Thursday, August 24, 2017

The logical endpoint of the anti-deaccessioning position (UPDATED)

LA Times art critic Christopher Knight has a solution to the Berkshire Museum's financial difficulties:

"Don’t sell the art. Do close the museum. Start behaving like the charitable institution you are supposed to be. Spend the next several years responsibly overseeing the dispersal of the collection."

Let that sink in, folks.  This is what the Deaccession Police believe.  (Another example here.)

They would rather a museum close than sell a single work.  (The sale of 400 works, on the other hand, just with a different use of proceeds -- that's perfectly fine.)

Previous discussions of Knight's contributions to the deaccessioning debate here and here.

UPDATE:  "With friends like Knight, the AAM and AAMD hardly need enemies. Hopefully, the dogmatism of the deaccessioning police will finally encourage more sensible minds to consider the actual consequences of the dogma."