MR.
SUAREZ: I was really pleased to be asked to
be with you today, because I've lived in this
city for 19 years, a third of my life, and
watched people from every corner of the globe
come to the museums in the
mall to engage with what is here, artifacts,
spectacle, material challenging, whimsical,
or beyond their ability to get anything out
of, frankly.
By life habit, by
profession, I'm a watcher.
I watch people do all kinds of things because
I find them fascinating.
I come and see the museums as a customer,
but I also watch the people watching the museum.
For years I've come here with my kids at all
stages of their lives, with my parents, out
of town visitors, and the random run of humanity,
and seen sadness, delight,
wrestling with difficult material, parents
trying to explain why people would be so horrible
to each other, or who Archie Bunker or Julia
Child were.
We're like those atoms and molecules in those
grainy, corny, hilarious old science films
we used to watch in elementary school: in
motion, bumping up against each other, bumping
up against things,
shedding old ideas, picking up new ones, transforming
and being transformed.
If we want to be a nation of grownups, serious
about what we've got on our plate, clear
about where we've been and where we're going,
the museums we've been discussing today have
some of the heaviest lifting in American culture
still left ahead of them.
There's still so much left for them to do.
We need a usable history and a big inclusive
view of this amazing hybrid culture.
Even as you who are in this business of educating,
engaging, and
entertaining the public have the challenge
of trying to throw your arms around this culture,
capture lightning in a bottle, the state of
the craft is in rapid flux as well.
That came through loud and clear in discussion
after discussion through today.
The tools, the materials, the means, all are
in renegotiation too.
So as important as the what is in all
these conversations, you have to sweat the
how as well.
I don't envy you that task, as old, young,
and middle-aged, consume and absorb communication
in vastly different
ways in 2012.
I would submit to you that while I once watched
Ed Sullivan on Sunday nights with my parents
and my grandparents, 50 years later, there's
virtually no communication produced for mass
consumption in this country that my kids,
their parents, and their grandparents would
all consume in the same way, at the same time,
in the same physical space.
Yet, this is the public you have to serve,
the riddle you have to solve.
You have to hit it out of the park again and
again for Americans of different world views,
generations, income and education levels.
Very few other communicators are expected,
not even expected, commanded to succeed in
such a consistent manner for such a widely
varied audience.
As the rest of the communications universe
is narrowing in its pitch and in its focus
you still have to throw open your arms wide,
not only to the country but to the whole world
that comes to the mall.
My hats off to you, better you than me.
[Laughter]
MR.
SUAREZ: My most idealistic self hopes that
as you move forward that the public will meet
you halfway, consent to be taken somewhere,
moved, taught, transformed by you.
Going to a museum should not just be a sort
of chopped kale noble time killer,
something you're expected to do because you're
in Washington, or because it's something you're
doing for your kids.
It should be an active consent where you agree
to be opened up.
You agree to feel something.
Maybe in the case of the culturally-specific
museums agree not to be such a stranger any
longer to millions of your fellow citizens.
So
thanks very much for having me, I think it's
been a terrific day.
Some housekeeping as we close the session,
thank you to everyone who had a hand in the
panels, both up here on stage,
getting people here, wrangling them, moderating
the various tasks that all went into creating
this program.
There's a reception just outside the door,
and I guess to the right in the Potomac Atrium
where you'll be able to mingle, talk, and
there'll be a live art performance by Native
American Artist Bunky Echo-Hawk, so please
join us at the reception.
Thanks for being here.
Good to see you all.
[Applause]
