My "Desperation Deaccessions" Performance and Carmine Branagan’s Walk-On Role

Carmine Branagan (left), director of the National Academy, showing CBS-TV's Martha Teichner an Eakins (top) that her museum still owns, during a recent edition of the "Sunday Morning" show

In my role as Deaccession Diva at this week's NY State museums conference (organized for relatively small-sized institutions), I played to a full house (or, more accurately, crowded room) of museum officials and state government representatives, including several who have previously played cameos or starring roles in CultureGrrl: Clifford Siegfried, David Palmquist, a representative from the office of Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, Michael Botwinick, and, let us not forget, Carmine Branagan.

I was not startled when Branagan (whose National Academy deaccessions featured prominently in my presentation) walked in the door, because a conference official had given me prior notice that she had expressed interest in attending my talk. I was a little surprised, though, that she ventured to address the room during the group discussion. Despite my specific invitation for dissent (at which point Branagan remained silent), this was a group that seemed uniformly committed to the concept that museum collections are held in trust for the public---a trust that was sorely compromised by the Academy's actions.

What Branagan did choose to pick up on was my observation at the end of my talk that "the current financial crisis has begun to stimulate a coming together of cultural institutions to help each other in problem-solving." I noted optimistically that by working together collegially to solve common problems, museums can "transform the current financial crisis into an opportunity to improve your governance, your appeal to visitors and donors, and your ties with sister institutions that share your goals and your concerns."

Branagan (who seems to be trying to craft a new role for herself as spokesperson for getting the big guys to become more sensitive to the problems of the little guys) seconded my kumbaya conclusion by observing that "what AAMD and the National Academy are doing is finding ways to work together and be more proactive so things are already in discussion before they reach a crisis."

Isn't that what Branagan should have tried to do BEFORE her museum secretly liquidated its paintings to pay its bills?

After my illustrated retelling (via PowerPoint) of New York State deaccession lore, from Hoving to Brodsky, the group became engrossed in a serious, far-ranging discussion of the provisions and ramifications of Assemblyman Brodsky's current, ground-breaking attempt to legislate deaccession policy.

More on that...COMING SOON.