On a recent visit to New York City I was excited to see that a travelling exhibit from the Mauritshaus in The Hague was at The Frick Collection. Having lived in the Hague for a couple of years in the early ‘80s I thought it would be fun to revisit some of the Dutch Masters I last saw in the beautiful royal palace in the Netherlands. But I was not able to: no online tickets available, unanticipated lines. Why? Because one of the paintings in the exhibit was “The Goldfinch” by Fabrittus, currently very popular because of Donna Tarrt’s eponymous novel. That got me thinking about the ways in which museums are now more part of our everyday lives than they used to be. And of course my go-to source, The Economist had a few things to say. *

Twenty years ago around 23,000 museums existed, now at least 55,000. “In 2012, American museums received 850 million visitors.” Extraordinary: why in the age of the Internet with such ease of access to great art and other collections are people actually visiting museums? Perhaps the higher level of education that more of us reach, suggests The Economist, but also how the museums are designed, laid out and their goal of reaching all of us, not just the select few. Museums are cool! A parent recently in London with her teenage son told me that he met his cousins at the Tate—he did not immediately know which Tate (of course the Tate Modern) but the point is that this was a very acceptable place for young people to meet.

Museums certainly remain a sign of evolved culture and mature cities. (You might recall my Pocket Change about the Detroit museum thinking of selling off their collections to pay off city debt.)  In 1949, China had 25 museums. “According to the current five-year plan China was to have 3,500 museums by 2015.” (A goal already reached). These new museums will be accessible to all the people, no longer the Imperial collections “seen only by a chosen few.”

I still recall school visits to dusty museums, usually natural history exhibits; dim lighting, plenty of “do not touch” signs and little sense of the context of history. Apparently we have Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers (architects known for their modern and functional design of museums) to thank for the lack of dust and contemporary relevance; when the Pompidou Centre was built in 1977 the museum was “turned inside out” and welcomed us all in to participate and help construct the context of our cultures.

“Temples of Delight,” The Economist December 21, 2013

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Pocket Change is a web diary written by Jane Moulding, head of school.