process and impose arbitrary restrictions to distance the artist from their work? In the future, will it become a place of innovation and critical thinking or will it remain a washed out skeleton of an establish with no meaty artworks, and on that note, no balls?

-Natasha