This made MoMA’s kickoff of a series of 24-hour screenings on New Year’s Eve a perfect fit, a civilized alternative to the mobbed masses huddled to the south. The work strikes midnight dramatically with an extended clip from The Stranger, in which Orson Welles dangles from a clock tower, followed by 10 one-second clips by way of a punctuated countdown.

It must have been great for those who made it into the theater. For the 75 or so museumgoers stranded in line, The Clock was a more curious decision: There would be no dropping ball, no Mayor Bloomberg dancing with a surprise celebrity, no drunken shouts heralding the new year.

What could be said for them?

That they were the regular MoMA-going crowd: urbanites and tourists, art lovers and students, one 7-year-old and a smattering of well-heeled society-types who appeared close to midnight and seemed to slip past the line? That they’d chosen to pass the passing of another year passing time in a line to watch a film focused on time’s passage? That they’d forsaken food and drink and good cheer to quarantine themselves from the madness outside? Had they stepped out of time? Had time passed them by?

“They said nothing good happens after midnight,” said Tricia Melloy, in from New Jersey to see The Clock. “I guess I wanted to find out.”

“We wanted to avoid all the New Year’s nonsense,” Justin McKinney told the Transom.Mr. McKinney was in from Montreal with his wife. They’d spent some time watching The Clock earlier in the evening, and after a bite at the MoMA Café, they decided to stick around for the climax.

And so they waited in the museum’s second-floor atrium. They passed time in conversation, or stretched out on divans in the center of the room. They drifted into the contemporary galleries, or popped into the café for a dessert plate or a sip of champagne. One young woman gave the crowd a taste of the spectacle they were missing out on in the streets, pantomiming a strip tease on Philip Worthington’s “Shadow Monsters” installation. Not that anyone really noticed.

Time passed, the line inched forward, and those in it became philosophical.

“Time is arbitrary anyway,” Dan Nation told the Transom. Chinese New Year, he pointed out, is situated, more logically, at the end of winter. “Besides,” he said, “I imagine there are people waiting on line to get into a club somewhere.”

“It’s all very meta,” David Osit admitted, having given up on The Clock to lead two out-of-town friends in search of a bar. “The experience of watching something passing seemed interesting. The experience of waiting on line, not as much.”

Last-ditch strategies were discussed. Rush the door, someone suggested. Tell people the show is canceled. Yell fire. Midnight neared. With 30 seconds to go, an iPad was thrust in the air, live-streaming the end of the year. Everyone shouted out the last 10 seconds.

And then it was over. There were handshakes and hugs and sedate kisses. Everyone looked a little better than they should have in the soft museum light. Ten blocks south, amid the Times Square madness, thousands were dancing in neon, laughing and shouting and who the hell knows.

Time passed. At 12:06, the first lucky patrons began exiting the theater, but we were still waiting. —P.C.

From 'The Clock.'

The Museum of Fine Arts Boston has abandoned its original plan to charge $200 for its debut viewing of Christian Marclay's The Clock, following outrage from Bostonians and a displeased statement from Mr. Marclay himself. Instead, the 24-hour video installation will now be shown a day earlier for free — with admission when the museum is open, completely free when not — with the $200 viewing party going ahead as planned.

From the press release:

For the 24-hour premiere, The Clock is included in Museum admission during MFA hours—from 4 p.m. until 9 p.m. on Friday, September 16 and 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Saturday, September 17. Overnight from 9 p.m. (September 16) through 10 a.m. (September 17), when only The Clock will be on view, guests will be admitted free of charge. There are no reservations and seating is on a first-come, first-served basis. The Loring Gallery will be arranged with couches and room for standing to accommodate a total of 48 visitors.

As thrown bones go, this one's not bad! Let's hope this pleases the Clockheads.

A still from Christian Marclay's 2010 film "The Clock." (Photo: White Cube)

Just days after the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, announced that it would unveil its copy of artist Christian Marclay's 24-hour film The Clock as part of a Sept. 17 party celebrating the opening of its new contemporary art wing, for which tickets cost $200, Mr. Marclay released a statement that seems to put him at odds with MFA officials.

Mr. Marclay writes, in a letter that was distributed by his London gallery, White Cube: "It has always been my express wish that there should be no additional charge to view my work The Clock, over and above any general admission price to an institution or any other venue, nor should it be used in connection with the promotion, advertisement or sponsorship of any person or business."

A spokesperson for the MFA Boston, which purchased the work in conjunction with the National Gallery of Canada, responded delicately in the Boston Globe, saying, "The MFA is not charging to see The Clock; we are charging for the party." MFA director Malcolm Rogers echoed that comment in a statement to press--"We regret that our plans for the opening party gave the impression that we are charging specifically for The Clock," Mr. Rogers said.

While it is, of course, common for museums to allow wealthy donors, museum members and--yes--members of the press to see exhibitions before they open to the general public, the MFA's decision effectively bars most of its visitors from seeing the complete film until almost a month after it opens, when the MFA Boston says that it will have a free 24-hour screening during Columbus Day weekend.

For now, the party, The Clock included, is still on.

A still from Christian Marclay's "The Clock" (2010) (White Cube and Paula Cooper Gallery)

After drawing large crowds at the White Cube gallery in London, the Paula Cooper Gallery in New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Venice Biennale, Christian Marclay's 24-hour film The Clock, which is comprised of thousands of short clips from a variety of movies that show time passing in real time, will go on view at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, on Sept. 17., at the opening of its contemporary art wing.

The ticket price? $200, which breaks down to about $8 per hour.

MFA officials argue that the steep admission price is to cover the cost of keeping the museum open through the night--the film will run from 7 p.m. on Sept. 17 to 7 p.m. the next day--and covering other aspects of the party, which includes food, drink and a performance by Irish artist Amanda Coogan, but the Boston Globe reports that some people are not pleased with the ticket price.

Artist and Kingston Gallery director Ilona Anderson called the price "revolting," and added, "If they want to cultivate an audience for contemporary art, they need to make it available. It shouldn’t be exclusive." And Ashley Lee, who writes about museum admissions fees, offered this trenchant argument: "Treating it as a gala opener and disrespecting its true, 24-hour purpose really degrades the work."

The museum says that it will schedule other 24-hour screenings of the film, without the $200 ticket price, later in the year. The rest of the time, it will be visible to the general public only during museum hours, meaning a vast section of the film will go largely unseen. The MFA also notes that the ticket price for the opening will decrease throughout the night. Arrive at 11 p.m. and admission is $100. At 3 a.m. it drops to $50, and it will become free at 7 a.m.

The Observer would like to float an alternative pricing scheme, which is sometimes adopted by organizers of Erik Satie's Vexations piano piece, a work that can last for more than 18 hours. (It features 180 notes, which are repeated 840 times.) Instead of charging people based on their early arrival, this method involves charging people when they leave, rewarding people who stay longer.

At a 1963 performance in New York, to cite one example, people paid $5 to enter the theater, but received a refund of 5 cents for every 20 minutes they stayed, and those that made it through the entire show actually earned 20 cents. Granted, that model may not be the best way to raise money.

Update: The Israel Museum announced today that it plans to show a copy of The Clock, on loan from Mr. Marclay, beginning Aug. 23.

A sensation in London, Christian Marclay's The Clock makes its New York debut this week in the artist's eighth solo show at Paula Cooper Gallery. A 24-hour video, The Clock is a compilation of film clips featuring timepieces-culled from the 100-year history of cinema-that is synched with the actual time that viewers watch it.

Mr. Marclay is known for going beyond the standard art-world audience with pieces that employ sound and music. Earlier this year, the Whitney Museum of American Art held a Marclay Festival, lauding the artist as a "pioneer of turntablism," holding daily performances and employing musicians to perform some of his scores. Visitors were also invited to add, on a chalkboard, their own notes. Among his most famous and popular pieces is Sounds of Christmas, conceived in 1999, but staged in a different city every holiday since. It features events organized around Marclay's 1,200-strong collection of Christmas albums.

In the case of The Clock, crowds lined up at London's White Cube to view it and camped out overnight to soak it up on sofas during several complete screenings. The BBC called it "a visual narcotic," the Financial Times "magnificent" and The Telegraph a "stand-out, knock-down hit."

Readying for daily screenings of his new-media artwork during gallery hours, along with five 24-hour presentations Friday through Saturday during the run of the show (Jan. 21-Feb. 19), Mr. Marclay recently spoke with The Observer.

The Observer: How did The Clock come about?

Christian Marclay: I've been thinking about this piece since 2005. I started collecting clocks from films and thinking it might be possible to find every minute of the day throughout the history of cinema. It actually took me a year of searching and editing until I felt certain it was possible.

Were there parts that were harder to find?

Oh, yeah. Not much happens between 5 and 5:30 a.m., at least in the movies. But that's the time when we dream the most. So I used a lot of dream sequences. I had assistants that were watching films and collecting the material. ... They had the best job in the world, sitting at home, watching movies and grabbing excerpts that had references to time.

Why is time an important subject to you?

Time is at the center of everything we do. As much as it is an artificial construct-in some ways it's pretty abstract-it is a reality that we all synch to, and we conduct our lives to that rhythm.

What role does time play in cinema?

In cinema, it's completely artificial. You could be watching a hundred years of history, or someone's whole life in a two-hour movie. Time is stretched and condensed, depending on what's needed to tell the story. The difference in my video is that everything happens in real time.

 What period of time do the films that you use span?

It spans the whole history of cinema, from early silent films to contemporary Hollywood productions.

Has anyone other than you seen the whole video?

Some people have, but not in one sitting. The 24-hour screenings are really important to the piece. ... One guy even showed up in his pajamas, but it's not necessarily meant to be seen in one sitting. It's an ambient piece, like a clock-it's always there, ticking.

How do you think it will stand the test of time?

[Laughs] I don't know. More than ever, we are aware of the time, every device we have is telling us exactly what time it is, the TV, the phone, the car or the computer. That, in itself, is a new experience. But this video is not so practical; it's in between a functional device and entertainment. You're being entertained, while at the same time you are constantly reminded about the time going by. It's a very philosophical piece.