Getting down and dirty with Van Gogh's Boots. Photograph: Graham Turner
It's one of the curious paradoxes of looking at art that part of you, guiltily, wants to own it. In place of actual larceny some talented folks take sketchbooks into galleries and stand there, pencilling away. (I suspect a there's degree of ignoble showoffery going on here, but I guess if you have the nerve to copy Velázquez in public you're entitled to it.) Other people buy postcards, or novelty items from the museum shop.
And others, including me, like to take pictures. My enjoyment of this year's Frieze Art Fair was substantially increased by taking a little digital camera with me, which I could whip out whenever there was something interesting on display - the nearest I'd ever get to making a purchase, I suppose. Enough to own some pixellated light if you're fifteen grand short.
But most galleries don't let you do that; in fact they strongly discourage it. The National Gallery bans all photography, whether with flash or not, citing heavy visitor numbers. Tate allow snappery in public areas, but not in exhibition spaces. And so it goes on.
So it's wonderful to read that the Design Museum here in London, whose superlative Alan Fletcher: Fifty Years of Graphic Work (and Play) exhibition I was at a few weeks ago and cannot recommend enthusiastically enough - go, go, go! - takes a more relaxed view. The reliably excellent City of Sound blog has a thoughtful post by Dan Hill on the whole issue of taking photographs at exhibitions, praising the concept and featuring shots by the author - some of which are rather good, partly because Fletcher's brilliant, bold images suit well to being snapped, partly because, well, they're interesting photographs.
So our challenge to you is: we want you to do the same. We're looking for your finest arty digital photos, whether they're beautiful scenes you've spotted out and about or quirky studies of Holbein's The Ambassadors taken from under the armpit of a National Gallery bouncer. (We're joking about the last bit. Probably.) The best will bask in glory and approbation on the front of the blog. No further reward needed, surely.
Send 'em along to arts.blog.photos@gmail.com, max size 800 x 600 pixels, if you please ...
