Trauma warnings are on the rise as studies conclude they are ineffective. These warnings that the content could be sensitive, irritating or trigger disturbing reactions are now proliferating in the arts world, a realm of emotional upheaval and aesthetic shock. Museums, literature classes, books, shows, operas warn their visitors, readers and spectators. Look, in a series of texts, on this phenomenon of trigger warningsWhere TW for the close friends.
Several museums here have started placing warnings and trauma warnings at the entrance to some of their exhibits. A way to make their reception more “safe and inclusive”. When we know the scientific vocation of museums, as well as their past anchored in shocking cabinets of curiosities, is this a social evolution, or a disconnection from the mission?
Museums, whether dedicated to art or history, have multiplied warnings to visitors in recent months. On the cartels near the works and on the Internet sites. Examples ? At the entrance to the Diane Arbus exhibition at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA), it is specified that the titles [tel Nain mexicain dans sa chambre d’hôtel] were chosen by the photographer, with “terms that are no longer in use today, due to changing perspectives related to gender, race, ability and other forms of diversity”.
The Canadian Museum of History recalls on its website that its collections “contain objects and images that evoke violence, war and other forms of conflict and cultural content of a sensitive nature”.
The National Museum of Fine Arts of Quebec (MNBAQ) offers two routes to its exhibition Evergon, intimate theatersincluding one to avoid the ten works of complete nudity, or sexually explicit, essential in the approach of the photographer.
Why use the TW, Avoidances and Cautions? The MNBAQ responds. It wants to be “a citizen museum, on a human scale”, asks the director of conservation, Guillaume Savard. “In tune with the challenges of our society, it advocates the values of diversity and inclusion”, as well as universal accessibility to content. The use of trauma warnings is envisaged there “on a case-by-case basis”.
Disclaimer: this museum is a museum
Other museums do not use disclaimers. So far, Pointe-à-Callière in Montreal believes that the contextualization work done during the preparation of exhibitions, “in close collaboration with specialists in the subjects covered and representatives of cultural communities”, is sufficient to avoid potential clashes, as detailed by Claude-Sylvie Lemery.
At the Pop museum in Trois-Rivières, it is only indicated on the website, far in the prices and the frequently asked questions, why the visit to the old prison, with walls steeped in a sad past, is not recommended for children under 8 years old. .
Shocks at the museum
The warnings and TW are precautions to avoid the visitor the shock, the bad surprise. However, there is “a long museum tradition in which the strange, the unusual, the fright, the fear aroused by cabinets of curiosities are part of”, recalls museologist Yves Bergeron.
These entertainment museums, like the Barnum’s American Museum, opened in 1841 in New York, played natural sciences, wax statues and… objects having been used to commit murders.
We are groping our way socially on the subject of the emotional security of the public
In Montreal, nestled on boulevard Saint-Laurent, was the Musée Éden, which presented scenes from Canadian history and reproduced murder scenes.
“The visitor was going to experience strong emotions there, and even see monsters,” continues Yves Bergeron, holder of the Chair in Museum Governance and Cultural Law. “It was so popular that ‘museologists’ at the time invented monsters by mixing stuffed animals together. »
The emotion, the work and the public
As for art museums, the notion of aesthetic shock, of explosive encounter with a work, is also a branch of the genealogy of museums. Pascale Brillon, trauma specialist at UQAM, studied art history before turning to psychology. She does not believe it necessary to soften the aesthetic shocks.
“Art is the representation of life… and life is also hard, trying, cruel, unfair. Whether art speaks to us about what is happening in Ukraine or in our families, about the presence of physical or sexual assaults, accidents, tragic deaths, wars, all of this is part of life,” he says. she.
“Evoking a difficult, painful emotion, sometimes confronting us with something extreme, is one of the mandates of art. And one of the museum’s missions, as the MMFA’s director of communications, Michèle Meier, points out, is to promote encounters between the public and the works.
Equity, diversity, inclusion and trauma warnings
Mme Meier confirms that for the MMFA, trying to listen to the public and be in tune with societal issues is “a delicate balance”. “How can we make the place as inclusive as possible, respecting the intuitions of the museum, of the artists? Our wish is that the museum be a safe and inclusive space for all, knowing that it is impossible to achieve this completely. We make the greatest effort, we evolve with the public. If there is reason to review our practices, we will do so. »
Specialist observers of museums have observed that it is those where education and the search for inclusion are the strongest that adopt warnings of all kinds.
For museologist and mediation specialist Christine Bernier, the warnings and TW are also navigating museums in concert with the “Equity, Diversity, Inclusion” (EDI) discourse, “which brings, in a gentler way than the TWa “compensation” for what could be a micro-aggression on the part of the museum”.
The professor at the University of Montreal gives as an example the exhibition Picasso. tricks, presented at the MNBAQ in 2021. “There was a lot of talk about ways to separate the man from the work, which is traditional in ways of educating the public. In addition, there were quotes everywhere from people, people, talking about their traumas in the acceptance of their own body. Like a counterpoint speech. »
These testimonies are absent from the catalog of the exhibition, notes the specialist. Which is not entirely coherent, according to her, since the catalog is the permanent trace of the scientific reflection behind the exhibition.
Once we get to…
For meme Berniers, the TW “are completely useless in an exhibition hall, because we are already there, as visitors. We managed to surrender, we will not retrace our steps. On a website, in preparation for a visit, I can understand. But not in situ “.
“We are groping our way socially on the subject of the emotional security of the public,” reflects in turn Pascale Bédard, professor of sociology of arts and culture at Laval University. “I have the impression that many organizations say to themselves ‘Let’s not take any risks, and let’s do it'”, like a kind of ‘Prevention is better than cure’.
Institutions, analyzes the specialist, protect themselves in this gesture more than they protect the health of their audiences. “It seems to be more about self-protection and public relations, to attract new generations of visitors, for whom these values are important. »
“The spirit of the times calls for museums to position themselves with delicacy, or with the appearance of delicacy,” she continues. The museum is supposed to be the institutional authority: its discourse is also that of the State, that of cultural legitimacy. »
However, by using warnings and TWby concealing the fact that studies to date have revealed them to be ineffective, the museum, which also has a scientific vocation, helps to legitimize their use.
“Wouldn’t, for a museum, want to comfort and avoid shock be more a form of propaganda? asks museologist Yves Bergeron. Yes, being confronted, moved, upset in all sorts of ways is one of the functions of the museum, which are numerous and complex. »