Can Yinka Shonibare Draw Visitors to Brooklyn's Period Rooms?

by Judith H. Dobrzynski  •  Jun 28, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Cross-posted from ArtsJournal.com

http://www.judithdobrzynski.com/2009/06/can-yinka-shonibare-draw-visitors-to-brooklyns

At the Brooklyn Museum* on Friday, I stopped in to see the just-opened Yinka Shonibare MBE exhibition, which runs through Sept. 20. Unbeknownst to me, it beautifully illustrates one of the strategies I was going to bring up at my lunch with Director Arnold Lehman for getting people interested in seeing museums' permanent collections. Lehman and the museum's curators were one step ahead of me: they had already displayed some of Shonibare's works within the permanent collection galleries.

Most of the Shonibare show is on view in the fourth-floor special exhibitions galleries, with a couple pieces on the first floor, too. But Brooklyn also asked him to make site-specific works that are on display -- surprise -- in its period rooms.

Retailers have used this strategy for years

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