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August 13, 2007
The NGA fluffs a collector
The National Gallery has earned every bit of its reputation for presenting important, scholar-driven shows and for installing them better than any museum in the United States. In just the last few years: Dada was the most important exhibition to be shown in the United States during the Iraq War. Rembrandt's Late Religious Portraits arrived with echoes of contemporary Palestinian martyrdom portraits. Cezanne in Provence was a visual treat. Clearly the NGA doesn't lack for exhibitions budget, the ability to get loans -- or for anything else. With expenditures of $151 million and an operating surplus of $14 million in its last reported tax year, the NGA is a powerhouse.
So then why is the NGA fluffing a private collector with an upcoming photography show? This fall the NGA will present The Art of the American Snapshot: 1888-1978: From the Collection of Robert E. Jackson. An NGA spokesperson told me that the museum will receive about half of the exhibition's works as a gift from Jackson. The rest goes back to Jackson, who is described by the museum as an "analyst for a large global asset management company" in Seattle.)
There are two problems with the show. First, it goes without saying that museums should not present vanity exhibitions. Museums shouldn't do it even when there's a coherent focus to the show. There's no question that the profile and financial value of Mr. Jackson's collection will increase after the NGA's curatorial, communications and exhibition-related staffs work to glorify him. A non-profit organization's resources should not be used in that manner. (And just because the NGA is getting half of the works on view there's no reason to believe they'll get the other half. The NGA should know this better than anyone: After fluffing the Ebsworths with a show in 2000, the Ebsworths' collection landed in Seattle.)
The NGA should be doubly ashamed because of its exhibition record. If the NGA wants to do a show about 100 years of the 'American Snapshot' it should do so. The museum certainly has the resources to do whatever it wants, to set its own curatorial agenda instead of letting private collectors do the job. Even more specifically: It would be preferable to have the NGA's curators define the show's title term, scope, etc. Jackson is not an NGA curator -- but the museum has just turned him into one.
Related: Also guilty: the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, which is showing works from the collection of the same Blochs after whom the museum's new building is named. The works on view are not pledged to the museum.
Posted August 13, 2007 7:56 AM
