Whether you call them exhibition guardians, attendants or sitters, there’s no doubt that they are the unsung heroes of any exhibition space. These are the people who stand in exhibition corners and are tasked with overseeing the art in exhibition spaces. They ensure artworks are out of harm’s way by reminding people not to stand too close or to touch the pieces. Exhibition guardians are also tasked with helping visitors with any questions they might have—everything from where the nearest toilet is to what a specific artwork might mean. Yet, more often than not, exhibition guardians are ignored by visitors and are generally some of the lowest-paid positions within the art system.
Thai artist Thitibodee Rungteerawattananon believes the position deserves more commendation and has created his performance piece Ghost to raise awareness of this issue. In Ghost, a trained performer wears the bright red uniform of the British Royal Guard and carries out the duties of museum guardians—a uniform that instantly elevates the status of museum guardians as “royals.” Ghost also asks the performers to incorporate miming and comedic lines while interacting with visitors to draw attention to themselves further. Imagine a museum guard trailing a visitor, mirroring their every move—an interaction impossible to ignore.
Ghost brings the unsung heroes of art spaces into visitors' minds, in the hope of ensuring that people no longer take them for granted and give them the pay they deserve, reflecting the the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of Decent Work And Economic Growth.
Singaporean curator John Tung’s perspective on Rungteerawattananon The Museum is Dead in an interview for OH! Open House. Video Courtesy OH! Open House's Instagram page.
Ghost was a site-specific performance set during at the exhibition The Museum Is Dead at Tanglin Shopping Center in Singapore. The exhibition was curated by John Tung and organized by Oh! Open House, an organization which aims to tell alternative stories of Singapore through the arts. The Museum Is Dead aimed to present a pro and con view of museums in Singapore. Hence, Ghost probed specifically into the roles of exhibition sitters within museums.
In Singapore, exhibition or gallery sitters earn an average of $2,350 per year, which is only $50 per week. The Singapore Art Museum, a premiere art institution in the country, pays its gallery sitters only $9 per hour. This is a meagre sum if one were to compare this compensation with the job's requirements, which require people to spend most of their time standing, being acutely alert, and constantly watching people and the artworks during a museum or gallery's opening hours.
An anonymous opinion piece published in the Singaporean art magazine Plural Art described how the job requires them to navigate sticky situations and not-so-savoury characters, including encounters with individuals who insisted on bringing their pet dog into the exhibition space.
Rungteerawattananon’s Ghost makes one thing clear—exhibition sitters are not just part of the scenery. They are workers who deserve fair pay, better conditions, and, at the very least, the chance to actually 'sit.' By flipping the script and making them impossible to ignore, Ghost forces visitors to see them not just as background figures but as people who deserve recognition and respect.
Learn more about Ghost and other pieces by Thitibodee Rungteerawattananon by following him on Instagram @thitibodee_r.