Are we responsible to the originals when we develop products for our museum stores?

“Turning High art into cheap products” writes Peter Aspden. June 2012. The Financial Times

In The Financial Times on Saturday June 23^rd, Peter Aspden wrote a powerful critique about the relationship between the value of art and the devaluation thereof in “art-related products”.  Quoting Francis Bacon “ The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery” Aspden follows on “Who will now believe the words of Bacon when they can be read on a blue-and-beige €320 cashmere throw?”

In my dealings with museum shops over some twenty years, every buyer has declared earnest responsibility to the aims and values of the museums which they represent. And yet, having spent the last three months visiting around twenty museum stores in the UK and Washington, Philadelphia and New York, I fear that many of these stores do actually fail in these aspirations in their product selection. They actually ridicule the original work, in many cases, through cheap product quality and woefully poor repro accuracy.

Ten years ago, one could always look to the US for best practice in museum store product selection, but today, from the sites which I visited, that claim cannot be justified. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, surely the original and best, now disappoints as a retail experience. An excellent selection of books, and textiles both inspire and inform but the gift products are pedestrian and some are downright inappropriate. How can you claim to respect the art and understand the power of art to inspire when you simply plonk an image on a 2 x 3” plastic luggage tag or cut a great hole in the image and print it on an incomprehensible product called an “Eyelight”? The great Philadelphia Museum of Art has a shop team which has decided that their paintings are best redefined on lenticular plastic postcards and fridge magnet sets. Perhaps most heinously the Foulger Library offers an astoundingly cheap black plastic box with a little photograph of the First Folio frontispiece  stuck on the lid. In a number of different sites a charming collection of product related to a single image make a retail “story”.  In most cases the discrepancy of repro quality invalidates the display. Is it not the buyer’s job to know that different materials take print in a differing way ? And one print will differ from another print from a different supplier. On precious few products is there any information about the artists and the collection. Perhaps that is a relief.

The great digital revolution and print on demand solutions now all provide a myriad of products with your chosen image. The Bridgeman Art Library boasts over 100,000 images and allows you to see your selected image on any number of products. Now you can go on line and model the picture you want to see on a mug, bag or placemat. Does that mug come with a certificate which explains who is the artist, where is the picture hanging and advises how close the colour of the print on the mug is to the original?

Aspden presents such as the “consumer’s banal checklist of trinkets” and such museums can certainly justify their product selection on the grounds of income and profitability. But let us aspire to a better thing. Can we not work towards better stores which inspire, inform and stimulate as well as generating great income for their museum?  Can we respect what Aspden defines as the “artist’s yearning for transcendence” in merchandise which is sufficiently appealing to fill the museum shop coffers?  To my mind we can at least try and the solutions are three fold:  1) designing or supplying products of genuine originality - themselves achieving transcendence through material and aesthetic satisfaction. Of course this will be a struggle and open to individual taste/prejudice but some “art-related products” are actually original pieces. Donald Stein’s legendary “History of Art” T-shirt, Rob Fishbone’s  inflatable “Scream” or Cary Bryant’s inspired “Dress up David” magnet set are all exceptional original ideas inspired by art. 2) Products inspired by the works in the collection - Vivienne Westwood and Gianni Versace following the manner of the original master, Piero Fornasetti, create original works using pattern and decoration from history. 3) yes - creating souvenirs from your artworks with care. A 2” x 3” fridge magnet or even a 4” x 6” postcard of an enormous historical narrative is absurd, but a 2” x 3” image of a vase/jug with sunflowers or a portrait works a treat. Why? because the scale and detail can tell the truth of the work accurately. If the historical narrative is the most popular image in the collection, select details for your pick up lines or develop products which allow you to project the scale responsibly. The National Portrait Gallery in London boasts a range of standard fridge magnets simply with a quote in a standard typeface on a plain seemingly irrelevant coloured background. The NGA in Washington offers quotes on a much more interestingly shaped magnet with a portrait of the quote-sayer. A much more imaginative solution for a “portrait” gallery and in this case, ironically, from the same magnet manufacturer.

As a museum there is a demand to inform as well as inspire. To that end is it not incumbent upon the museum to see each product sold as a platform for further knowledge and interest? All it needs is a few words stating title, dates and artist as well as some link to the collection and to more information about the piece. Every museum related souvenir without at least this is a wasted opportunity.

What can then be done to resolve this? The route to success here must come from the top. In many circumstances the institutions have become, frankly, lazy. It is much easier to buy in an existing supplier’s OK new product than it is to challenge them to make it a great product. In many cases the buyers pay lip service to the responsibility, but they come from the high street and are much more interested in gross margin and minimum orders rather than responsibility to the work of a great artist. There needs to be a common presentation protocol on all products driven by the ambition to say as much as possible about the work, the artists and the institution. There needs to be one agreed scan for every picture with a match print against which every subsequent print must be measured. The buyer needs to be driven to deliver the appropriate gross margin and commercial imperative but know about the work, their responsibilities to their collection and to the artists therein who strived to reach such expression and who “yearned for transcendence” . It can be done. More visitors will leave with better products which can inspire and inform all who subsequently come across them, and in doing so the museum coffers will grow ever more full.

Ian Peter MacDonald  - July 2012

LED Lighting in Art Galleries and Museums

At last a lighting technology has arrived which can genuinely do it all. Yes it can save all those maintenance hours changing light bulbs, it uses less than half the energy consumed by “energy saving” compact fluorescent technology and because each lighting element is a semi conductor, it can be controlled with ease. It also projects no Infra red and no Ultra Violet, the two specific elements which damage art and artefacts. What is more is that the bit that emits lights is also very, very small. Having said all that this technology is very, very new.

An art gallery really needs lights that do not need changing - often the light sources are very high and require at least two people, and often scaffolding to change one light. They are obliged by law to show their energy consumption and are therefore keen to reduce that energy bill. They have a range of items in their collection - some of which would show to best effect in a warm light, others in a cooler light, all needing to be as near to daylight in colour accuracy to project the artefacts to best effect. Most importantly all light sources damage the artwork and so much effort is made to reduce the amount of light on the actual collections - please see the British Galleries in the V&A or the Smithsonian Museum of America to witness where light levels are so poor that the much prized artefacts can be barely made out.

Recognising these enormous benefits the museum and gallery markets are piling into this new solid state - LED lighting. The energy reductions are dramatic and the lights do not fail. Furthermore there is no damage being done to the artwork. And yet to my judgement the galleries where these are installed completely fail to light the work sympathetically. The colour temperature is uniformly cold, the narrow beam angles make for a “hot” spot right in the middle of the cherished art work with much lowers light levels over the remainder of the work, and the light fittings themselves are astonishingly ugly with a series of white lights glaring.

How has this come to pass? Given that the technology can deliver all the stated benefits and that the payback certainly justifies the investment, why is it that so many sites have bought into compromised solutions?  The answer seems to be that the savings benefit is what has driven the change and not the aesthetic demands nor a complete understanding of what the technology can offer. It is considerably easier for a Building Services team to turn to their old supplier of art lighting and ask them for LED art lighting than it is for them to really learn up on the technology and understand how to assess what the technology can deliver and who can deliver it. The real experts on this technology are not the great brand names of historic lighting but electronics specialists dotted around the country - yes the UK has some of the very best thinking and expertise in the world.

The answer must be for the curatorial teams and building services teams to engage with the thinking of the technology experts. Both parties can then truly understand what each needs and what each can offer. Once each understands the other, clear specifications can be drawn up which determine the criteria required. Only then should we be commissioning LED lighting which genuinely suits the extraordinary collections we enjoy and the artworks they hold.

Ian Peter MacDonald, Norwich, June 2012

Lighting your factory with LED - take care to get a great result

“A no-brainer” stated the Finance Director, delighted at his return on investment as he installs new lights that use 66% less energy and require no maintenance for a promised 10 years. “ And it reduces our CRC charge, shows how green we are and the lighting cost will be relatively stable over the next ten years “. Enthusiastic LED lighting salesman is delighted. At £350 each, this is a valuable sale.

Two months earlier he had been approached by an independent consultant who had told him lots about LEDs – and had recommended an English manufacturer of LED lighting for his factory. Delighted, the Finance Director had ordered 20 units of the English lights every month.

But the Enthusiastic LED lighting salesman had shown him a new light that was £150 cheaper and appeared to do the same job. The Financial Director cancelled the order with the English manufacturer and asked Enthusiastic LED salesman to supply 20 units of the new, cheaper Chinese lights every month.

A month after these new lights had been installed the English manufacturer received a call. “These new lights appeared every bit as bright as yours, but six of the initial 20 have already failed and they are already less bright than they were when installed. I have taken them all out and we are fighting with the supplier over the credit now due. Please can we get back to our original deal.”

This true story illustrates the challenges in selecting the right LED light for your task. Typically a customer will respond positively to the initial approach to reduce the energy consumption with LED. The promise of savings is so attractive and the manufacturer’s presentation so effective it is difficult to see what could possibly go wrong.

The truth is that LED is a largely unregulated technology. The lighting design community is highly cynical of the claims made by even the most familiar household names, who peddle the phrase “equivalent to 50W” without any qualification of that statement and many major companies are regretting their rush to adopt a technology which leaves them with half the light they had before, despite a significant investment.

Now the Finance Director is delighted. He has found the right light to last for 10 years. But he found out that choosing the right LED lighting is complex. The key steps were not only to establish how much light they needed, how much energy would be required to supply that light efficiently (because he thought he’d understood that bit), but also to really understand how long the lights would remain at full brightness. Once these issues have been defined, the key questions are: (1) can the manufacturer/supplier be trusted to supply accurate data and (2) what would happen if anything goes wrong ?

84 x £350 is a lot of money to throw away if the supplier will not support you. Spending 84 x £500 is well worth it if you have a payback in less than two years and you can actually drive to the English factory if problems do arise as far as 7 years out.

LED provides the right light for the long term BUT choose with care.

Ian Peter MacDonald - MacDonald Tait Light - info@macdonaldtait.com- 01603 788448

Missing data = Obfuscation ?

As a young pigtailed ‘un I had a pretty clear understanding that physics and chemistry were all about real true things. Things that could be measured, monitored and tested. Certainly science lessons with Mrs Barry and Mrs Brandt didn’t allow for much creative interpretation. Turns out that there are many ways to be creative with measuring, monitoring and testing. And one of the easiest ways is by simply not including data.

My train of thought was sharpened by a recent editorial in the BMJ “Missing Clinical Trial Data” (BMJ 2012; 344: d8158). It appears some drug trials are overlooked, especially where the results don’t entirely show the latest groovy drug in best light. Unpublished evidence; an absence of data; failure to ensure proper regulation and registration of clinical trials – a catalogue of bad science to make Mrs Barry quite upset.

In LED lighting the outcome of trial and tests may not be as life threatening – but the consequences of not having clear regulation, consistency of product specification and obfuscation leads to very muddy waters.

Let’s try beam angle, for example.  Quite often manufacturers advertise the lumen output for a range of lights without clearly indicating that they are referring to the lumen output from the model with the narrowest beam. Wider beam – lower lux at 2m compared to a more narrow beam can all too often be the unstated case. Another popular confusion is created by describing light output in lumens for some products and candelas for others.  While there may well be historic reasons for this, it doesn’t help the customer.

And, while I’m on a roll, there’s another couple of areas rich in obfuscation. First up is lumen output and delivered lumens. Even in the Old Testament they didn’t condone hiding lights under bushels – and still most specifications don’t differentiate between lumen output from the light unit and lumens delivered. Finally there’s energy consumption. I anticipate that this is an area that we will be coming back to again in the future. LED power consumption is so very much less than traditional lighting that people don’t yet much question the amount of energy used for the light engine, or the entire system Wattage.

For professional specifiers and designers this stuff is old hat – and questions keep being asked of the manufacturers until the “apples and pears” conundrum as described by CELMA is untangled.

However, if LED technology is genuinely to be embraced by all the different kinds of people that buy lamps we need to be doing better than this.

Perhaps the industry could learn something from the wine producers and merchants. Over the years they have developed clear labelling regulations.  It is compulsory for each bottle to clearly show country and appellation of origin, bottle and alcohol content, name and address of producer/brand owner. Optionally you could mention the grape variety. People like wine and, over and beyond the whole wine snob thing, they know what they are getting and what it is worth.

Less high – faluting as an example might be Ronseal – “IT DOES WHAT IT SAYS ON THE TIN”. That’s what lighting packaging should deliver – if we can all just agree on what the criteria should be....

Looking into 2012...

What  can we expect in 2012 ? Looking deep into our crystal ball we see several developments both in how the customer responds to the technology and how the technology itself advances.

1)       The market/consumer will become more discerning as they hear more horror stories and yet witness good new projects. The efforts of the Lighting Association to police supplier’s data should soon begin to make an impact.

2)       Customers commissioning new buildings will demand LED lighting as they see good examples.

3)        The costs will not go down in 2012, but lower cost products will come into the market. These should be judged with care and we must rely on third party test data and not that from the manufacturers.

4)       The introduction of advanced technologies such as Chromawhite from Photonstar will show the way to a completely new LED solution. These chips can be tuned to colour temperature and will automatically adjust colour temperature and output as the product ages. These will offer unprecedented stability over the long term.

5)       The range of tasks which can be covered well by LED will continue to develop. Today we can happily replace all low and Hi-bay with LED as well as all standard downlight tasks in home, office, restaurant and shop. By the end of 2012, we shall be replacing 600 x 600 layins as standard.

6)       Many of the best LED manufacturers in the world come from the UK. Buying effective LEDs will not only enhance your project but will reduce the carbon impact of supplying lighting and will continue to create new jobs in Britain.

Leisure Centre LED conundrum

Here’s a conundrum from a leisure centre near us in Norfolk. Really keen to be green, they first approached us in September 2010. All the key areas, such as the gym, reception area, corridors, gift shop and restaurant were lit with halogen dichroics – about 67 in total. After an audit of existing lights we came up with an LED scenario which would see their energy consumption reduced from approximately 6,293kWh pa to around 1,197kWh pa simply replacing these dichroics. A pretty decent energy reduction of over 80%.  This was achieved using mostly 7W LED downlights. And at that stage the capital investment, in lights alone, would have been about £2,400 – excluding installation costs.  Last year the management team were keen to retrofit with the LEDs, but simply didn’t have enough cash stashed away to do it.

Given the challenges of the current economic climate a cautious approach is quite understandable. The leisure team also anticipated that, following the usual pattern of fast moving technologies, LEDs would become cheaper. But, a year on from the original decision new features have become apparent.

Out of the potential variables of energy use (W’s), light output (lm’s) and unit cost (£’s) neither W’s nor £’s have actually changed much – the developments have been in light output. You get more bangs for your buck than you did a year ago. If you require a defined light output and supported longevity, the units themselves are not likely to come down in price until the component prices and production processes evolve.  

One might argue that the gamble taken by the leisure team simply hasn’t paid off: had they made the change back in September 2010 it might have taken 3 years to get to the point where the original investment had been paid back. It will still take 3 years, but they have now spent a whole year with energy costs much higher than they need be. Had they taken a bank loan (if they could get one!) at current interest rates it might have taken them a little over 3 years – but not that much. Given the cost issues it is unlikely that product prices will reduce dramatically in the next year, but electricity costs will continue to climb...

So, the conundrum is: when is the optimum moment for them to make the change?

A cautionary tale from LED land

Once upon a time there was a young property investor who decided to build a hotel. His hotel was in a busy, business area near London. He wanted it to be very fine and worked with a big hotel chain to design it to meet all their standards. But he wanted more than that; he wanted his hotel to use LED lighting technology. He loved the idea of low energy bills and he envisioned some really 21^st century lighting effects in his new hotel. But he knew it was a complicated thing to do – and he respected the challenges new technologies could bring – so he found a special wizard (LED consultant) and shared his idea.

“We can do this, and we can do it well” said his wizard, “here is a design, and a plan and list of exactly the right lights to achieve your dream”.

“Fabulous”, said the young man, “let me show it to the project management company”.

So the project management company looked at the plans and said “We need more: more graphs, and more pictures and more meetings”.

They had more meetings and looked at CAD models of the lights and talked about dimming protocols. And then one day, co-incidentally, they went bust and vanished.

The young man found another project management company. He introduced his LED wizard to them and showed them the design and the plan and the specifications.

“Oooh!” said the new company, sucking their teeth, “we need even more details and meetings and designs.” Which the wizard and the young man very politely provided.

And  then everything went silent.

The LED wizard was worried. The young man’s dream for his lights was not going to be realised in time if they didn’t order the lights before the building was finished. So he rang and emailed the new project management company.

Then one day the new project managers said “Look how clever we are: we have found lights just like the ones you told us about – but they cost much, much less”.

“Are they really the same?” said the wizard – “I’d like to see them.”

But the man who had made the new lights got very angry “ARE YOU CALLING MY LIGHTS RUBBISH?” he shouted, “MY LAWYERS WILL BE CALLING YOU.”

The LED consultant was a brave soul and gently suggested that the young man, the project managers, the designer, the new light supplier and anyone else interested should all get together and turn on the lights to see what they were actually like.

So everyone met in the half-built hotel and they turned on the lights: they looked at the new lights and they looked at the lights originally specified. There was silence.

The project management people said “Wow! We didn’t realise that despite having the same wattage and lumen output the difference between two LEDs could be so big. The beam angle is different, the colour is different, the light temperature is different, the fall of light on the floor is different and they have different life expectations.”

“ARE YOU CALLING MY LIGHTS RUBBISH?” shouted the angry man who had made the new lights.”MY LAWYERS WILL BE CALLING YOU”.

“Well, no,” said everyone, “but we can all see that they will not deliver the design as specified and don’t even offer a close compromise. The young man – who ultimately pays for all of this – will not be getting what he wanted.”

And between each other they wrote many emails blaming and shaming and worrying because they had already ordered masses of the wrong lights.

In other stories someone would appear now with a wand, or a horse or, even a princess – but in our story we still don’t know whether the dimming protocol will work with the LEDs chosen in error – let alone if the young man will get to have his vision realised... another chapter to follow...