Search Results for: max hollein

The Eagles may have booted Don Felder out of the band, but he was the one who enjoyed a star turn at the Metropolitan Museum's memorable press preview for Play it Loud: Instruments of Rock & Roll, which opened yesterday (to Oct. 1). Following comments by several rock luminaries (see below), Felder strolled up to the microphone, picked up his trusty double-neck sidekick, and … [Read more...] about Rockin’ at the Met with “Play It Loud”: Guitar Action & My Copyright Infraction (with video)

The hits to the Metropolitan Museum's finances attributable to its previous director, Tom Campbell, just keep on coming. In a contrite press release, the museum reported on Feb. 15 that it had recently surrendered to the Manhattan District Attorney's office (for return to Egypt) the gilded Coffin of Nedjemankh. Evidence had emerged that the late Ptolemaic cartonnage, … [Read more...] about Fool’s Gold at Metropolitan Museum: Tom Campbell’s Golden Coffin & Golden Parachute

It's always dangerous for a critic to bring preconceptions to an exhibition she hasn't seen yet. But it's a pitfall that I sometimes fall into, against my better judgment. I went out on a limb in October when I optimistically touted an exhibition that wasn't opening at the Metropolitan Museum until mid-December---Epic Abstraction: Pollock to Herrera, organized by Randall … [Read more...] about Abstraction Dejection: Riffing with Griffey at the Metropolitan Museum

In this Era of Bad Feelings, when so many of our fractious political and cultural conversations have been driven by the dangerously erratic course of a President lacking a GPS, I savored a feel-good moment last February when I covered the high spirited friends-and-family reunion of the Obama Administration (linked below)---the high point of my 2018 professional … [Read more...] about The Year in CultureGrrl: Impolitic About Art & Politics

Luke Syson, who in 2012 came to the Metropolitan Museum from the National Gallery, London, becoming the Met's chairman of European Sculpture and Decorative Arts in 2014, is now poised to join the wave of high-level departures from our country's preeminent museum. The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, recently announced that Syson, who most recently co-curated the Met's provocative … [Read more...] about Syson Siphoned: Met’s Departing Department Chair to Direct Fitzwilliam; 2 Future Stars Emerge (video)

As an admirer of the late Jack Whitten's paintings, I welcomed the chance to see his little-known, previously unexhibited wood sculptures and mixed-media assemblages now on view in the Met Breuer's Odyssey: Jack Whitten Sculpture, 1963–2017. But the considerable pleasures to be derived from this admirable show were partly undermined by its subtle but substantive commercial … [Read more...] about Jack Whitten’s Sculpture Show Uncovers his Secret Strengths (& the Met Breuer’s Hidden Weakness) CORRECTED

My 2011 Museum Musical Chairs post now has an unexpected sequel---the "Frick Breuer." As foreshadowed in my recent interviews with Ian Wardropper and Max Hollein, their respective directors, the Frick Collection and the Metropolitan Museum have just announced (here and here) that the Met hopes to decamp from the Whitney Museum's former flagship building in 2020. The Frick … [Read more...] about Museum Musical Chairs (again): Frick to Sublease Building That the Met Leases from Whitney

In preparing for my recent interview with Max Hollein, the Metropolitan Museum's tech-savvy new director, I decided to revisit the museum's app, much ballyhooed four years ago, but disappointing when I recently app-lied it in the galleries. To my surprise, I discovered that the app's been zapped. (Read the black box at the bottom of my screenshot, below.) In June, … [Read more...] about Technical Corrections: Metropolitan Museum Zaps Its App; SFMOMA Cans App’s Claptrap UPDATED

When Earl (Rusty) Powell III announced his intention to retire in early 2019 from the directorship of the National Gallery of Art (NGA) in Washington, I wrote that our country's "two preeminent [art] institutions could be going head-to-head for top candidates." With the vacant Metropolitan Museum directorship's chair soon to be occupied by Max Hollein (after what turned … [Read more...] about Wanna Direct the National Gallery of Art? (Job Description Below)

Where's Max Hollein when we really need him? Several "what-were-they-thinking?" moments jolted me recently at the Metropolitan Museum, reaffirming my belief in a bedrock principle of museum management: An art museum, particularly a complicated operation like the Met, needs a director who has had substantial curatorial experience and also, preferably, has served elsewhere as … [Read more...] about Infernal “Heavenly Bodies”: How the Directorless Metropolitan Museum Went Astray

With all the recent pushback against the supposed "glass ceiling" at the Metropolitan Museum (occasioned by the naming of an eminently qualified male, Max Hollein, to assume its directorship), let's take a look at another glass-ceiling problem there, which is unambiguous and needs immediate remediation: Keith Christiansen, the Met's chairman of European paintings, ended … [Read more...] about Fixing the Actual “Glass Ceiling” at the Metropolitan Museum: My Q&A with Keith Christiansen

I thought I'd give it another try by attending the preview for Frieze Art Fair (to May 7), but I still find that, for me, art fairs are a a good way to network with artworld luminaries but a poor way to view and absorb art. A suitable format for conveying this superficial, disjointed experience is chain of live tweets. Aside from the people mentioned in my tweets, I ran into … [Read more...] about Schmooze & Peruse: My Live Tweets on the Frieze Art Fair in New York

I got an early jump on the culture pundits who are rushing to analyze Tom Campbell's planned departure from the directorship of the Metropolitan Museum. Commentary is now pouring in from people whose strong opinions are not always founded on a complete grasp of the facts. Holland Cotter's prescription for curing the ailing Metropolitan Museum bore an uncanny resemblance to … [Read more...] about More on Met Directorship: My Takes on Puzzling Punditry by Cotter, Gibson, Dobrzynski, Oliver

Now she's a board chair, not president. But whatever names you call her, it appears that Diane ("Dede") Wilsey has out-maneuvered the proponents of regime change at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. The smartest move in this continuing chess game comes from Max Hollein, FAMSF's new director, who (in conformance with professional guidelines [p. 5] for art museum … [Read more...] about Wilsey or Won’t She? FAMSF’s Board Head Defies Regime Change (plus: Albright-Knox name change)

The long overdue wresting of control over the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco from a bejeweled socialite and consummate fundraiser, Diane "Dede" Wilsey, is finally occurring under the museums' new director, Max Hollein, who assumed his post on June 1. What we don't yet know is whether Max impelled this change or just got lucky. In her dual role as FAMSF's board … [Read more...] about Willful Wilsey Wilts: Regime Change at Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco