In the National Gallery it's Van Gogh's Sunflowers. In the Louvre it's the Mona Lisa. And in Florence it's Botticelli's The Birth of Venus (above). It seems that every major gallery has one iconic work that is the principal focus of selfie attention.
Around these 'trophy'
artworks the hushed reverence that was once the default gallery mode
has been swept away by smartphone-toting tourists elbowing their way to a
clear view on their screens or, even worse, blocking everyone else's
by posing for a selfie. Anyone wishing to peacefully contemplate the
actual painting in front of them is in for a hard time.
Collecting such
photographs is one of the more explicable idiocies of tourism.
Perhaps what I have been doing - taking pictures of people taking
those pictures – is idiocy squared, but tourism and its idiocies
fascinate and repel me in equal measure. Being a tourist traipsing
around Europe's big cities, with no connection to anyone who lives
there, carefully channeled through a string of 'must-see' landmarks
to which no native gives a second glance, can be a deathly
experience. Suddenly alighting on something recognisable, both to
the viewer and to their Facebook friends back home, makes a connection between
the real world and this transient state of novelty and
boredom. Maybe that's what
photography is all about.
Florence 2016
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