Real Clear Arts

Judith H. Dobrzynski on Culture

Timken Mess, Part 3: Hugh Davies Adds Perspective

The Timken Museum of Art in San Diego, as you’ll recall, is a governance mess: trustees have caused Executive Director John Wilson, a professional, to resign and have replaced him with a well-known art restorer who will run the museum part time from New York City. See my posts here and here. That’s no way to run a museum.

hugh-daviesThe saddest thing, as reported in a piece last week by KPBS, the public radio station, is that locals now see the museum as regressing. Wilson had boosted attendance and raised some money, but apparently also thought the board should help fundraise. One source told me that at one point a few years ago the board had been asked to get or give a certain amount, but that the current board president, Tim Zinn, has let that fall by the wayside.

Reporter Angela Carone spoke with  Hugh Davies, director of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, and he had the courage to speak out on the record:

“It’s potential was finally being tapped by John Wilson…And I can’t for the life of me figure out why you would nip that in the bud. I can only think it comes from the leadership of the board.”

But her story continued:

Zinn said Wilson was a great curator, but the board wanted a different fundraising and administrative approach. “It’s where you put your time,” said Zinn, suggesting that Wilson’s focus was too heavy on curating.

“And he’s been here for six years, and sometimes it’s just time to repot a plant.”

Zinn said that Bull will raise money from New York, but Davies shot that down:

“David Bull will not be able to raise money. You have to know people and have known them for a long time,” said Davies. “You have to be invested in the community. He is just parachuting in five or six times a year for cocktail parties and openings.”

One of the divisive issues between Wilson and the board was who was responsible for fundraising. Wilson wanted the board to facilitate more access to individuals and families who might give to the Timken. Zinn said a case for giving, especially since the museum already has a $25 million endowment, needed to come from Wilson. “That needed to start with the administration of the museum,” he said. “John’s feeling was the board needed to come up with that. A different philosophy.”

Truth is, board and director need to work together. There’s still more to come out here.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Art Ltd.

 

Save The Corcoran Plaintiffs Receive Standing

SavetheCorcJust in: D.C. Superior Court Judge Robert Okun has granted standing, aka petition to intervene, to nine of the 19 people who, as part of Save the Corcoran, asked to be part of the case to stop the mergers put forward by the museum’s trustees.

The 9 include current students, staff and faculty. The judge reportedly told the attorney representing the Trustees of the Corcoran Gallery that he expects further justification of the mergers with the National Gallery of Art and George Washington University as the way forward for the gallery and the school.

The next hearings have been scheduled for next Monday, from 2 to 4:45 pm, plus Tuesday and Wednesday, from 10 am to 4:45 pm and Thursday, 10 am to 3 pm. Here’s the Washington Post article that ran on Saturday explaining more background.

LA To Get Yet Another Contemporary Art Museum

Maybe it got little notice nationally because it’s still just a paper plan, but it looks as if Los Angeles will get another contemporary art museum. It’s called the Old Bank District Museum and it’s the brainchild of a real estate developer named Tom Gilmore. He has hired architect Tom Wiscombe, and they are planning “an epic, locally minded art institution within the stalwart structures shouldering Main and Fourth Streets.” That’s in LA’s “historic core district.”

FarmersMerchants_LACThe buildings involved are the Hellman, Farmers and Merchants Bank Building (at right), and the Old Bank Garage, according to LA Curbed, and the museum will “occupy basements, rooftops, and mezzanines” of the three structures. It also said:

An early guesstimate at the museum’s cost runs between $25 and 35 million. Gilmore and [Jerri] Perrone are providing the seed money, then seeking benefactors, and likely creating a nonprofit to run and fund the museum….

“It will be a repository for prominent Downtown artists of the last 40 years,” says Gilmore. Among others, they’re interested in Robert Reynolds and Tod Lychkoff, two artists who operate out of the Historic Core.

If I have my geography correct, this is not near the downtown area where the Broad Art Museum is set to open, on a much wider, more international scale, next year. And that’s good — spread art around — though it makes success more difficult. Without a nearby critical mass, the Old Bank District Museum would have to succeed on its own. It’s also good that this museums says it has a different mission than the Broad or MOCA-LA — local artists. If it ever really gets off the ground, that will be a plus.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Los Angeles Conservancy

 

Let’s All Help Save Syria’s Treasures: A Plan

Everyone has been very worried about the state of cultural heritage properties in Syria during this civil war. There have been irregular reports but they all suggest that Old Aleppo, the Krak des Chevaliers, many medieval Christian cemeteries and dozens of archaeological sites and museums have been damaged — or, as a new release from an organization trying to do something put it, “subjected to extensive raiding and looting.”

GreatMosque-AleppoIn late June, the Penn Museum’s Penn Cultural Heritage Center in Philadelphia and the Smithsonian Institution, along with the Syrian Interim Government’s newly formed Heritage Task Force, sponsored a three-day training program called “Emergency Care for Syrian Museum Collections,” for museum curators, heritage experts, and civilians working to protect cultural heritage inside Syria.

The release noted that “additional training programs are being planned, pending funding.”

There’s been a lot of hand-wringing about Syria (see here, here, here and here). In that last post, in April, I quoted a curator named Ammar Kannawi saying that Syria needed “technical support and expertise from Western experts who helped in previous conflicts.” Now perhaps they are starting to get it — but they need more expertise. The Penn Museum release quotes  Brian Daniels, Ph.D., Director of Research and Programs at its Penn Cultural Heritage Center, saying:

While it is very difficult for international heritage organizations to travel into Syria today, there are a number of Syrians who regularly risk their lives to protect their cultural heritage. This workshop and other efforts going forward are designed to support these individuals and their efforts.

But our experts, with luck, aren’t risking their lives. The training was held in an undisclosed location outside of Syria, and about 20 Syrians attended. The release continued:

The objectives of the workshop were three-fold: to offer information on how to secure museum collections safely during emergencies; to provide participants with basic supplies for packing and securing museum collections, and to begin a dialogue among Syrian participants about emergency responses. “This workshop fits the model of heritage preservation promoted by the Penn Cultural Heritage Center,” said Richard M. Leventhal, the Center’s Executive Director. “Local communities are best equipped to identify heritage in need of preservation and protection, and this is precisely what is happening in Syria. We are pleased to work alongside communities in Syria and other places around the world to support these efforts.”

Conditions at the Ma’arra Museum in Idlib province, famous for its collections of Byzantine mosaics, were a subject of much discussion and concern. The museum has received collateral damage in the fighting and come under direct attack by ISIS units. The workshop was able to offer some suggestions for stabilization in the current situation and provide emergency conservation supplies.

This, though, was a first step, as Penn said. The parties are planning a project that will “document current conditions and future preservation needs, tracking and reporting intentional damage and destruction to cultural heritage sites in Syria.” I hope it goes further than that — providing the technical expertise necessary.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Times of London

“Anonymous” Women, Once Again

It’s that time of year — actually, it’s a little past that time of year — when the Anonymous Was A Woman Foundation makes public the ten female artists who will receive $25,000 no strings attached, just to support them. This is the 19th set of winners  — and I was there at the creation, sort of. So I sometimes like to publicize the winners (which were announced on July 2).

2950828_origThe awards go to women over 40 “who have significantly contributed to their field, while continuing to grow and pursue their work.” This year they are:

These women paint, make sculpture and ceramics, work in theater and performance art.  Five are from New York; the rest are from elsewhere in the U.S.

It’s too bad we still have to make special awards for women artists, but I don’t think the playing field is level yet.

Photo Credit: production still from House/Divided by Marianne Weems, via the Anonymous Was a Woman FoundationÂ