 |
| Emigdio Vasquez, A Sunday Night in Harmony Park (detail), 1999. Fred Ortiz collection |
Chapman University's Hilbert Museum of California Art reopens Feb. 23 in a two-building, 22,000-sf compound nearly triple the size of the original (2016) facility. Twenty-six galleries will showcase Mark and Jane Hilbert's 5000-piece collection, centered on 20th-century figurative art by California artists, along with loans from other collections.
 |
| Rendering of Hilbert Museum of California Art |
The new campus debuts with an eight-room survey of the Hilbert collection; a loan show of Chicano artist Emigdio Vasquez (1939-2014); an installation of California modernism (Agnes Pelton, Roger Kuntz, etc.); a selection of views of Orange County; 40 works by Millard Sheets. The latter designed the mosaic mural on the Hilbert's façade, rescued from a Santa Monica savings and loan.
 |
Motorola 5R1 radio, 1950s. Hilbert collection
|
|
There are now dedicated spaces for cinema arts, illustration, Native American art, and American design. These will open, respectively, with mini-shows on Mary Blair's concept art for the Disney Alice in Wonderland (1951); Norman Rockwell; Navajo blankets; and mid-century modern radios.
The Hilbert is at 167 N. Atchinson St., Orange Calif., across from the Orange train station. It will be open Tues. to Sat., 10 AM to 5 PM. Advance reservations are recommended. Admission and parking (at 130 N. Lemon St.) are free.
 |
| Burr Singer, Touch Up, 1943. Hilbert collection |
Comments
*
The Bakelite radio is so cool.
Bakelite was invented in Yonkers, so it was especially apt that the Hudson River Museum (in Yonkers) featured a spectacular Bakelite show in 2010.
It's a bit grainy, but following is a news segment on local TV about the 2010 exhibit...
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GOOcV2sNGSA
In terms of design and architecture, is the sign of "HILBERT MUSEUM" - both in size and font - necessarily the best way to identify the building? As for some of the facade, although I don't believe those are what a lot of warehouses are made up of, they still sure do look like white concrete blocks.
https://s.yimg.com/am/365d/77a6ea94230b63edef9444db36190875
Okay, doers do, complainers criticize. Or easier said than done. Also, money goes only so far. But sometimes flaky judgment is just flaky judgment.
The Detroit Institute of Art uses a millage, which taxes property owners in three counties in and around metro Detroit. The initiative was approved handily in a referendum.
An owner of a property worth $200,000 pays an additional $20 a year for DIA's budget. Residents in the millage counties are admitted to DIA free of charge. DIA is now on a strong financial footing. Millage covers roughly two-thirds of its operating costs.
*
LACMA, what are you waiting for?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-model-for-financial-stability-at-the-detroit-institute-of-arts-millage-196bfbcc?mod=arts-culture_feat1_reviews_pos2
This is not a "museum-quality" collection.
This is not a collection worth studying.
This is what happens when regional colleges forsake their educational mission to promote themselves.
https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-et-cm-ca-lacma-50th-money-20150510-story.html
> The Los Angeles public [through county government] has
> given $349 million — not counting a $125-million
> commitment for future construction.
> The county’s $30-million appropriation for LACMA this
> fiscal year exceeds New York City’s $26-million
> commitment to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
> Being able to count on a guaranteed $30-million annual
> payment from the county is like having an additional
> endowment of $600 million.
LACMA's endowment fund, $125 million as of 2015 (I doubt it's much higher today), is a sign of a major institution never traditionally generating the level of support from local philanthropists to justify what's going on with its new building.
Per the most recent financial statements, ending June 30, 2023, the Met's endowment was $5.614B.
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2018/02/08/the-getty-the-worlds-richest-museum-hunts-for-wealthy-patrons
> “From the viewpoint of a philanthropy adviser,
> it’s better that donors have more opportunities,”
> says Scott Stover, the president of the Los
> Angeles-based firm Global Art Development, which
> advises cultural foundations. “But if I were
> working at a major museum here, such as Lacma,
> I would be pretty angry. There are limited funds,
> and it continues to be a very competitive
> environment.”
> The president of the Getty Trust, James Cuno, says:
> “It’s not our intention to compete [with other Los
> Angeles museums] and it’s not the case that we have.
> We are not aggressively going after members of the
> boards at the Hammer or Lacma, for example.”
> “Harvard has a $35.6bn endowment, yet many alumni
> continue to give significant donations, recently
> over $1bn annually,” [Hammer board member Mihail]
> Lari says.
At Christmas, for example, Dick Wolf gave the Met what the museum's press office described as: "paintings by Bronzino, Artemisia and Orazio Gentileschi, and Vincent van Gogh; to deep holdings of Italian drawings beginning with late 15th-century works and culminating in exceptional works by 17th-century Bolognese artist Guercino, and the 18th-century Venetians, Giovanni Battista and Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo; to sculpture and decorative arts of the highest quality."
*
Just to put a fine point on it, Italian drawings of the 15th century are as rare as hens' teeth.
I don't believe there is anywhere near the cadre of private collectors in Getty's orbit to enrich its collection in similar fashion.
It's interesting the way that people like Wolf for decades will live in the LA area (Wolf lives north of it around Santa Barbara), but remain tied to the cultural scene of the East Coast. Some of Wolf's top TV shows are also physically based out of NYC, so it's not like his business needs require where he sets up his home.
He's similar to tycoon Walter Annenberg. He was originally mainly of a suburban NYC background, but spent a lot of his time in southern California. He donated his prized collection to the Met.
That's why Michael Govan estranging the Ahmanson Foundation, one of the few resources that exists in the LA area for receiving donations, is so irresponsible. Even worse, it's apparently not so much because hie new building will be smaller, but because he's into the idea of a museum's permanent collection always appearing and then disappearing. Or an extreme version of rotating exhibits that no major so-called encyclopedic museum ever observes. Bleh. Cultural malpractice.
It's not just the California-centric collectors who have dropped off everything at the Met.
Muriel Kallis Steinberg Newman was a Chicago legend, and her AAA+ collection of modern art was eyed by the Art Institute for decades. She ultimately gave the awesome jewels of her collection to the Met in 2006.
*
But it can sometimes go both ways. Samuel Kress's 17-room duplex stared out over Fifth Avenue directly opposite the Met, and Met curators salivated over his European Painting collection forever. The National Gallery in DC got the heaviest cream from that bucket, no doubt.
Kress gave generously to scores of museums in every region in the US, even the Met, but the National Gallery's Italian Old Master paintings are without doubt the finest in America because of collections like Kress's. The Met's collection does not compare.
I've long heard about collectors wanting to give strength to strength, but after browsing through the Louvre, a museum crammed with so much stuff that even its masterpieces became sort of a blur (even a yawn) after awhile, I wonder if even really good art stands out more and will be more effective - or appreciated - in smaller museums.
Also, since so much of the stuff at the Met is always squirreled away in storage, it's sort of oddly greedy of them to want more things and also kind of both flakily egotistical and wasteful of people like Dick Wolf or Muriel Newman (less so for her since the Met's modern collection isn't loaded down like MOMA's is) to donate objects knowing they'll likely end up hidden away.
Those lesser works do often sit in storage, but just follow Sotheby’s and Christie's old master sales and read about the Met's deaccessions galore. Proceeds buy better works. There's a churn at the Met that they don't advertise, lest they scare off donors with 2 great pieces and 50 so-so ones.
In my opinion, if the Louvre is a blur, you're doing it wrong.
Solve: Go for 2 hrs only. Pick 10 artworks that pull you in. Stand there, for 15 minutes, even. Observe the fine details, the colors, the message.
The Louvre is a small royal city. It's folly to think you'll ever fully know it, no matter how many times you go.