Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982

PART 1

RALPH COLIN Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I’m Ralph Colin, the administrative vice president of the Art Dealers Association of America, and I will be acting as chairman for each of the five panel discussions on the general subject of behind the scenes with the New York art world. It was the association’s feeling that persons interested in the world, whether they be collectors, connoisseurs, students, or casual observers, might like to know more about what happens backstage, so to speak. This series of panel discussions has been aimed at supplying that kind of information.

Before we begin, I wish to express the thanks of the association to the Guggenheim Museum for permitting us the use of this auditorium, and [00:01:00] appreciation to the museum’s staff for its fine cooperation. There was some question this evening as to whether I should welcome you here, or whether Mr. Messer, the director of the museum, should. So I am in the happy position of welcoming him to his own institution.

It’s a pleasure to be able to report that the entire series of five evenings has been completely sold out. On behalf of both the Guggenheim Museum and the Art Dealers Association, I express regrets to those members of the public who were, therefore, unable to purchase tickets. The first evening will be devoted to what takes place behind the scenes in the birth of an exhibition, whether it is a dealer in a dealer’s gallery, or in a museum.

The moderator this evening requires little introduction to anyone who has been, even to the slightest degree, [00:02:00] interested in the arts. Hilton Kramer has been an editor and feature writer for Arts Magazine since 1954, and for many years, until recently, was chief art critic and art news editor of the New York Times. He left the Times at the end of last season to become the editor-in-chief of his own new magazine, The New Criterion, which deals not only with the visual arts, but with all of the arts generally. We deeply appreciate Mr. Kramer’s willingness to serve as the moderator of this first panel discussion, on the birth of an exhibition.

I’m sure that the members of the panel are all well-known to you. Thomas Messer has been director of the Guggenheim Museum since 1961, [00:03:00] and the other three members of the panel — Paula Cooper, Arnold Glimcher, and Serge Sabarsky — are directors of their own galleries, actively engaged in putting on exhibitions each year, some in their own galleries, and some in the capacity as advisors in the creation of museum exhibitions. I turn you over to Mr. Kramer and the panel, with confidence that you will have an informative and enjoyable evening. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Thank you, Mr. Colin, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I think in all of our experience, the art exhibition is both the major experience [00:04:00] in our artistic lives, whether it takes place in a gallery or a museum, and the one we tend to take most for granted. That is, we assume, as a matter of course, that exhibitions will open when they are said to be opening. We assume that all the requisite objects will be in place. And we tend to overlook, or at least rarely think about, all of the logistical, intellectual, financial, and other complications that have been invested in what is, for I think most of us

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 1 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 in this auditorium, a commonplace aesthetic experience. We tend to think of exhibitions as having a kind of [00:05:00] virgin birth, which I think would be amusing not only to the people on this panel, but to anyone who’s ever had a hand in organizing such an event.

I think that the whole world of art exhibitions, particularly in the galleries, is something that we tend, in other words, to take for granted. So much do we take it for granted that very little attention is ever given to the fact that the world of gallery exhibitions provides us with what I think can justly be described as the highest level of serious intellectual and cultural entertainment to be had, free of charge, anywhere in the world. [00:06:00] And so this evening, I think, is something of a first. I think the whole conception of the discussion is an innovation, in attempting to take us behind the scenes and try to illuminate, as much as it’s possible in a single discussion of this scope, try to illuminate the thinking, the work, all of the elements that enter into a conception and execution of an exhibition, both in museum setting and in the gallery world.

Now, before calling upon the first of our panelists, I might explain something about the format we’re going to follow in the discussion. We will hear from each of our panelists first, and then there will be some [00:07:00] discussion among the panelists, if it’s warranted, and then I will call for questions from the audience. I will try to repeat the question so that everyone in the audience will know what we’re talking about. I perhaps should say in advance that, as a moderator, I will be firm in entertaining questions, and firm in discouraging speeches.

So now that we know where we are, I’ll call upon our first speaker, Mr. Messer, the director of this museum.

THOMAS M. MESSER I suppose that it would be appropriate to begin with some sort of a definition of what we are talking about, art exhibitions. It is, to me, [00:08:00] at least, definitely an art form, a sub-creative performing art form. I’m calling it sub-creative deliberately, not to raise any pretensions, and not to give the impression that it is, in my mind, something comparable to the making of a , the writing of a poem, or the composing of a string quartet. It is not that. But it is, in my mind at least, analogous to the interpretive activity of a conductor, a producer, a director. In other words, an activity and an achievement that bases itself upon another already existing art form. The existing art form in our case, of course, being paintings and , out of which [00:09:00] we are trying to create an exhibition. But if it is to be worthy of its name, it must be done with knowledge of the score, as it were, with knowledge of the subject, and with both intellectual and intuitive finesse toward the proposition.

Now, how do we go about achieving such high aims? The first thing, of course, is the choice. What, among all the things in the world, could we be showing in a museum such as this? I shall be using the Guggenheim as an example simply because I know it best. Well, the choice, or the possibility, of determining program seems, at first glance, endless and indefinite. In reality, it is not so, [00:10:00] as everybody who has been in such a position knows. Let us take again the case of the Guggenheim, which is, as you know here, an art museum of the 20th century that is a museum whose self-defined subject is painting and sculpture in our age. That immediately rules out millennia of art history, and any number of media that could be validly approached as exhibition subjects, and fixes us within a particular scope.

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But even within this scope, we are not likely to do just anything. Every museum has a particular personality, a particular image, if you wish. We’ll do certain things, and not other things, as those of you who [00:11:00] walk from one New York museum to another know perfectly well. There are things that the Whitney will do which we shall not, that the Museum of Modern Art will not do and we shall, et cetera. So scope and personality are taken for granted. There is the limitation of place, I would say. We are not alone in this world, and exhibitions that have been done by others, or even by ourselves, are not easily repeated. So that, again, cuts out much more than you might assume. There’s the limitation of purse and capacity. Not everything that we would like to do can we do. We don’t have the money. We may not have the ability.

And finally, there is the limitation of decision. How do we, among ourselves, decide what to do? How do we sort out differences of [00:12:00] opinions and arrive at some resulting presentation? So, as you see, when you deduct all of these things, far from being involved in a limitless or endless potential of choices, you are lucky if anything is left at all that you want to do, that is worth doing, and that you are able to do. But if you do get to this point, and if you have made a plausible choice, then the question is what you do next.

Many people come to the museum and assume that exhibitions are hung. In a way, this is an illusion that we like to encourage, because we don’t want the public to come in and groan, and admire us for the difficulty that is entailed in such an undertaking. But here, [00:13:00] in great confidence, among those rounded walls — and I’m sure that the secret must not go out of this room — I will tell you that there is more involved to it than hanging it.

Somebody must, first of all, passionately desire an exhibition, and must fight it out with others, who have other passionate desires, and usually not the one that one has. That still has to do with choice to a certain degree. Then a concept, an exhibition concept, has to be shaped, formulated, articulated. That is a process of some complexity, I assure you. Since an exhibition is linked with a catalog production in the typical instance, somebody has to author what amounts to a book. Exhibitions have to be negotiated, often under incredibly difficult and high-diplomacy conditions. They have to be [00:14:00] financed, which in our day is particularly tricky, difficult, and to some extent compromising. Eventually, only, one has to control the complex logistics of exhibitions — the packing, the shipping, the insurance — so that, in the end, it can actually be hung, which, incidentally, is one of the most difficult, also one of the most rewarding, aspects of the entire exhibition proposition.

So if you take those steps, each of which is much more lengthy and interesting than I can sum up here, and if you consider that, in a museum such as this, you are not dealing with one exhibition at a time, but usually with, I would say conservatively, 15 to 20, which are in various degrees of advancement, then you will conclude with me that a [00:15:00] certain juggling act is involved, and frankly, I don’t know how we do it. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Paula Cooper, from the Paula Cooper Gallery.

PAULA COOPER Well, our situation is, of course, very different from the Guggenheim’s. We work specifically with 11

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 3 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 artists, and they’re very much alive, and we work very closely with them. I’ll be very specific and give an idea of how we work, what kinds of shows we do. Each of these 11 artists shows usually every other year, and they have one-man or one-woman exhibitions. We’re not so strict [00:16:00] about when an artist can show. If an artist has a body of work that they would like to show, if time permits, we will try to do that show. This year, we will have 14 exhibitions. We will have five one-person shows, and nine group exhibitions.

I think that the purpose of the one-person show is, naturally, to expose the work to the public. But from the artist’s point of view, it’s extremely important to get a response to the work that they’re doing at that time, or what they’ve done. It’s also important for an artist to see the work out of his studio, or her studio, in a different environment.

As far as installing a show with an artist, [00:17:00] sometimes the artists have strong ideas, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes, at this point, we work very closely together. Group shows, I would rather say, are more expositions. We tend to do quite a few group shows, and I like to do shows that will run for two months, and perhaps change one work or two works, because I find that people look at things very slowly. They don’t often see things. Maybe they’ll focus on one piece. I had a piece of sculpture in the gallery once for three months, but I changed the location of it in the [00:18:00] gallery, and many people came in and said, “Oh, is that a new piece of sculpture by that particular sculptor?”

I think that installation is a very, very important thing. You really can influence how people think about work in the way that you install it. If you put a particular work, juxtapose a particular work, next to another work, it will bring out particular ideas or aspects of both of those works. Installation is crucial, and can really change one’s ideas or thoughts enormously.

[00:19:00] I suppose our audience is similar to a museum’s, but probably it’s a much smaller audience, it’s a much more specific audience. The exhibitions are for everyone. They’re really to proselytize in a way, not only to expose the work. In terms of the handling of the work, the insurance, the documentation, the crating, the organizing of an exhibition, it is an enormous job. Even a small exhibition is a lot of work and planning.

HILTON KRAMER Thank you very much. (applause) Mr. Arnold Glimcher from the Pace Gallery, who is [00:20:00] going to show some slides.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER Well, I’d like to say a few words before I show the slides. That is basically, I’m a dealer because I like to make exhibitions. My pleasure is the making of exhibitions and the production of catalogs, and the other parts of the gallery are just things I have to do. Our artists exhibit every 18 months or two years, depending on whether or not they’re ready. Some people more frequently, some less. Brice Marden, who we’re showing now, hasn’t had a show for three years. He’s an artist who works at a much slower pace. Someone like Lucas Samaras may show, for three years in a row, every year. It’s a question of the artist’s temperament.

When we make exhibitions from estates which we represent, most of which are artists who were with us when they were alive or with whom I had some strong association during their lifetime, we try to

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 4 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 show some aspect [00:21:00] of the work that wasn’t known. Rothko’s Surrealist works, or his murals, Reinhardt’s watercolors, Picasso’s last paintings.

Lastly, the catalog, for me, is immensely important, because it’s the only record of the existence of that exhibition. Many great exhibitions happened in the ’60s in New York, before the galleries were all doing catalogs, and they’re lost. We know about them, they’re legend, but they’re — catalogs are used by art historians years later, and I think, finally, the history of a period is written through the catalogs and through the exhibitions in galleries.

I’d like to show you a series, very quickly, of 13 slides of different exhibitions, bearing in mind that, with the exception of two slides, we’re going to be looking at the same room. OK. Can we take the light down a little bit more? Yeah. This is a show of Lucas [00:22:00] Samaras’s chair sculptures. The room was designed by Samaras and by me. The color was selected by Samaras. The floor was changed for the show.

Next. Concurrently with the Guggenheim’s Rothko show, it was the beginning of our representation of Rothko, and we wanted to show this set of 1959 murals, done for the Seagram Building, that were never exhibited before. Very straightforward exhibition.

Next. Tony Smith. This was his last exhibition with us while he was alive. Tony designed this group of 10 elements for the gallery.

Next. Exhibition of Jim Dine about three years ago. And again, very straightforward. The use of the platforms around the edges of the wall protects the paintings, and also serves, more than that, to bounce the light back up onto the bottoms of the pictures, because it’s almost [00:23:00] impossible to light a painting evenly from the ceiling. The white platform lets the light come back up.

Next. Dubuffet. An exhibition called Studies for a Spectacle. He did a big theater piece, and we showed all of the sculptural studies for the costumes, and presented it like a theater. There was even a marquee with Dubuffet’s name in neon letters out front.

Next. Brice Marden’s last exhibition prior to this. Five paintings presented in a very simple, straightforward manner. You notice the room breaks up into smaller spaces. We built walls and we changed the shape of the room and the color of the room for the specific work. The work dictates the exhibition.

Next. Ad Reinhardt. Same room, with a series of walls breaking it up into small rooms, to show his watercolors, which were very much [00:24:00] unknown to the contemporary audience.

Next. González. The Guggenheim actually is planning a show. This is a show we did several years — no, this was a couple years ago — of González’s work.

Next. Robert Irwin, who we’ve shown since his work has been showable in the early ’60s. Last year, we did five works, one from each of our exhibitions, as a kind of synopsis of exhibitions.

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I think that’s it. Is it? No, Louise Nevelson. Louis Nevelson is always involved in the installation of her work and the designing of the environment, because, of course, that’s what the work is about.

Next. And Saul Steinberg, an exhibition last season of tables and watercolors. His first exhibition with us.

Next. [00:25:00] exhibition. The works were smaller. The platforms are gone from the edges of the room, except for the big painting.

I think that’s the last one. No, there’s one more. This is our last show, which many people saw, which was the sculpture of Picasso. For that, we totally reconstructed the gallery, because the scale of the pieces is very small, although we think of them as being very big. That’s all. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Serge Sabarsky of Sabarsky Gallery.

SERGE SABARSKY In February of 1965, Mr. Messer showed an Egon Schiele and Gustav Klimt exhibition at this museum. In September of 1982, I opened the Schiele exhibition at the [00:26:00] Historical Museum of the City of Vienna. The show was called Works from American Collections. There is a direct connection between these two shows that I would like to relate. The catalog of the Vienna exhibition contained an essay, “Schiele’s Art in America,” and I would like to read a short excerpt from it. This is a translation from the German text. “The great Schiele/Klimt exhibition in the New York Guggenheim Museum was a milestone in the history of Schiele’s art in America. Many who saw this show still remember the unique event in the famous rotunda of the museum. The revolutionary idea of Frank Lloyd Wright to run an open, descending ramp along the inside of the building, around the great inner court, permits an almost continuous viewing of the paintings, first close up, and later, also, from across the open [00:27:00] [bell?] from a distance. In these surroundings, Schiele’s and Klimt’s works are more impressive than ever.” End of quotation.

One of the most impressed viewers of that show was I. The exhibition ran for three months, I think, 90 days, and I must have seen it more than 150 times. How so? Some days I came twice. I was not a dealer then. I have never told this before, but my involvement with the world of art in general, and my decision to become an art dealer, was probably born then, right in this house. But from the birth of an art dealer back to the birth of an exhibition. One of the most exciting aspects, as Mr. Glimcher has said, of being an art dealer is the possibility of staging exhibitions, whether in your own gallery, if you’re equipped [00:28:00] to do so, or in museums. But aside from the satisfaction of organizing shows, it’s also a matter of personal credo.

I am of the firm opinion that the foremost duty of any museum director, art historian, and last not least, art dealer, is to expose the largest possible numbers of people to good art. If you reflect for a minute on what a small part of the population is aware of visual art at all — and there are states in this country without a single museum, and some have museums which are, for instance, called the Cowboy Museum. And even some of the real art museums never have any visiting exhibitions. This is, of course, deplorable. A lot is done, however, [00:29:00] in some other countries, which many here might not be aware of, and I would like to tell you a little bit about one particular case.

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It has become a tradition in Japan, for instance, for newspaper chains and department store chains to organize exhibitions of Western art. The shows are generally presented first in the respective department store museum, which is usually situated on the top floor of the store’s headquarter building. By the way, these museums are equipped according to the latest and best museum housing specifications. After the initial presentation, the exhibitions travel to two or three more provincial museums. Most Japanese cities have a modern, Western-style museum, and these museums depend, for their offerings, on the cultural departments of the newspaper chains which are the organizers.

[00:30:00] My first experience with Japan came about some five years ago, when I was approached to do the first Egon Schiele exhibition in Japan by the Tokyo Shimbun, a newspaper chain which publishes 40 million papers a day, and whose cultural department competes with other media in promoting international art. They commissioned me to do this first Schiele exhibition, and after the successful conclusion of the exhibition — the show was seen by more than 200,000 people — the chain asked me to organize the first Gustav Klimt exhibition in Japan.

I am telling you all this to tie in with our theme — an exhibition is born — and you’ll soon see why. Gustav Klimt paintings are notoriously difficult to borrow. First, most of them are in Austrian museums, and Austrians are, to say the least, [00:31:00] very difficult people. I should know, I was born there. Second, many of Klimt’s paintings are in a rather delicate condition, and would probably suffer from extensive travel. But of course, on the other hand, most works of art are fragile, and owners generally have to be charmed into agreeing to letting their prized possessions travel to distant museums. Well, it was very difficult to get enough oil paintings for the Klimt show, and in two separate trips to Vienna, not even interviews with the minister of culture and personal solicitations with the directors of all the museums were successful. In desperation, I decided, in the last minute, to call one more time, and I must have been especially convincing with the director of the Historical Museum of the City of Vienna. I touched a patriotic nerve, and finally, in the last minute, just a couple of hours before my flight left for the , [00:32:00] he agreed to lend me some paintings. These, and some others which I got from a museum in Linz, enabled me, finally, to do the show. I was in a euphoric state, and I thanked him.

I don’t know why, but I said, “How would you like to have an Egon Schiele show in your museum in Vienna, with works from American collections?” My suggestion was accepted, and in September of 1981, the show was opened in Vienna. This museum, by the way, which stages several shows a year, had never had more than — this is on record — 18,500 visitors per show. On November the 2nd of last year, exactly a year ago today, the director called me from Vienna and said, “Mr. Sabarsky, our show closed yesterday, and I’m happy to report that we counted 107,561 visitors.” [00:33:00] Well, that was exactly six times the highest number of visitors he had ever had, so you can imagine how proud that made me. Since then, an alliance was formed between these and three more museums — between Vienna, Linz, and three other museums — and they are showing a new exhibition that I have the honor to organize every year. Well, the connection of all these shows with the Guggenheim, it all started here in the spring of 1965. Thank you. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Before I call for questions from the audience, two matters occurred to me in the course of the panelist

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 7 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 remarks that I think might have occurred to others in the audience, and I thought I might throw out [00:34:00] these two subjects or two questions for discussion among the panelists before we turn to questions from the audience. The first, which I think is something that is on the minds of many people who go to galleries — it’s certainly on the minds of many artists who go to galleries, particularly the artists who want exhibitions and find them difficult to arrange — first question is, to what extent are your decisions about exhibitions governed by a particular aesthetic point of view? And to what extent are you open to works that represent very different points of view? I think we tend to identify certain galleries with certain points of view. [00:35:00] I think it would be very dismaying to dealers to be constantly being approached by artists whose work does not necessarily follow in that line. Paula, would you want to say anything about that?

PAULA COOPER I’m thinking in particular of John Borofsky, whom we show. I knew him — actually, we had shown a piece of his in 1969, in a group show, but it was a very conceptual piece, and it had to do with numbers. In 1974, he invited me to his studio, and I saw the strangest work I had ever seen. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. He invited me back to his studio again a month or so later, and I said, “Well, why don’t we have a show, and we’ll do it just like this, just like the studio?” [00:36:00] I was so struck by the work. Although one would think, perhaps, it wouldn't be my aesthetic taste, I was so moved that I did something very rare for me. I just acted immediately.

HILTON KRAMER Yes. That’s, I think, tremendously interesting. The other question that occurred to me, that I think must be on the minds of many people who think about galleries and dealers and exhibitions — and, I daresay, it must occur to dealers from time to time, too — and that is the question of the extent to which their decisions about exhibitions are governed by financial considerations. I’ll call for volunteers on that question. (laughter)

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I’ll volunteer. It’s not a consideration at all for me, and it never has been. [00:37:00] The only thing I care about is my conviction about the work. I don’t think it’s a consideration of any first-rate dealers.

HILTON KRAMER Serge?

SERGE SABARSKY I underwrite that, and I will say that the foremost consideration is how proud will you be of the exhibition that you are staging. It’s an ego trip. Like Mr. Glimcher said before, it’s one of the most important functions for us. Recognition is for the soul what food is for the body. This is very, very important for us. I think we are all very vain, and we like to be stage center. If we like a show and if we know it will be successful because it’s a good show, that is much, much more important.

I don’t think that financial considerations have ever entered into [00:38:00] it. As a matter of fact, in my own gallery, whenever I do put on a show, 99.999 percent of the viewers are not prospective clients, and those clients that do come in usually walk straight through — I apologize to my clients that are present here — they walk right through my real room and say, “What have you got to show me? It has to be something virginal.”

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HILTON KRAMER I expect we’ll want to return to some of these issues, but I’ll call now for the first question from the audience. Yes?

MALE 1 Contemporary exhibit, do you think it has influenced, in some substantive way, contemporary art? The phenomena of the exhibit itself. Has that changed, in a substantive way, the type of work that’s being done?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, does the [00:39:00] art exhibition, or do exhibitions, the whole institution of exhibitions, change what artists actually do? Are you addressing that to a particular member of the panel, or to the panel as a whole? Paula, do you —

PAULA COOPER I would say no. I would say it’s the reverse, almost. I think that people change their places frequently for the art. Sometimes I’ve made smaller rooms, not too frequently, but as Mr. Glimcher changes his space quite frequently. I’ve worked with artists who do very small things, which are very difficult to show in a big space, oftentimes, but it certainly hasn’t changed the work at all.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I —

HILTON KRAMER [00:40:00] Yes, Arnold?

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I disagree with Paula, because I think that maybe not the — our spaces are flexible, and we as dealers have a responsibility to our artists to make a space for the kind of work they do, but the phenomena of the exhibition, which I think he was addressing himself to, I think has substantially changed the history of art. I think it’s very different today with — anything within the landscape of the artist, mental or physical, is going to have an effect on him, and the art center, being as rapacious as New York is, and having so rapacious an audience, and the idea of exhibitions on a continuing basis, has had to have an effect on the work. It may have a positive effect, it may have a negative effect, it may even out, but I think it’s had an enormous effect. I think it’s one of the most important directives [00:41:00] in the history of modern art from the war on.

HILTON KRAMER Well, certainly, the exhibition is the most readily available form of communication about art to other artists, and it would be almost inconceivable to think that it would not have an immediate impact on their thinking. But exactly what the results of that impact is, I think is a more elusive phenomena. Yes, Tom?

THOMAS M. MESSER I also agree with Arne Glimcher that the effect of exhibitions, some exhibitions, upon artists, which I believe the question was, is quite traceable and quite strong. We are extremely aware of the artist as

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 9 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 public. Certainly part of the exhibition planning tries to — not always successfully, but tries [00:42:00] to imagine whether a particular exhibition choice would be nourishing to the creative population. There are instances, usually not necessarily of the most contemporary art — but I remember that when we suddenly did an [Ensler?] exhibition, which, for us, is a very historic approach, of course, the Ensler exhibition was clearly reflected in the work of some artists. One of them, I think, was in your gallery. So my answer would be yes.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

FEMALE 1 Paula Cooper states that she has 11 people in her stable, so to speak. Are they the same 11 year after year, or are they different people? And do you drop them, or do they drop you, and why?

HILTON KRAMER The question addressed to Paula Cooper is, in her roster of artists, [00:43:00] does the roster remain the same, and if it isn’t the same, do they leave her, or does she drop them?

PAULA COOPER The group of artists is fairly constant. I’ve been working with Joel Shapiro and Lynda Benglis and Alan Shields since 1969, and Robert Grosvenor since 1966. I think it’s mutual when artists leave. It takes a while to occur. With me, it takes several years, and I think, by that time, it’s mutual.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

FEMALE 2 Mr. Messer mentioned that the need to find financial support for exhibitions has been, to some extent, compromising. Can you explain in more detail what you mean by that?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, to what [00:44:00] extent does the need to raise money for exhibitions compromise them?

THOMAS M. MESSER I knew this was going to —

HILTON KRAMER You really asked for it. (laughter)

THOMAS M. MESSER — get me into trouble. I should have swallowed the word. I didn’t mean anything dreadful and horrendous, but any time that you approach somebody else for support, you have to reckon with his personality, whether it be individual, governmental, corporate. The patron is there, you know he’s there, and it affects your thinking to some extent. I didn’t mean anything more sinister than that.

RALPH COLIN

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Mr. Kramer?

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

RALPH COLIN I think that the statements made by Mr. Glimcher and Sabarsky that the financial problem does not enter into the exhibition [00:45:00] decisions needs some clarification. I think they both have to explain how they stay in business. (laughter)

HILTON KRAMER Yes, I think that’s an interesting question. If financial considerations do not enter into a consideration of exhibitions, then how do galleries remain in business?

SERGE SABARSKY I can answer that very simply. The same way that all those art dealers stay in business that do not have galleries and do not show exhibitions. How do they stay in business? Indirectly, of course, the exhibitions help, because your reputation is established. But once your reputation is established, at least in my field — and I sell classic art, I don’t sell contemporary art, unfortunately — the collector, the buyer, will find you.

As I said before, it has happened — I didn’t mean it as a joke — it happened again and again. I have my [00:46:00] best clients come into the gallery. I have a beautiful new exhibition, if I say so myself. They walk right through. They come in and say, “What have you got to show me?” I don’t understand it, but that’s how it is. So we do the shows for the general public, and I repeat, 99 point — I don’t know how many percents — are not prospective clients. They are probably advertisers, by word of mouth, and they create our reputations, but we do not do the shows in order to sell art. My most successful shows were shows that did not sell a single piece, but that’s a trade secret.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER Many of my artists, who are quite well-known now, 18 years ago, 19 years ago, this October, when I opened my gallery in New York, were not very well-known. I showed them continuously. I was very lucky, when I opened the gallery, to have Louise Nevelson come with me. But even at that time, she didn’t sell her work. [00:47:00] Nevelson sold very little, as Hilton knows. We had very, very rough years with borrowing money from family and friends to keep the doors open, but you keep showing what you believe in, and hopefully you build up a reputation, and collectors begin to listen to what you have to say and have some respect for what you’re exhibiting. That’s really how it happens.

I showed Robert Irwin for 15 years, when he would build a wall across my gallery, or stretch a scrim across half of the room. They were some of the most important shows I’d ever made, and they were shows that one couldn’t sell, and they were even shows that nobody came to see. People would get off the elevator and take one look and scratch their head, and turn around and get in the next elevator. We had very fallow months where we couldn’t sell anything that was in the back room.

We’re not a masterpiece gallery, [00:48:00] so to speak. We don’t have the back room working for us to support the exhibitions. The exhibitions support the gallery. But it’s over a period of years, being

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PART 2

HILTON KRAMER The question is, is there a conflict of interest in a dealer keeping some of his special treasures in the back room for his special clients, where the public never gets to see them? Is that really a conflict of interest?

SERGE SABARSKY No. No. It actually never enters into consideration. I understand your question, but it really doesn’t. Also, there are so many unknown aspects to this business, and I am not the one to say that — as a matter of fact, I know none of the answers. I do not know why certain works sells, and why others don’t. You were talking about the paintings that some dealers might not want to buy from another dealer because they have to be shown in too many galleries, or have not sold and end up as being [dealt with?] from dealer to dealer. [00:01:00] To be shown in a good exhibition ennobles a work of art, too, as far as we are concerned. But it does not enter into consideration.

HILTON KRAMER And isn’t it often the case that a work that is in the back room this year is likely to have been in an exhibition five years ago or 10 years ago?

SERGE SABARSKY Sure, and the next year again, of course.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 1 (inaudible)

HILTON KRAMER [00:02:00] The question is, why do we not have in this country, as they have in certain European countries, the institution of the [Kunstauer?], which is an exhibition, a public exhibition gallery, unlike a museum to the extent that it does not have a permanent collection, but like a museum in organizing loan exhibitions? Well, Tom, would you like to address that question?

THOMAS M. MESSER Yes. As a matter of fact, I’ve had some experience with this particular institutional type, which, here, frequently goes under the name of Institute of Contemporary Art. Institutes of contemporary art usually, or often, do not have, or at least do not stress, their collection, and exist essentially as exhibition halls, like the German [Haus der Kunstile?]. There are a number of reasons for their scarcity. One of them [00:03:00] is that they are terribly difficult to support. The collection is, in the last analysis, the museum’s greatest attraction. The obligation that contemporary institutes have taken

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HILTON KRAMER Thank you. Yes.

FEMALE 1 (inaudible)

HILTON KRAMER The question is, what is the — if I understand it correctly — what is the role [00:04:00] of the critic in doing what to an exhibition? (laughter)

FEMALE 1 Making or breaking it in one sense. In another sense, just perhaps contributing to the (inaudible) of criticism so that the artist (inaudible).

HILTON KRAMER Well, the extent to which criticism makes or breaks exhibitions, frankly, was never one that interested me. I was much more interested in whether — both in what I wrote and other people wrote — whether it was either true, relevant, or interesting. Whether it illuminated something about the exhibition, not whether it was going to make or break it, because that’s a temporary matter that was quickly forgotten by everybody but the artist and his dealer. [00:05:00] And his family. (laughter) Who later write you letters. One of the nice things about being an art critic, say, unlike being a theater critic, is that you know that no matter what you write about an exhibition, it’s not going to close one minute sooner than it otherwise would have. You’re not going to prevent anybody from going to see it who really wants to see it. You’re participating in an intellectual dialogue, as it were, but you’re not necessarily telling people what to think. Whether that’s the view from the galleries or the museums, I’ll leave to the panelists to discuss. What role does criticism play in exhibitions, both beforehand and in the aftermath?

SERGE SABARSKY We like it better when it’s [00:06:00] good.

HILTON KRAMER Well, that takes care of criticism. (laughter)

FEMALE 1 Louder, please.

MALE 2 I think you’re evading the question. I think the critic has a major role.

HILTON KRAMER You think I’m evading the question?

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MALE 2 Yes, in a sense. If you write a rave review, it certainly has an effect. It certainly does affect interest in response in the viewer, and I think it even affects an exhibition financially.

HILTON KRAMER (overlapping dialogue; inaudible) For those who didn’t hear the remarks, what Mr. Cole from the [AA?] Gallery was saying was that I’m evading the question, and that he feels that it’s absolutely true that a rave review creates interest, results in sales, [00:07:00] and otherwise determines the success or failure of the exhibition. In nothing that I said — and I’ll let other panelists address this question — in nothing that I said did I mean to suggest that reviews did not have consequences. What I was saying is that, for me, as a critic writing that review, the consequences were of no interest to me. My interest in the exhibition was totally disinterested, and so frankly no concern of mine whether the artist and the dealer made a fortune out of it or went broke. I was concerned about the art. I was not concerned about the artist’s career, the commerce, his income tax, or anything else. So I was not evading the question. I was answering it directly. Serge?

SERGE SABARSKY I think they’re making a little mistake. [00:08:00] We have to differentiate a little bit that this is more individual. It’s different in each case. You have to say what role they would play in a gallery that sells contemporary art, what role they play in a gallery that sells graphics, let’s say — excuse me for using figures — between $200 and $2,000, and what role they play in a gallery that sells art for $50,000 and up, into the millions.

I can only give you little examples. One time — again, it’s Schiele that comes to mind, of course. About three or four or five years ago, I had a show of Schiele, the artist, using himself as a model, seated self-portraits. I don’t want to mention the name. It starts with John and ends with Russell. He wrote about the show and really knocked the show. He didn’t like Schiele, whatever. I had several people coming in the day the review appeared in the Times. Of course, the review [00:09:00] had it, “Egon Schiele at Sabarsky Gallery” in heavy letters. People came in and congratulated me and said, “What a wonderful review you had.” They only saw the size, of course. They didn’t read it.

HILTON KRAMER Arnold? (applause) I think it was Arnold Bennett who first said that he didn’t read his reviews, he only measured them.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I think, in honesty, a review in the Times brings an enormous audience, whether it’s a good review or a bad review. It makes absolutely no difference. It brings a big audience to the gallery. It is my experience it has absolutely no effect on sales. I remember a review that Mr. Kramer gave us when we showed Larry Bell in 1966 for the first time. Stop me if I’m wrong, but you didn’t like the works at all.

HILTON KRAMER No, I didn’t.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER You said that they were —

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HILTON KRAMER I still don’t like them. (laughter)

ARNOLD GLIMCHER [00:10:00] You said that they were much better suited to the exhibition of jewelry at Tiffany’s than to exist as works of art in the Pace Gallery, and the exhibition completely sold out. So there’s the reaction that the avant-garde collectors can say, well, you know, he’s so conservative.

HILTON KRAMER We all know that there are artists in New York who are lighting candles to the Madonna, praying for an unfavorable review in the Times. So it’s very simple-minded to think that a favorable review, unfavorable review has fixed consequences.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER But it does affect the audience. It does absolutely affect the audience. The earlier in an exhibition that a review comes, the bigger the buildup of an audience that there is. With the Picasso show, which we just closed, the review came the first week, and it just snowballed. Well, the show, [00:11:00] I think, merited it, and the artist, of course, is a very popular artist. It was the biggest audience that we’ve ever seen. I think a great deal was because the review came so early.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 3 Something specific was said by some of the panelists about the genesis of an exhibition, that you select — there are so many artists in New York (inaudible) scene. They come in with a dealer, week after week, showing their wares, and I know the dealers are very nice to them. How do you select (inaudible)?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, how do you select the artists you show in your exhibitions?

THOMAS M. MESSER [I can’t answer that?].

MALE 3 Kramer? (laughter)

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 3 Perhaps that could be the subject of a separate panel discussion (inaudible).

HILTON KRAMER [00:12:00] Well, nobody seems terribly eager to answer it, so I think we’ll have to leave it for a later

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SERGE SABARSKY In my case, it’s very easy. The artist has to be dead. (laughter)

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I think, in our case, it’s just the artists we represent. It’s the artists Paula represents, the artists I represent.

HILTON KRAMER Yes, but you add and subtract, as it were, to your roster. So that’s really not an answer to the question.

PAULA COOPER I’m very slow about it. I’m very, very slow, and I don’t really want to take on any more people, because I think you could work with one artist and be very busy all your life. I would have people show in group shows, and then again, so that I could look at the work, to see it and live with it, and then either I was finally convinced or finally not.

HILTON KRAMER [00:13:00] Next question. Yes? Could you speak up, please?

MALE 4 I hope my question is not too late.

HILTON KRAMER Is it a question?

MALE 4 Yeah, it’s a question. [Harold Klausenberg?] said that art is educational, not in regard to art, but in regard to life. To some artists, art is a transcending concept, and that’s —

HILTON KRAMER Excuse me, is this a question about the subject we’re discussing? Is it about the topic of the discussion?

MALE 4 Yes.

HILTON KRAMER Well, could you make it a little briefer?

MALE 4 (inaudible)

HILTON KRAMER Let’s get to the punchline.

MALE 4

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OK. Does they apply themselves to the (inaudible)? Are art dealers [00:14:00] open to this concept? If they are open, how can they stage a number of artists indefinitely and not change?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, if you’re really interested in the relation of art to life —

MALE 4 No, no, no. If you’re really interested in the development of art.

HILTON KRAMER If you’re interested in the development of art, how can you stick with your one roster of artists?

MALE 4 Right.

HILTON KRAMER I can think of many obvious answers to that question, but I’ll call on the panel.

PAULA COOPER The artists develop and change and continue living, and you have many different experiences.

MALE 4 (inaudible)

HILTON KRAMER Well, the question seems to imply that a greater number of artists would automatically represent a greater [00:15:00] spectrum of development. Is that — yes.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER I’ll ask you an interesting question. If you work with artists — and the gallery’s stables do change. There are artists I represent now that I didn’t represent five years ago or ten years ago. So in my case, it has changed. The nucleus of the people I show have been with me for many years. There are only so many people for which you can do a really good job. A gallery is an all-service organization for its artists. We are entrusted their entire lives with this body of work that they produce. If these artists develop over the years — and I certainly find transformations within their works, and excitement to keep me excited and interested in their works — what do you do at some point when you have 10 or 12 or 13 artists that you’ve represented for a long time? They are all very effective, [00:16:00] they’re extraordinarily exciting to be with, to live with. Do you get rid of them at that point in their career to take on new artists? Do you say, all right, I’ve had enough of you; on with something new? That’s why new galleries happen. New galleries come up. I was a new gallery once. My artists were new ones. I’m not a new gallery anymore. I’m middle-aged, and I’m a middle-aged gallery.

HILTON KRAMER Next question? Yes?

FEMALE 2 I’m interested in the beginning of the gallery. Paula Cooper, did you make shows differently at the

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HILTON KRAMER The question, addressed to Paula Cooper, is, were your exhibitions different when you started your gallery than they are now?

PAULA COOPER A little bit. I was much more flexible. I showed many more artists than I do now. I would show them once or twice, just to help them get going [00:17:00] so people could see their work. Yeah, I was much more flexible then. In fact, one year, the artist that I represented got very worried, because I had not one one-person show this year. No one-person shows.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 5 Ms. Cooper may be flexible now, but I was wondering about museums. Do they have more flexibility? In other words, do they have to be a celebrity to get into a museum (inaudible)?

HILTON KRAMER The question, addressed, I assume, to Mr. Messer, is, in selecting an exhibition, an artist for an exhibition in a museum, does the artist have to be famous, or is it sufficient for the artist to be good?

THOMAS M. MESSER Well, depends which museum you are addressing. I think the Metropolitan would insist on the fame before they would show an artist.

MALE 5 [00:18:00] Assuming (inaudible).

THOMAS M. MESSER Assuming that what?

MALE 5 (inaudible) the most adventurous (inaudible)

THOMAS M. MESSER Yes. Well, the fact is that contemporary art museums — and there is a certain contradiction in terms here. It is difficult to be a museum, and contemporary — as Gertrude Stein already has told Alfred Barr ages ago, it’s possible to be one or the other in museum, contemporary museum or modern, but to be both is tough. However, we all try, within reason. If you are asking the question of the Guggenheim, you may be aware of the fact that we are presenting, annually, selected exhibitions, whether American or from foreign lands, where the artists are not necessarily known to many people, not always to me. So there is an attempt to create a balance [00:19:00] between what confirms existing values and what introduces the potential of a new one.

HILTON KRAMER

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Yes?

FEMALE 3 I wanted to ask Paula Cooper, what are the intended relations, if there are any, that governs putting together a group exhibit versus a one-person exhibit?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, is the intention of a group exhibition in a gallery involve something quite different from the intention behind a solo exhibition? I think, to some extent, you’ve already addressed that question.

PAULA COOPER Yeah, naturally, it does. Usually you start with a premise or an idea, or maybe — well, that’s where you start, of course. [00:20:00] Then you develop that idea. Often, we invite artists who are not affiliated with the gallery to be in shows, and that’s what most group shows are, combinations of some artists who are at the gallery, some artists who are not in the gallery, perhaps some older artists, and some younger artists, depending on the particular exhibition.

FEMALE 3 I meant more in terms of one artist to another that are included in the exhibit. Is there some sort of intended relation —

HILTON KRAMER Is there a unifying principle? Does a group exhibition have to have a unified —

PAULA COOPER There is, and it may be hard for some people to recognize sometimes, but yes, there is.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 6 Following on that, five years ago, I guess, the Pace Gallery (inaudible) [00:21:00]

HILTON KRAMER The question, addressed to Mr. Glimcher, is that it’s been five years since he did a group exhibition called Grids, which had a unifying theme. I guess the question is, what have you done for us lately?

ARNOLD GLIMCHER Lately, we did an exhibition last December called From Chicago, which was a survey of the artists in Chicago, with a catalog and an interesting text. Didn’t you see that show? (laughter) What it really depends on is, from time to time, just having the idea. It is not easy to get the ideas. I thought of the grid exhibition, thought of the Chicago show. We’ve done themed shows [00:22:00] at other times, and we’ll continue to do them. It’s just a question of wanting to.

HILTON KRAMER Is there another?

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MALE 7 I have one question.

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

MALE 7 Tom Messer. Tom, I think everybody — at least I have, for years, been wondering about this museum and the installations you do. Anybody who’s seen the Calder show, or the [first one?] sculpture show, they were fabulous. Did Frank Lloyd Wright hate art and artists, or didn’t he?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, did Frank Lloyd Wright hate art? I think it’s a very compromising question for the director of this museum.

THOMAS M. MESSER No, I’ll be happy to speak about it. I have the feeling that Hilton Kramer would prefer to answer this himself.

HILTON KRAMER I already have.

THOMAS M. MESSER The [00:23:00] building, of course, has a great deal to do with exhibition concepts and exhibition implementations. The notion of an exhibition in a vacuum is nonsense. There is no such thing as an exhibition without a space toward which it is tending, which is imagined when you are making a selection. The spaces do not always have to be as consistent as Frank Lloyd Wright’s spaces are, but neither do they always have the dramatic potential that this architecture, about which there is legitimate discord among informed people, can bring to bear. I don’t expect everybody to believe this, because people have made up their mind in general that this is a most difficult building to install, in that it is impossible to do.

So if I say the contrary, it will make absolutely [00:24:00] no difference, even though there’s no man or woman alive who has installed in this building more than I have. But I will tell you that I find the building a constant not only challenge, because that has negative implications, but a constant creative inspiration, that there are no two exhibitions which are approached in the same way, that it opens the possibilities to view works of art and their relationship, which probably no other building would present in quite that way. And beyond this, that the building is something that those of us who work here are carrying in our minds as a given. We know it by heart, as it were, and inevitably — and this may be both good or bad — but inevitably, in the process of selection, we are selecting with a building in mind, and are, from the beginning, tending toward the final result. So [00:25:00] Frank Lloyd Wright does not need me as an advocate, but I would like to say that I admire him very much. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Colin?

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RALPH COLIN I wanted to make a statement that I don’t compromise my position as the administrative vice president of the association by asking the question on the financial [basis of?] Mr. Sabarsky and Mr. Glimcher. I know the answer, but I’m not sure the audience knew.

HILTON KRAMER Thank you. Yes?

MALE 8 The panel represent institutions with very different primary constituencies, people that they feel most responsible to. A public institution that, as non-profit status, does indeed get some public support. There are commercial galleries who deal with living artists, commercial galleries that deal with non- living artists. How do you define your primary constituencies, that is, the people you’re most [00:26:00] responsible to, and how does the creation of your exhibition reflect that primary responsibility?

HILTON KRAMER The question is, how does each of you define your primary constituency, and how does your responsibility to that constituency govern your decisions in organizing exhibitions? Serge, would you want to speak first on that?

SERGE SABARSKY My obligation is first to myself. But I have discovered an undertone there. You say there are different audiences in different exhibitions or galleries. That is only true to a limited extent. The vast majority of those that come to see our shows see almost every other show in town, and that includes contemporary shows. Those are, by the way, as I said before, again and again, [00:27:00] not the people that buy our art, unfortunately. They are the most excited by the shows, and they are usually also the most knowledgeable. I’m surprised, when I do have a chance to visit somebody that is either a contemporary artist or involved with contemporary art, how well they know what is going on in my gallery or in other galleries of my kind. We are talking about, unfortunately, a very small, minute group of New Yorkers, but it is usually the same group. That is my opinion.

HILTON KRAMER Arnold? How do you see your constituency?

ARNOLD GLIMCHER When I make an exhibition, I really make it to please me. It’s an exhibition I want to see. I don’t want that to sound arrogant. It’s a question of conviction. When I finish the installation of a show and go home the night before it opens, I want to feel terrific. My responsibility, I think, [00:28:00] is second to the artist. Obviously, first, we all please ourselves in that way. Then there’s this wonderful international audience that New York has continually running through. For many years, they’ve wanted to make an art fair in New York, and even got to the Art Dealers Association last year, where we were thinking of doing it. I tried very hard to torpedo it, because New York is an art fair. Every Saturday, every day of the week, it’s this extraordinary art fair. You’re there. You support us in that way. Obviously, it took only a few people to buy the Picasso sculptures to make my show successful,

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 21 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 but the thrill was the hundreds of people, the New Yorkers that were there every day, people who were in town from Chicago, or were in from Europe, that came to see the show. We’ve come to rely on you and take you for granted. I [00:29:00] think, as Mr. Sabarsky says, it is the same audience that travels through the museums.

HILTON KRAMER Paula, would you care to say something about the way you think of your constituency?

PAULA COOPER Yeah, I think, without question, I really care more about the artist. I’m not talking about the artists that I work with, but because we are where we are, we started when we started, it was one of the few amusements down there. Artists would come there a lot. I think, after the artists, it’s probably other professional people, the museum people, the professionals. Then it’s a small group of people who really care about art. Then the people who just come down as tourists and come in. It is a public place. You’re open to the public. But those are the people that I care about.

HILTON KRAMER [00:30:00] Tom?

THOMAS M. MESSER I’ll tell you this story. When I came to this museum many years ago, the president of the foundation at that time, Harry Guggenheim, who was much concerned with the question of who is our public, instituted a survey. As people walked into the museum, they were asked statistical questions of every kind. After much grinding and fussing, the company that did this for us came up with a profile of the typical visitor. It was a woman living outside of New York, but in the vicinity, with an annual income of, at that time, $35,000, which you would have to double now to get the impression. In other words, the [00:31:00] survey provided us with data of this kind. After I read it, I wondered how this information would affect our programming, and what I would have done if I had been told that the typical visitor to the Guggenheim Museum was a Siamese cat.

Art exhibition, I think, I said at the beginning, is a form of creativeness. It is not consumer-oriented. I don’t think it should be. To the extent to which it is, in itself, an art form, it communicates, as all art forms, not directly from the creative person to the public, but from the creative person into the medium, and from the medium into the public. In other words, by rebound. So that if we want to reach you, [00:32:00] I think we have to pour ourselves into the exhibition itself, and hope that, thereby, we bring it to life. The answer is, I don’t really know who the constituency is, and I wouldn't know what to do with it if I did know. (applause)

SERGE SABARSKY Hilton?

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

SERGE SABARSKY I would just like to make a point that has nothing to do with this, but it is a question that I would like to

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 22 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982 kind of ask the audience. Whether they are aware of the fact that we, the galleries, private galleries, who stage shows in the city, are certainly an important part of the city. Neither the federal government nor the state government nor the city has ever shown any interest in any of the shows that I have or that my colleagues have made. They use us as advertising for the city. They say the city, with a great opera, with music, with museums, and with galleries, [00:33:00] but I know so many European cities that take a much, much greater interest in what is in the galleries. I have never been visited by anybody — even our commissioner of culture, when he was still with the Metropolitan, used to come in. He has stopped coming in since he has become commissioner. I feel that we are existing in a vacuum, as far as city, federal, and state authorities are concerned.

ARNOLD GLIMCHER Well, you may see him again, because he’s just resigned as — (laughter)

HILTON KRAMER Is there another question?

MALE 9 Was that a question for the audience?

SERGE SABARSKY Yes.

MALE 9 (inaudible)

SERGE SABARSKY Good point.

HILTON KRAMER Is there another question? Yes?

FEMALE 4 I saw the Kandinsky exhibit here, and I saw it in San Francisco. I had no idea that it was the same exhibit [00:34:00] in any way. [The paintings?] there was no excitement. All the excitement was here. Why would there be such a tremendous difference?

HILTON KRAMER The question is about the Kandinsky exhibition that was here and in San Francisco, and how can we account for the fact the excitement was all here and there wasn’t any in San Francisco? You really want to answer that?

THOMAS M. MESSER All I can say, that I’m glad that it wasn’t the other way around. (applause)

HILTON KRAMER Yes?

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 23 of 24 Guggenheim Museum Archives Reel-to-Reel collection Behind the Scenes with the New York Art World: “Birth of an Exhibition,” 1982

FEMALE 5 The questions have all been on one side of the galleries. What I’d like to know is how the artists choose the gallery that should represent them. Is it based upon money? It is based upon — what would they tell us?

HILTON KRAMER The question is not how dealers and museum curators select artists, but how do artists [00:35:00] select galleries and museums? I’m not sure that any of us are really in a position to answer that question, but it’s an extraordinary conception, and I think it’s the perfect final question of the evening, because it will give us a great deal to think about. Thank you very much. (applause)

END OF AUDIO FILE 9009479_01_9009480_01-Birth-of-an-Exhibition.mp3

Birth of an Exhibition, introduction by Ralph Colin / Hilton Kramer, Thomas M. Messer, Paula Cooper, Arnold Glimcher, Serge Sabarsky, 1982/11/2. Reel-to-Reel collection. A0004. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Archives, New York

Transcript © 2018 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation (SRGF). All rights reserved. Page 24 of 24