Cost-cuts, The Guggenheim Museum and Its Exhibition Program

Disingenuous, adj.: 1) not straightforward; not candid or frank; insincere; 2) slyly deceptive or misleading, typically by means of a pretense of ignorance or unawareness.

That’s from Webster’s New World College Dictionary, 4th Ed., and that’s the word I thought of when I read, in today’s New York Times that in announcing cost reductions at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum* yesterday, director Richard Armstrong “emphasized [that] no exhibitions have been canceled.”

Interesting, because the Guggenheim had signed up to be the third venue for Prendergast in Italy, a show organized by the Williams College Museum of Art (it begins there on July 18) that will then go to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice. In April, after many loan agreements were signed, news came that the third venue was, instead, to be the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. I know this because I own a small, atypical Prendergast in the show, and I was asked to sign additional papers. I recently had an opportunity to ask why, and was told that the Guggenheim backed out for cost reasons.

When I asked Betsy Ennis, the Guggenheim’s Press Officer, about this today, she emailed:

The Prendergast exhibition was pulled because of costs but well in advance of these cuts and the current economic downturn. The show was never 100% confirmed.

But, I said, what about those papers I signed? Was it cut in a previous round of cutbacks? Her response:

As you must know, in the world of museum exhibition programming, exhibitions and their travel schedules are subject to a great deal of change. There was no previous round of cutbacks.

I’m not trying to play a game of “gotcha” here. But the Guggenheim has changed its exhibition program because of costs, in at least this one case. (And the downturn, as we know, became a crash in September, 2008.) Why not say so? It’s these kinds games some institutions play with disclosure, often on much more important things, that undermine public confidence in them.

* Disclosure: I consult to a foundation that supports the Works & Process program at the Guggenheim Museum.

Photo Credit: Monte Pincio, Rome, 1898-99, Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois; Daniel J. Terra Collection