During Slow Economy Museums Use Exisisting Collections

Jacqueline Trescott of the Washington Post has a good article in a Sunday special section insert on museums.  The story is based upon the slower economics many individuals and intuitions are feeling, with museums taking advantage of existing collections for exhibits. One strategy museums are currently using to curtail expenses yet keep exhibitions fresh is to borrow one piece outside of the museums collection, build the exhibit around that item with property from within its own collection.  The Metropolitan Museum of Art is doing this with a new Vermeer exhibition, and the Art Institute of Chicago is doing it with a Caravaggio exhibit. Although combining exhibits and new and creative methods are good, they dont solve all of the problems museums face under the specter of lower admissions and controlling rising costs and belt tightening. The bottom line is many museums cant operate as business as usual from the past. I think we all understand that.

The article shows there are ways to cope and bring new and fresh ideas to museums and collections and still maintain control over expenses.  During slow economic times we all must consider new and experimental ways of dealing within a new paradigm for the fine and decorative arts professions.

Which is not to say that these museums aren't worried about funding and survival, too. Creative curating will get you only so far, as recent conversations with several local curators confirmed. Since last fall, many museums around the country have been forced to shorten their hours, lengthen the stays of their shows, and sometimes dismiss staff, all in reaction to the recession. Museums, like other arts organizations, have seen declines in foundation, corporate and individual giving, and their endowments -- if they ever had them -- have tumbled along with their membership rolls.

Still, Earl "Rusty" Powell III, the National Gallery director, denies that the recession is the silent curator of his museum's season. "The recession began for us, and I expect others, one year before it became publicly discussed. Our donor base was changing. So the formulation for how you support the exhibition has changed," Powell says. "In our case, we formed an exhibition circle, and they donate a certain amount a year to a fund." That fund provided the financial underpinnings for this fall's shows, as did some foundation gifts; the Federal Council on the Arts and Humanities provided insurance.

But in the end, Powell says, it's the quality of a museum's warehouse that will determine whether visitors will line up, at least in the present climate. "Using our permanent collection as a special exhibition is secretly something everyone would want to do," Powell says.

Over at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, the recession arrived just when plans were being finalized for "Oil," a show of photographer Edward Burtynsky's works, which opened Saturday. "We were forced to think about things in a different way," says Paul Roth, senior curator of photography and media arts. "We tried to keep the costs down and tried very hard to get a dedicated sponsor." Challenges included the artist's fees; costs for reproducing, framing and shipping the works; and finding a generous sponsor to offset said costs, one who wouldn't be put off by the subject matter -- the refining of petroleum.

"We decided to do it leaner and meaner," Roth says. Burtynsky helped by guiding the show from Toronto, taking on the production and framing, and arranging for a conversation with Scotiabank Group to come in as the chief sponsor. "All that displaced a six-figure number from our budget," Roth says, adding that his show will actually come in under budget.

To read the full Washington Post article, click HERE.