For some time, art museums have been expending considerable amounts of energy and other resources on a broad campaign of public engagement designed to establish a stronger bond between themselves and the public, and thus cement the museum’s place as an essential—even indispensable—component of public life. Social media promotes their programs and addresses the public in other ways, “crowdsourcing” guides them in their acquisition and exhibition decisions, and “crowdfunding” helps pay for them. All manner of events and programs are put on in hopes of making the museum an appealing, even hip destination. Last year, one institution—the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts—even invited an adolescent to curate an exhibition. So far this campaign seems to be paying dividends. In September, The New York Times reported that the Metropolitan Museum of Art is now New York’s most popular tourist destination, having welcomed some 6.5 million visitors in 2012.
Yet, like a Trojan Horse, there is something in their midst that threatens to undo the museums’ efforts. This is the near-universal use of smartphones and tablets to snap pictures inside the galleries. Flash photography has long been banned owing to the damage its blasts of high-intensity light can inflict on paintings. Smartphones and tablets pose a less visible but potentially graver threat. They disconnect the visitor from the art on display and imperil the museum in other, very real, ways. For this reason, if the museum experience is to continue to mean anything, these devices,
