Page - 135 - in Siting Futurity - The “Feel Good” Tactical Radicalism of Contemporary Culture in and around Vienna

135 from grand Hotels to tiny treasures manipulate feelings by controlling the characters they created. But in an exhibition, they can handle only existing artworks that have their own histories.” Moreover, Anderson’s and Ma- louf’s specific practices are “all about creating narratives and moods — of yearning, of melancholy, of passion. […] Un- like a director moving actors around a set, a museum curator cannot dictate how the works will make a viewer feel” (ibid.). That is, Anderson and Malouf found themselves facing intran- sigence and recalcitrance both on the part of the objects and the museum-goers. No longer able to order people about and draw lines wherever they saw fit, they had to accommodate the preservational needs of their surroundings, not to mention each other and their relationship. Unlike in their respective fictional worlds, objects and pesky characters like adjunct or fellow cu- rators could not be simply destroyed or killed off; rather their autonomy, fragility, and worth had to be respected. Being cut off from his usual narratives and having to nego- tiate and debate with his co-curator may not necessarily have been a pleasant experience for Anderson, but one sees that it was a valuable one in the title and upbeat mood of the exhibi- tion. As one astute critic noted in a sly dig at his more arrogant colleagues: It would be easy to dismiss the simplicity of Anderson and Malouf’s approach, treating them as mere dilettantes. To do so would miss how Spitzmaus Mummy bursts with the joy of discovery. It allows us to relive those moments we first fell in love with things, when the shelves in libraries, bookshops, museums, or galleries seem to extend infinitely into the dis- tance. (Feldman 2018) That this joy of discovery was appreciated and shared by mu- seum-goers is evident in Instagram comments such as “I love the color blocking that reminds immediately of Wes Anderson’s movies! [film camera emoji]” and “[f]or me all in all it’s a fun experience to walk through these rooms and discover all the little details and unknown exhibits. For those who expect any