Why do Colleges have so much art?

November 4, 2016 9:16 AM

The Important Role of Art on College Campuses Thoughts on the role of the campus museum (SLTheAtlantic)

"Sleepwalker," previously

posted by PussKillian (10 comments total)

I think the better question is: why do American public spaces not have art?
posted by Phredward at 9:24 AM on November 4, 2016 [7 favorites]

Green was referring to the “grandiosity” of the Tate Modern in London and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, but the same sentiment applies to campus art: How much is too much?

Thought experiment:

The 13 Most Expensive College Football Stadium Renovations

Compare and contrast.

That's not to say you can't have football and art, it's just a question of keeping the dollar figures and perceived "grandiosity" of one or the other in perspective.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 9:47 AM on November 4, 2016 [2 favorites]

Personally, I wouldn't ask "should there be an art museum on campus?" Rather, I'd ask, "should the art museum on campus be primarily dedicated to preserving 50 year old pieces whose total value is often comparable to the entire university endowment?"

Comparing the value students get from being able to stand a few feet from original epic Warhol silkscreens to the value one could generate sinking the same money into contemporary arts funding and an exhibition space for local artists and students. . . it's hard to come up with an argument for the Warhols that isn't cynical and tied to donor relations.
posted by eotvos at 9:51 AM on November 4, 2016 [6 favorites]

Pretty sure the scupltures are there purely so they can be adorned with traffic cones or random underwear at 1am.
posted by w0mbat at 9:53 AM on November 4, 2016 [2 favorites]

I found it a more than a little odd that an article called "Why do Colleges Have So Much Art?" devoted almost no attention at all to the experience of being a student at a college. Does art affect the flavor of their formative years? Who knows? Who cares? The Atlantic can be a little tone-deaf in its exclusive attention to the lives of well-to-do old white people, to state the obvious.
posted by kozad at 10:15 AM on November 4, 2016 [4 favorites]

Oh man, another article that I knew was in The Atlantic before I finished reading the title.
Ta-Nehisi Coates wept.
posted by Dmenet at 2:44 PM on November 4, 2016

As someone who appreciated the heck out of the Hammer Museum (UCLA) as a grad student and enjoyed the meditative aspects of Turrell's Skyspaces (Rice) and loved the little campus museum at my last job (North Dakota) and who keeps meaning to go the cutting edge and completely free campus museum at my current job (undetermined), I really can't get behind this article.

Then again, this article is terrible. It seems to be arguing that art on college campuses serves a purpose but expenditures shouldn't go overboard (like at...Harvard? I guess?) and that museums should serve a true teaching purpose.

I'm pretty sure everyone agrees with the basic idea to keep costs reasonable and the mission of the museum/art aligned with the mission of the university. So why--and I am genuinely baffled here--have an article about it?
posted by librarylis at 6:48 PM on November 4, 2016

I was interested in the article because it raised a lot of questions that are currently sort of bubbling quietly underneath my own academic art museum, and which in a very broad sense reflect a former director's vision for the museum as opposed to our current director's vision. It's not a good article in that doesn't really go any place special with some of the thoughts it raises, but some of those questions are interesting anyway. We're trying to synch ourselves up more closely with the students on our campus, but we're also the main museum of our city, and sometimes the exhibitions we put up are more suited to the context of a college class and leaves the 4th graders coming on their tour with only a few things to see. At least we don't have to worry about showing student art, because there are other galleries on campus for that.
posted by PussKillian at 7:37 PM on November 4, 2016

I would assume because art donations are tax deductible and valuations are - negotiable.
posted by IndigoJones at 10:55 AM on November 5, 2016

We're trying to synch ourselves up more closely with the students on our campus, but we're also the main museum of our city, and sometimes the exhibitions we put up are more suited to the context of a college class and leaves the 4th graders coming on their tour with only a few things to see.

Yeah, that makes sense. To some extent our Special Collections has the same issue--trying to support our student body and faculty research aims while also preserving the history of the city and drawing in international scholars. The department has a mandate to be unique but still accessible. It's a tricky balancing act!

Especially in museums, where children's museums are distinct things which exist, I can see how y'all would struggle. My own prejudice as an academic is to say that of course you need collections and exhibits of interest and alignment with campus but I don't know the context of your campus and city.

I can see how this article stirs up some of those questions, but man I wish it was better. Campus museums--and public art, which I think mostly got left out of the original article but is actually probably the most significant art on my campus--deserve a more coherent article because they're pretty interesting actually.
posted by librarylis at 11:38 AM on November 5, 2016 [2 favorites]