No Photos Allowed
This week, whilst in London, I visited two beautiful venues who had another thing in common. The first was Windsor Castle, the other, the Sir John Ritblat — Treasures of the British Library Gallery. Both sites had a “strictly no photos allowed” policy. The no-photos policy is not limited to just England but is a worldwide phenomenon. Visitors cannot take photos in places like the Sistine Chapel in Rome, the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam or Versailles Palace in France. Some museums have modified this policy to allow photography (without flash) in certain parts of the museum but not in temporary exhibitions. It appears that the primary reason for the ban is financial. Damages to paintings from flash photography, reduced visit quality caused by bottlenecks of selfie-stick wielding visitors and lost income from souvenir shops,
Yet this can be significantly counterproductive and museums should be embracing user-generated content within museums, including that of digital photography and videography. Museums taking a more visitor centred approach are realising that banning photography for their audiences is a problem.
Banning photography blocks our incredible desire to visually record and document our lives. Each year more than a trillion digital images are uploaded by users to the internet. Selfies taken in front of important buildings and landmarks as well as famous objects are amongst the most popular images uploaded on social media.
Smartphones and fast mobile internet connectivity make documenting our life on the go easier than ever. They also make photography bans more frustrating than ever. This frustration is enhanced when the same venues banning photography post high res photos on their websites of the same places they ban visitors to take photos of. People love to upload digital photos on the internet, this in itself is a great way to market a museum. Normally people share photos of places they enjoyed visiting with their loved ones. They share photos of their experience because they wish to share it with others for a variety of reasons. Today we know that museum visits do not end the minute you walk out of the museum door, Visitor photos are a great way to remember places and works which caught the visitor's attention and interest. Visitors may follow up the physical visit with online research possibly looking up more information about specific works which were interesting enough to be captured in a photo.
Museums must realise that digital photography amounts to free advertising, when visitors take photos and share them on the internet they are creating user-generated content for the museum. Sites like TripAdvisor Booking.com and Google Business encourage visitors to post photos of their visits to back up user reviews. These make these reviews even more credible. Generally speaking, photography helps to strengthen and promote culture
Advances in technology mean that cameras are becoming even smaller and more wearable making it even harder to ban photography. Whilst it is understandable to ban tripods and selfie sticks which can occasionally hit artworks and other visitors makes sense. However, a complete ban on photography in an age when even the cheapest smartphone is equipped with a camera does not make sense any longer.
