Hanging judge.(Art & the Power of Placement)(Book Review)

Victoria Newhouse Art & the Power of Placement. The Monacelli Press, 304 pages, $50

A more descriptive title for the splendid new book by the architectural historian Victoria Newhouse would be Art as Diminished by Curatorial Incompetence. It is a work of genuine scholarship, filled with fresh and discerning insights about the art itself and its history, but her underlying theme is that, with few exceptions, those with the power to place art--museum officials, curators, and architects--do it badly. Where possible, she offers meticulous documentation and enlightening descriptions of great works of art that have been or remain empowered by where, how, and by whom they are placed. Those long gone are illustrated by paintings and drawings made during or after the decades or centuries of their existence. Newhouse tells how extant historical works were first created, discovered, and then--as survivors of the passage of time--came to hold positions of honor in the permanent collections of such venues as the Louvre and the Vatican Museums. She also describes and evaluates the settings in which the work of today's leading artists is regularly seen.

Her introduction opens with a full-page Renaissance drawing of the legendary Colossus of Rhodes (c. 280 B.C.), a 110-foot-high bronze statue that straddled the island's harbor for only five decades before an earthquake knocked it down. Pictures and text then focus on private, gallery, and museum interiors from the sixteenth century to the present that are filled with paintings massed from floor to ceiling. As arranged, these paintings have compelling power--collectively, if not individually. So does the introduction's concluding two-page-wide photograph: a display of fifty-four photos and drawings of all sizes on a gallery wall and its opposite corners, from a 1991 exhibition at MOMA: "Head On: The Modern Portrait," curated by Chuck Close.

In reference to her first chapter, "The Complexities of Context," Newhouse explains that "a few specific works from different periods, seen over time, demonstrate the implications of the charged zone where spectator and art meet." To develop this theme she chooses examples from the classical art of Greece and Rome, including the Elgin Marbles (mid-fifth century B.C.) long displayed at the British Museum and the Winged Victory (Nike) of Samothrace (c. 190-180 B.C.) perched at the top of the principal stairway at the Louvre. Newhouse finds much to fault in the placement of the Elgin Marbles. They were positioned high on the Parthenon; in London, at eye level, they are viewed from an incorrect perspective. She writes: "The British Museum's institutional interiors and London's pale daylight complete the decontextualization of sculpture that was once part of a riotously colored temple bathed in the bright Mediterranean sun."

The first fragments of the much mutilated Nike were found in 1863 and arrived at the Louvre a year later. After over two decades of further excavations and restorations, the statue acquired one original wing, and one copy, as well as its original pedestal--in the form of a trireme's prow, in memory of the naval victory. Through the years, the Nike rose in the hierarchy of placement at the Louvre until 1883, when it was granted a place among miscellaneous classical works under a sky-lit cupola on the upper landing of the grand Dam Stairway. This position commands and is the climax of what was then the museum entry sequence that led to its greatest treasures. It wasn't until 1932-1933, however, that the stair hall was cleared and expanded to allow Nike to stand alone, an event for which Newhouse has high praise: "The way the viewers saw Nike was the result of more than a half-century of restoration and repositioning, implemented by successive generations of curators. The statue's 1932-1933 installation singled it out as one of the Louvre's greatest treasures, the first major monument visitors encountered." All remained well with this triumph of placement until the Eighties when I. M. Pei's renovations and expansions forced viewers into a new set of itineraries that robbed ...