Week 9: Collections

 

 Donato de’ Bardi,  Saint Jerome, on panel, 1445-1450
Source


Waves keep crashing into the shore and there is no need to be concerned. It is when the waves have received back to the ocean and it does not seem like the waves will come back is when all should be worried. All museums have had ups and down when it comes to donations, funding’s, lack of trustee’s support its just waves crashing into the shore. But over the pasts mouth the world has been hit with a global pandemic. Museums have lost their connection with public because of lockdown. There are no funds and no audience to pander to.  It can seem like museums are the small island ready to be destroyed.

However, museums have a dangerous and unappealing option to save them from having to shut down. Robin Pogrebin explains that ominous deed museum might do in “Brooklyn Museum to Sell 12 Works as Pandemic Changes the Rules”.  The action of deaccessioning art has always been seen as detrimental to museums since it can shatter the trust they have with the public and squander its conservation of art. Museum are the safeguard of art being lost and never recovered. A title all museums hold on to as a lifeline. But the Brooklyn Museum is struggling, their lifeline is to sell artwork.

The Brooklyn Museum “is aiming to establish a $40 million fund that can generate $2 million a year, to pay for their collection’s care” 1. The Brooklyn museum is selling artwork that is old and successfully taught. The public is not losing as much as they want to believe because it already has been documented. There are printed pages with the image available of the art they are selling. And Anne Pasternak Brooklyn Museum’s director has this to add about deaccessioning the museum’s art “what’s more core having an appropriately sized conservation team or works that don’t see the see the light of day in collection?” These are great points art matters, but currently it is the people that are living through these hard times and need to keep their salary. It is the people that are working that need to be the focus, not old masters that had their time to live.

Interesting enough, there always seems to be a shock wave after things have settled down. But when it comes to Britain, it is not shocking to find out they once more refusing to return stolen art to their place of origins. In U.K.’s, own turmoil over exiting the European Union has strike up conversation about the U.K. having to do what they absolutely refuse to do. In “A New Brexit Mandate could force Britain to return the Parthenon Marbles to Greece” gave Greece hope. In spite of the chronic denial of the U.K. “The Greek culture minister Lina Mendoni told Reuters that ‘ the right conditions have been created for their permanent return,’ due to Britain’s attempts to distance itself from the rest of Europe.” It is possible one day the U.K. will have to return the Parthenon Marbles. However, it may be reasonable not to hold one’s breath.

1.) 

Pogrebin, Robin. “Brooklyn Museum to Sell 12 Works as Pandemic Changes the Rules.” The New York Times. The New York Times, September 16, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/16/arts/design/brooklyn-museum-sale-christies-coronavirus.html.

2.)

Editorial, Artsy. “EU Adds Parthenon Marbles Repatriation Mandate to Brexit Negotiations.” Artsy, February 19, 2020. https://www.artsy.net/news/artsy-editorial-new-brexit-mandate-force-britain-return-parthenon-marbles-greece.


Comments

  1. SoarxisscaredOctober 25, 2020 at 10:23 PM

    Selling museum art doesn't sound as bad of an investment as some believe. It really depends on who purchases the art. Is it another museum? A private collector? It's a shame that piece are removed from their original home and into new places, though the way I see it, as long as its to another museum, the piece is merely being exposed to new people. Even if the piece is catalogued in the original museum through scans, there is a certain magic seeing an artwork in person that just doesn't hold up over the internet.

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