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March 7, 2010
Art of the Steal
I want to see this movie - the story of the Barnes Collection move.
The saga of the Barnes over more than 80 years is laid out as a story of initial rejection of Dr. Albert C. Barnes' peerless collection by a philistine establishment, to accumulating envy and subversion, and finally appropriation in a grand conspiracy orchestrated by civic boosters, public officials, and powerful foundations.. . .
Whether you support or oppose the move, these are issues that need to be addressed. Philadelphians don't need another fiscal liability, with the original and authentic Barnes less than five miles away, and sustainable for a fraction of the cost of moving it.
This last point is of particular significance, since the legal basis for moving the Barnes rests entirely on its alleged financial untenability in Merion. But Montgomery County has offered a bond-leaseback arrangement that would make $50 million available to the Barnes at once, at no cost to taxpayers. Lower Merion Township has rezoned the museum so that it can admit up to 150,000 visitors a year, an action not only supported by its neighbors but lobbied for by them. The Barnes itself has salable assets, not covered by its indenture, that could regenerate its endowment. And, were local philanthropists so inclined, the Barnes could be put on easy street for far less than the $68 million raised to save The Gross Clinic, a single painting inferior to scores if not hundreds of works in the Barnes.
Any or all of these options would make the Barnes viable in Merion. But the movers prefer to spend your money instead. In a back-door deal, the Pennsylvania legislature authorized $100 million for move-related construction eight years ago - long before court permission was actually granted.
That next to last paragraph is particularly interesting - the huge fundraising effort to "save" The Gross Clinic - that is, raise a pile of money to buy a painting from one public collection to put into another public collection but prevent it from being sold to a public collection out of town (the Walmart heiress's museum in Arkansas) overshadowed any effort to raise money for the Barnes. Oh, well.
And for a negative review of the film (one that sees the Barnes enterprise as flawed from the beginning), go here. Negative? Really negative:
"We never positioned ourselves as people who were hostile and had any agenda," he says. But his film is hostile and has an agenda. It uses a well-developed set of polemical techniques -- ominous music, imputations of dark motives, ad hominem interviews -- to connect only the dots that make its case.
Posted by CrankyProfessor at March 7, 2010 8:10 AM