The at a Crossroads

n a series of events the first week of April open to the public, the citizens of the state whose 1983, the new home of the North Carolina taxes supported the museum with $1.9 million in Museum of Art will open on the western operating funds for 1982-83. Who will these edge of Raleigh. Arts patrons, political museum visitors be? What will they see and feel? I How will their lives be enriched? Put another dignitaries, arts professionals, and the public will each have their moments-luncheons, way, who benefits from this state-supported and speeches, education day, artists day, and state-run museum? founders reception. When the photographers and television crews gather at the long-awaited ceremonies, they will probably rely on wide- Beginnings angle lenses. Such a prism can bring all of one n 1961, 14 years after the legislature voted $1 dramatic corner of the $16 million building into Imillionforworks ofart and 5years afterthe the frame while cropping out the Polk Youth N.C. Museum of Art opened in the Highway Center correctional facility, a landscape of Building in downtown Raleigh, the N.C. temporary buildings, and the field out of which General Assembly delineated the functions of the new structure rises. And such a resourceful this "agency of the State of North Carolina." The lens will allow for a close-up view of each seg- N.C. Museum of Art, the legislators charged, ment of the April grand opening. shall "acquire, preserve, and exhibit works of The N.C. Art Society, for example, has its art" and "conduct programs of education, own Art Society Day (April 8). This private, research, and publication designed to encourage non-profit association of citizens, which an interest in and an appreciation of art on the functions as a volunteer membership arm to the part of the people of the State."' For 20 years, art museum, might from 1961 to 1981, well view that day the art museum staff as the culmination worked toward these of a 60-year old The four purposes in dream. The 5,000- temporary quarters member Art Society totaling less than launched the idea of North Carolina 50,000 square feet. a state-owned and Still, the collec- -operated museum Museum of Art tion gained prom- with its formation inence, the museum in 1926, 21 years began to acquirea before the first state at a Crossroads reputation, and at- appropriation for tendance grew, top- the museum. Join- by Michael Matros and Bill Finger ping 110,000 in 1978 ing the Art Society and staying at 98,000 members will be in 1979. prominent individual patrons, people like The museum's programs expanded to meet Gordon Hanes and Mary D.B.T. Semans. the legislative charges and the expanding Certainly, these philanthropists will be pleased patronage. The Collectors Gallery opened, to see the doors finally swing open to huge halls where visitors could buy works by artists, where their gifts will hang secure in a new home. usually from the state. An annual North North Carolina political leaders of the last Carolina exhibition, begun by the Art Society 20 years will be invited to the "official" opening years before the museum existed, continued. on April 5, where they can bask in the concrete Traveling exhibitions toured statewide, with realization of years of both high ideals and museum art appearing in such settings as hard-nosed haggling. libraries in rural counties. The Mary Duke The combined resources and tenacity of Biddle Gallery opened, featuring sculpture for the Art Society, arts patrons, and political blind visitors. The Art Society enlarged its leaders made possible this dramatic 181,000 membership. And the education program grew, square foot edifice-the expansive galleries, the attracting schoolchildren from around the state large formal staircase, the series of balconies and establishing the museum as a mandatory balanced along a four-tiered structure. But when stopover on the Raleigh tour. The busloads of the music stops on Friday, April 8-after the boys and girls trooped by the museum's star final patron has called it a night at the Art holdings-past the four smiling children in John Society's $125 per-person, annual Beaux-Arts Singleton Copley's "Sir William Pepperrell and Ball-who will then stroll through the galleries, down the staircase, and along the balconies? On Michael Matros is associate editor of this issue of N.C. the weekend of April 9-10, the doors will finally Insight. Bill Finger is the editor. 22 N.C. INSIGHT His Family" (1778, oil on canvas, 1947 state institutions that I've been involved with have appropriation) and the pristine baby in Peter been. In Kansas City, taxi drivers taking people Paul Rubens' "The Holy Family with St. Anne" in from the airport would make the point of (c. 1633-35, oil on canvas, 1947 state appropria- saying, `You're only here for a few days, but tion). you absolutely must visit the Nelson Gallery- In 1967, just six years after charging the art Atkins Museum.'" museum to acquire, preserve, exhibit and If Bowron hopes for the same taxi-ride talk interpret works of art, the legislature created an from the Raleigh-Durham airport, he's got his Art Museum Building Commission, whose 16- work cut out. In his proposals for the next five year-old life should finally end this April (if it years, Bowron may well alienate many potential submits its final report; see sidebar on page 26). supporters by: As the new building slowly became a reality, so * changing the N.C. Artists Exhibition did a new structure, staff, and program evolve. In 1980, the legislature established a new from an annual to a triennial event; * closing the Collectors Gallery; museum board of trustees to share control of * failing to include the N.C. Film Festival museum operations with the secretary of the in its long-term program; N.C. Department of Cultural Resources (DCR). * curtailing the schedule of museum- Then, in 1981, the new board, chaired by sponsored traveling exhibitions; and Gordon Hanes of Winston-Salem, and Sara * limiting the use of the Biddle Gallery by Hodgkins, secretary of DCR, hired a new blind persons. museum director, Dr. Edgar Peters Bowron, with museum experience in Kansas City, Bowron and his staff defend these actions Minneapolis, Baltimore, New York, and Rome. with an emphasis on quality-a word that "When I ar- appears again and rived," Bowron re- again in interviews members, "I was with staff members very disturbedby and in the written not only the quality proposals being cir- of some of the [staff culated by the Bow- members] but by ron administration. their total lack of "In accordance with experience in art the new focus of our museums." So he Museum on selec- began assembling a tivity, quality, and battery of art his- scholarly documen- torians, several with tation," writes Mit- Ph.D.s and most chell Kahan, the from outside the curator of American state. Eight of the and contemporary first nine persons listed on the art museum's art, "the major effort on our part in regard to art official staff biographies, including all the of this state will be employed in the solo shows curators, arrived in 1982, from the Portland Art and limited group shows of work by North Museum in Oregon, the Montgomery (Ala.) Carolina artists."2 Museum of Fine Art, the National Gallery of Art The North Carolina Museum of Art stands (Washington), the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts at a crossroads, probably the most important (Richmond), the Royal Oak Foundation (New one since 1947, when the General Assembly York), and the Walters Art Gallery (Baltimore). made its original appropriation for the Of these nine, only the curator of ancient art had museum's core collection. Will it seek to become ever worked in North Carolina. In short, this is a a quality, general-purpose museum, emphasiz- new museum-a new board from around the ing art from throughout the world? Will it focus state, a new staff from around the country, and a on the strengths of the Tar Heel art community? new building. Or will it try to do both? Understanding how a Can this new enterprise measure up to the museum makes such choices requires a brief legislative mandate and the public expectation? review of the museum's efforts in acquisitions, "We're a very young institution," says Bowron, preservation, exhibitions, and interpretation- with just over one year in North Carolina under the four-part mandate of the legislation his belt. "I don't perceive that the public feels sanctioning this museum as well as the four strongly about this institution, that this central aspects of any art museum. institution has insinuated itself into their hearts. It's not a point of pride in the way the other FEBRUARY 1983 23 Egyptian, Greek, Roman, African, Oceanic, pre- Acquisitions and Preservation Columbian, and others-and in various media- he museum collection began long before a paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, and T "museum" existed. In 1925, arts patrons in decorative arts. The American collection the state, many from wealthy North Carolina includes works by the 19th century Hudson families, began assembling a new art collection River paintersand 20th centuryavant-garde under the aegis of the N.C. Art Society. In 1928, artists Georgia O'Keeffe, Robert Rauschenberg, New York philanthropist Robert F. Phifer, a and Frank Stella. Mr. and Mrs. Gordon Hanes North Carolina native, bequeathed his art donated the Stella painting, Raqqa 11 (1970, collection to the Art Society, together with a synthetic polymer on canvas) which the museum trust fund.

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