In today's Comment pages, I have written about the questions of principle that lie behind the foundation of our national arts institutions: the fact that Tate, the British Museum, the National Gallery and the rest were created for the people of Britain as an integral part of civic life. In contrast, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, for instance, was created by collectors and private individuals, and thus arguably serves the interests of a much narrower slice of society than its UK counterparts.
Do you think these founding principles of institutions actually matter in practice? Or is all that neither here nor there to visitors to these museums?
My sense is that these ideas are really important - when well articulated and expressed by the institutions themselves. I remember as a teenager going to the National Gallery in London and having an incredibly emotional response to it: because I felt that everything in it belonged to me, and to my fellow citizens. These wonderful pictures were precious objects held in common, shared by us all. I don't think I'd particularly even noticed that the then director, Neil MacGregor, had been banging the idea home relentlessly - none the less, the idea seeped through, and had an incredibly powerful effect on me.
