Two New Curatorial Appointments at the Whitney

11.20.09

The Whitney Museum of American Art announced today the appointment of Scott Rothkopf as curator, effective December 1, and the promotion of Dana Miller to curator of the permanent collection.
“These appointments occur as we gear up for our downtown expansion, a time of decisive and transformative growth for the institution,” said Adam Weinberg, the museum’s director, in a statement.

Rothkopf comes to the Whitney from Artforum, where he has been senior editor since January 2004. Miller began at the Whitney in 1996 and has been associate curator of the permanent collection for the past seven years.

As a frequent contributor to Artforum, Rothkopf has written on exhibitions such as the Venice Biennale and the Whitney Biennial and on topics ranging from the art and architectural criticism of the 1980s to the writings of ’60s critic Gene Swenson. He was a guest curator at Harvard University’s Fogg Art Museum, where he organized “Mel Bochner Photographs 1966–1969” (2002). At the Fogg, Rothkopf was also cocurator, with Linda Norden, of Pierre Huyghe’s This Is Not a Time for Dreaming (2004), a site-specific installation, performance, and film.

Miller has worked with her colleagues on acquisitions, loans, and conservation projects, as well as curating exhibitions drawn from the collection. During this time, she organized the major loan exhibition “Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe,” curated with Michael Hays. She is currently in the planning stages of a retrospective of the artist Jay DeFeo for the Whitney.

High Museum of Art Appoints Michael Rooks Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art

11.20.09

Michael E. Shapiro, director of the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, announced today that the museum has appointed Michael Rooks as the new Wieland Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art. Rooks will officially join the museum in January. Rooks has held curator positions at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Contemporary Museum Honolulu, and the Honolulu Academy of Arts. Most recently, Rooks served as chief curator and director of exhibitions and artist relations at Haunch of Venison, a contemporary art gallery in New York.

As curator at the Contemporary Museum, Rooks initiated Hawaii’s first international-artist project series with major outdoor works by Taiwanese artist Michael Lin and British artist Paul Morrison, and he served on the advisory board of the University of Hawaii’s international artists’ residency program. While at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago (MCA), Rooks was responsible for a dozen exhibitions, including the retrospective “H. C. Westermann.” As coauthor of the Westermann catalogue raisonné and other publications on Westermann, Rooks is the leading authority on this highly influential but still underrecognized American artist. Also at the MCA, Rooks organized “Roy Lichtenstein: Interiors,” a posthumous survey focusing on Lichtenstein’s late work; “War: What Is It Good For,” the first museum response to the Iraq war; and “AA Bronson: Negative Thoughts,” Bronson’s first solo show in a museum.

In his position at the High Museum of Art, Rooks will be responsible for the growing collection of modern and contemporary art, now totaling more than twenty-three hundred works. Significant holdings include works by Michaël Borremans, Chuck Close, Ellsworth Kelly, Agnes Martin, Gerhard Richter, Sean Scully, and Fred Wilson. The collection was recently enhanced by a gift from Herbert and Dorothy Vogel, New York–based collectors who are donating artworks to museums across the United States as part of a philanthropic program called “50 Works for 50 States.” The Vogels’ gift to the High included works by Richard Tuttle, William Anastasi, and Stephen Antonakos, among others.

Architecture Contracts on the Rise

11.20.09

After more than a year of meager activity, the nation's architects reported a growing number of new contracts in October from builders preparing to get real estate developments off the ground, reports Roger Vincent for the Los Angeles Times.

It was the highest level of new business for the nation's architects since August 2008, a report from the American Institute of Architects says. “This news could prove to be an early signal toward a recovery for the design and construction industry,” said Kermit Baker, the AIA’s chief economist.

The architects’ survey is a leading indicator of construction activity, because there is a nine- to twelve-month lead between when they start work on designs and when builders break ground.

The AIA, the leading trade group for the profession, said in a report scheduled to be released today that its index of “work on the boards” reported by architects was up sharply in September, but new commissions still remained far below mid-decade highs.

“The industry is nearing a bottom and might start pulling out in the next quarter or so,” Baker said. “We are months away from a substantial upturn in construction activity, but this is the first sign in place for that to turn around.”

Metropolitan Museum Reports $8.4 Million Budget Deficit

11.20.09

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s latest financial statement reports a $8.4 million shortfall over the past year and warns that the gap could have reached as high as $20 million in future years if executives had not trimmed staff by a dramatic 14 percent, reports Artinfo. A letter accompanying the report, signed by director Thomas P. Campbell and president Emily K. Rafferty, states that the “painful but unavoidable process [of reducing staff] . . . was taken only after all possible cost-cutting measures had been introduced.” As part of the effort to reduce costs, the museum offered some employees voluntary retirements, closed retail outlets, and instituted a hiring freeze, allowing many contracts to expire. The museum, however, is not at risk of going broke any time soon. It reported assets totaling $2.9 billion and revenue of $213 million from a diverse variety of resources.

Jeanne-Claude (1935–2009)

11.19.09

The artist known as Jeanne-Claude, who along with her husband, Christo, made wrapping famous structures an artistic calling card, died Wednesday night at a New York hospital from complications of a brain aneurysm, reports David Ng for the Los Angeles Times. She was seventy-four.

Recognizable by her orange-dyed hair, Jeanne-Claude was a fixture of the international art scene and was a highly visible New York personality. Along with Christo, she created The Gates, a 2005 public-art project consisting of 7,503 orange rectangular structures draped with fabric and erected throughout Central Park.

Jeanne-Claude, who was born Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon to a French family in Casablanca, met Christo in 1958 and soon started collaborating on art projects. Their signature style involved wrapping public structures in fabric. In 1964, they moved to New York, where they were based ever since. Among the outdoor structures and buildings they wrapped were the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Pont Neuf in Paris; and the Reichstag in Berlin. One of their most recent projects was Over the River, which involved fabric panels suspended horizontally above the Arkansas River.

When asked in a 2002 interview what her favorite among her creations was, Jeanne-Claude replied: “We always say that each one of our projects is a child of ours, and a father and mother who have many children will never tell you which one is their favorite. If people insist that we have to have a favorite one, then we say, ‘OK, you are right, we do have a favorite one and it’s always the next one.’”

Santa Monica City Council Votes to Launch Negotiations with Eli Broad

11.19.09

The Santa Monica City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to launch formal negotiations with art collector and philanthropist Eli Broad to secure the museum he intends to build on the Westside for his two-thousand-piece contemporary art collection, reports Yvonne Villarreal for the Los Angeles Times. The plan outlined in a report by City Manager P. Lamont Ewell, proposes that Broad build on two and a half acres of city-owned land next to the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. It also calls for the city to lease the land to Broad’s foundation for a “token” amount, to put forward about one million dollaes for design and construction, to provide parking, and to plant and maintain the exterior landscaping.

“The collection is deep. And the collection is wide. And, may I add, the collection is Broad,” joked City Councilman Kevin McKeown during the meeting. “It is a remarkable opportunity for our city.” The public echoed his sentiments. There were public comments from twenty people, all in support of taking the necessary measures to secure the deal. Despite their support in continuing negotiations, a few council members remained cautious.

“If it looks too good to be true, it probably is,” said council member Bobby Shriver. “I just want to caution you all that this is a very competitive process, not only in Santa Monica but around town. There are negotiations with other cities in town for this collection, by other museums in town for this collection.”

He went on to say that the staff report was written in an “exuberant” way, noting that it failed to point out that the small fee for the land would be an "enormous expenditure of public assets" considering it is prime real estate that is worth an "enormous sum." And he questioned the possibility that “the foundation could compel the city to buy a building that has no parking”––referring to the current Broad Art Foundation building in Santa Monica.

Shriver also said that not knowing which architect Broad would choose was a “gigantic issue” and warned that details were still unclear over the operating endowment, how many art pieces would actually be placed in the facility, and whether there would be education programs.

“This is a tremendous opportunity for Santa Monica,” said Jessica Cusick, cultural-affairs manager for the city, after the meeting. “It’s something that our arts community has desired for a very long time. I think it’s going to be a win-win if Broad locates his museum here. It’s a great site for him. It’s a world-class location for a world-class institution.”

Dia Using Weather Balloon to Document Spiral Jetty

11.19.09

The Dia Art Foundation, owner of Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty, 1970, has begun documenting the site, photographing it from year to year to give curators and conservators a better idea of how it is changing and a better basis for making decisions about whether to intervene, reports Randy Kennedy for the New York Times. Preservation concerns about Spiral Jetty have arisen lately not only because of the work’s reemergence from the water but also because of plans announced in the past two and a half years by companies to initiate industrial projects near the site.

One is a large expansion of a field of solar-evaporation ponds used to extract potassium sulfate from the water for fertilizer. Another is a plan for exploratory oil drilling that Dia officials argued would disrupt the way the work would be viewed and potentially harm it physically. As a result of the drilling proposal––currently in limbo––Dia and Utah officials have begun exploring the creation of a buffer zone around the sculpture that would help protect it while still allowing the lake area to be used for other purposes.

“In my field, we’re trained to make condition reports,” said Francesca Esmay, Dia’s conservator, but she added of Smithson’s work, composed of more than six thousand tons of rock and soil: “Its scale is such that I can’t just go out with a camera and pencil and clipboard by myself and describe it.” Several months ago, Esmay turned to the Getty Conservation Institute, an arm of the J. Paul Getty Trust, which has organized and assisted in conservation and monitoring of art and historic sites from Central America to Africa to the Middle East.

After considering nearly every possible way to document Spiral Jetty from above––rent a weather satellite? An airplane? A helicopter? Use a kite?––the institute, which often works in countries where conservation projects are carried out on shoestring budgets, came up with a remarkably simple solution: a fifty-dollar disposable latex weather balloon, easily bought online. Along with a little helium, some fishing line, a slightly hacked Canon PowerShot G9 point-and-shoot digital camera, an improvised plywood and metal cradle for the camera, and some plastic zip ties (to keep the cradle attached and the neck of the balloon cinched), a floating Land-art documentation machine was improvised, MacGyver-like.

“I’m not supposed to use the word cheap––it’s inexpensive,” Rand Eppich, a senior project manager with the institute, said. Eppich, who conceived the balloon plan, made the two-and-a-half-hour drive from Salt Lake City last May with a Getty assistant, Aurora Tang, and Esmay, to put the system into use for the first time.

And despite a couple balloons that popped in the Utah heat (“Thankfully, we didn’t have cameras on them,” Eppich said), the three managed to get some spectacular and highly useful shots of the jetty from heights ranging from eight hundred to sixteen hundred feet, as they unreeled the fishing line tied to the balloon, allowing it to rise.

Eppich said the Getty’s goal was to create a system that Dia could use annually at little cost and one simple enough that Esmay could operate it herself. “We want to help people do something that’s repeatable and sustainable after we’re gone,” he said.

ASU Art Museum Names New Director

11.19.09

The ASU Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts has announced the appointment of Gordon Knox as the new director for the ASU Art Museum. Knox, currently a core collaborator for the Stanford Humanities Lab (SHL) at Stanford University, will begin his duties as museum director on a part-time basis on January 11, assuming the position full-time July 1.

Knox, whose work explores the transformative role of the arts in society, was recently recognized by Forbes for his work on collaborative projects at the SHL that brings together experts in the arts, humanities, and sciences. Previous to the SHL, Knox was the artistic director of the Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga, California, developing projects such as Edge of Desire, an exhibition of a collection of recent art from India, and FUSE, a new-media collaboration with the CADRE laboratory at San Jose State University. Knox also was the founding director of the Lucas Artists Program, a residency program at Montalvo.

As a part of the transition to Knox’s directorship, current interim director Heather Lineberry has been named interim associate director and senior curator, effective on Knox’s arrival. In that role, Lineberry will work closely with Knox as an administrative partner while also continuing to pursue her curatorial interests.