Gugg: Acquisitions

Continued from yesterday's catch-up-with-the-Gugg posts, when we discussed membership and architecture and design. Today: Collecting.

From my NYO story: "In fiscal years 2001 to 2003, the Guggenheim spent an average of fewer than a million dollars per year on acquisitions, half to a fifth as much as comparable museums such as the Whitney, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. (In 2004, the Guggenheim's 2004 numbers were more in line with its peers.) 'My ambition is to double [what we spend on buying art] as quickly as possible,' Ms. Dennison said."

Today: The Gugg hasn't doubled its acquisitions budget yet. "I think what I take great encouragement from was that at our last board meeting I was happy to report that in addition to the monies that our collection groups had raised for acquisitions over the past year we had a substantial [growth in] percentage, about 20 percent, above that of donated funds from members the collection committees," Dennison said. "Which means that we're getting them excited about what we wanted to acquire and they're stepping outside their dues to help us buy works of art."

The Guggenheim is showing signs of becoming more permanent collection focused: The Gugg will increase the number of collection shows it puts on (to one out of every three exhibition cycles), and Dennison says that she is working to make more space in the museum for permanent collection galleries. ("We're close, but we haven't finalized that yet," she said.) And it's increasingly buying out of exhibits: "We've asked our curators to prioritize work from exhibits, such as the Russia show," Dennison said. The Gugg bought or is in the process of buying two pieces from that exhibition.

Dennison is also proud of what the museum has acquired in her tenure, including a gifted 1959 Agnes Martin drawing (above), this Cathy Opie, a set of early Richard Prince photographs, Roni Horn, Douglas Gordon, Pierre Hughye, and the Francesco Vezzoli we wrote about here recently. And under her watch Deutsche Bank gave the Gugg the commissions it sponsored as part of a recent series, including works by Bill Viola (Going Forth by Day, shown here and the last good Viola I've seen), Jeff Koons, Gerhard Richter, Lawrence Weiner and James Rosenquist.