Well's section titled "Photography Within the Institution" really stood out to me. In it he discusses the position of photography within museums, and how this position has developed since the 1970's. He reviews the scale of the photographs and how it may reflect a certain status in the gallery context through that scale. He touches on "heritage industries" and how museum and "heritage institutions" have become an inextricable part of displaying and questioning nation identity.
What stood out to me the most was the quote that Wells used by Robert Wilson. He argued that "in the twentieth century museums have taken over the function once exercised by church and ruler, they provide the symbols through which a nation and culture understands itself" (Wells, 297). I can heartily agree with this, especially after taking many courses on Medieval Europe and its art, and seeing that history and imagery in contrast with the present. During the Middle Ages, the Church was one of the main creators and influencers of culture. Its chapels and basilicas, holy places, monasteries and cathedrals, as well as private libraries and collections, housed relics that in most cases would be flocked to by thousands for viewing and veneration. These relics and the symbol of power that the Church was, in a way reinforced the identities of "ideal" Europeans and Christians. Today, we flock to museums to witness and revere great works of art that reinforce in a similar way, although perhaps not religiously, our western cultural identity. These works of art propel us to think of our nation and contemporary as well as historical identities on a grand scale, and the "heritage institutions"--the containers of these identity-makers--as asserting the authority of our nation and culture.
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