While the annual meeting of the Association of Art Museum Directors (in Cleveland through tomorrow) focuses on ways “to increase diversity throughout the field,” Kaywin Feldman, director of the Minneapolis Institute of Art and former AAMD president, has noticed a major change among her fellow attendees at the directors’ conclave.
She tweeted this insight:
Majority of directors @MuseumDirectors meeting have been directors for under 5 years. Exciting tidal wave of change in the field!
— Kaywin Feldman (@KaywinFeldman) May 23, 2016
To my mind, that “tidal wave” could be not only “exciting,” but also, potentially, a tsunami. Museums need stability, not revolving-door directorships. An exodus from the top spot could be signal that the complexities of museum finances and expanded programmatic imperatives have become dauntingly onerous to manage.
That said, many of the recent departures that immediately come to mind involve veteran directors, arguably of retirement age.
These thoughts occasioned this Twitter exchange between Feldman and me, sparked by her initial tweet, above:
@CultureGrrl @MuseumDirectors definitely exciting. Solid professionals with new ideas, drive, and enthusiasm for the future.
— Kaywin Feldman (@KaywinFeldman) May 23, 2016
@CultureGrrl@MuseumDirectors Yes, mostly retirement. It really is a huge moment of shift in the field.
— Kaywin Feldman (@KaywinFeldman) May 23, 2016
Another potentially “huge shift” in museum leadership, which I’ve already noted, is that not only are directors getting younger (because of the turnover), but encyclopedic museums are increasingly tapping contemporary art specialists to be their new directors. In addition to the three I highlighted here, the Milwaukee Art Museum, whose resourceful director, Dan Keegan, I interviewed for my recent Wall Street Journal article, has just named Marcelle Polednik to succeed him. She is director and chief curator at the University of North Florida’s Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville (and, it seems, likes to color-coordinate her necklaces):
Photo by Thomas Hager
Encyclopedic museums must give due attention to the art of their own times: I get it. But the bulk of their collections are historic works that have stood the test of time. That’s where the bulk of their curatorial and programmatic attention should be focused. I know that having a director who is a contemporary specialist doesn’t mean that collections outside his or her area of expertise will suffer neglect: Tom Campbell, a tapestry specialist, hasn’t festooned the Metropolitan Museum’s galleries with wall hangings.
That said, the fashionable shift of encyclopedic museums towards the new and trendy is a “tidal wave of change” worth monitoring with at least a touch of trepidation.