One of the greatest art heists in history is happening under the noses of Pennsylvania state officials. The art vandals are none other than trustees of the Barnes Foundation, who plan to transfer over $25 billion worth of artwork from a suburban Merion home to the bustling avenues of Philadelphia.
But first, a little background on this controversy that’s rocking the local arts scene.
Back in 1922, philanthropist Alfred Barnes (who graduated from the School of Medicine in 1892) built the Barnes Gallery to house his expansive personal art collection and develop art education programs. Today, the collection contains over 2,500 pieces from around the globe, painstakingly gathered and arranged. It’s a must-see for any Renoir /a>
lover, housing over 180 pieces from the French master, more than five times as many as you’ll find in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
.
Seventy years later, Barnes Foundation trustees petitioned to overturn the stipulations in Barnes’ will and move the collection to Center City. Plans have been solicited for a new museum on the corner of 20th Street and Benjamin Franklin Parkway, rendering the Parkway
an art lover’s mecca.
Foundation trustees claim that the move will allow the museum to stay afloat financially. In accordance with Barnes’ will, the collection is only open to the public three days a week and pieces are not permitted to go on tour. Courts in Lower Merion have limited the number of visitors allowed weekly to 1,200, giving rise to a cumbersome reservation system.
Faced with these fiscal woes as well as strained town-gown relations, the trustees intend to move the collection by 2009 or early 2010. Several area charities have helped the Barnes raise $150 million for the move, and the state legislature — backed by Governor Ed Rendell — has approved over $100 million
to support the transition.
Many argue that the museum is not accessible enough to visitors. Fixing this problem, however, doesn’t require the strain of a full-fledged move to Philadelphia.
For instance, a shuttle could run directly from the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the Foundation, which is really only 5 miles away. In fact, the collection is already serviced by train and bus from the city. It’s actually faster
to travel from PMA to the Barnes, than from PMA to the Liberty Bell.
In a recent op-ed in theInquirer,,Nancy Herman, a member of the “Friends of the Barnes organization,” recommends maintaining the current museum while building a new museum at the Parkway site. The new museum would house visiting modern art exhibits and a small part of the original Barnes collection.
Most importantly, however, a new museum will damage the artistic integrity of the original. Art critic Peter Schjeldahl of The New Yorker has deemed the structure “a work of art in itself . . . Altering so much as a molecule of one of the greatest art installations I have ever seen would be an aesthetic crime.”
Henri Matisse painted a magnificent mural on site in the entrance gallery. And the surrounding twelve acres of garden are a horticultural masterpiece. As an Impressionist haven, the gallery is refreshing in the spareness of its labels–giving only the name of the artist with each painting. No fussy critical interpretations, no nonsense. The gallery bears the curatorial mark of its namesake through the peculiar arrangement of diverse pieces of art, interspersing Pennsylvania Dutch hardware with Titian oil paintings — an intimate experience lost in a dominant landscape of large art galleries.
Keep the Barnes as it is. Moving the collection to Philly would be like shipping the cheesesteak to California. You can take the artwork out of the Barnes, but you can’t take the Barnes out of the artwork.
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March 28th, 2007 at 9:44 pm
Hey, the Met is not the MoMA. The Met is found at http://www.metmuseum.org. Otherwise, good commentary.
April 8th, 2007 at 10:21 pm
Re: Stealing the Barnes
My correlation stated here will have hairs bristling but I think it is a good one. During Hitler’s march through Europe, he and Marshall Goering stole a preponderance of great art for their personal collections. Now we have the ‘political bigwigs’ in Pennsylvania and the business ‘robber barons’ and misguided ‘charitable’ organizations (Pew, Lenfest, Annenberg) doing the same thing as they, with their vast amount of millions of dollars and through a great deal of underhanded legal finagling and short sightedness, are on a mad course to steal the great Barnes Foundation art collection. The attempt is to move the great Barnes Collection a hop, skip and jump away, to the Parkway in Center City Philadelphia near the present Art Museum. This is merely a manipulation to gain puff, increase tourism and added revenue for the city.
The Barnes building and adjacent arboretum can never be duplicated in a yet to be designed and built new museum. It is a dangerous and foolhardy attempt when the Barnes is so easily accessible by car, bus or jitney bus.
As a freelance photographer and artist, I have traveled around the world four times and have been to eighty countries. My passion is art and in every city I have visited my first stops are to the museums. In Paris, for example, the Louvre is a must and the D’Orsay within walking distance. But to get to the Pompidou you take a subway. To get to the Picasso Museum another short subway ride, the same to the Rodin, and then to more major and minor of the greatest museums in the world. A person who relishes seeing great art will not be limited by short excursions. Better still, I am delighted and invigorated by walking to each and admiring the architecture and ambiance of the city. With the Barnes so close to the Parkway, why not experience this same enjoyment?
The Barnes is struggling with finances and the wolves are at the door. It is ironic that the move may well cost over 200 million dollars while a fraction of that amount as a gift to Barnes would make them solvent for many many years to come. Dr.Barnes’ dream need not be turned into a nightmare.
April 8th, 2007 at 10:23 pm
Re: Stealing the Barnes
My correlation stated here will have hairs bristling but I think it is a good one. During Hitler’s march through Europe, he and Marshall Goering stole a preponderance of great art for their personal collections. Now we have the ‘political bigwigs’ in Pennsylvania and the business ‘robber barons’ and misguided ‘charitable’ organizations (Pew, Lenfest, Annenberg) doing the same thing as they, with their vast amount of millions of dollars and through a great deal of underhanded legal finagling and short sightedness, are on a mad course to steal the great Barnes Foundation art collection. The attempt is to move the great Barnes Collection a hop, skip and jump away, to the Parkway in Center City Philadelphia near the present Art Museum. This is merely a manipulation to gain puff, increase tourism and added revenue for the city.
The Barnes building and adjacent arboretum can never be duplicated in a yet to be designed and built new museum. It is a dangerous and foolhardy attempt when the Barnes is so easily accessible by car, bus or jitney bus.
As a freelance photographer and artist, I have traveled around the world four times and have been to eighty countries. My passion is art and in every city I have visited my first stops are to the museums. In Paris, for example, the Louvre is a must and the D’Orsay within walking distance. But to get to the Pompidou you take a subway. To get to the Picasso Museum another short subway ride, the same to the Rodin, and then to more major and minor of the greatest museums in the world. A person who relishes seeing great art will not be limited by short excursions. Better still, I am delighted and invigorated by walking to each and admiring the architecture and ambiance of the city. With the Barnes so close to the Parkway, why not experience this same enjoyment?
The Barnes is struggling with finances and the wolves are at the door. It is ironic that the move may well cost over 200 million dollars while a fraction of that amount as a gift to Barnes would make them solvent for many many years to come. Dr.Barnes’ dream need not be turned into a nightmare.