Ripostes II

Why did I call former Phillips Collection director Jay Gates "a hero" in 2008 when I wrote just last summer that "it's a somewhat mixed legacy that Gates leaves as he resigns from his position with the institution"?

That's not exactly how one reader put the question to me. A reader raised some skeptical points in response to my high praise for Gates in this City Paper review on "Degas to Deibenkorn: The Phillips Collects", when I know full well that Gates made decisions that threatened the integrity of the institution? Here's what I wrote:

"Degas to Diebenkorn" is of a piece with other changes over the last few years at the red brick house on 21st Street. The Phillips celebrated a dramatic expansion in 2005 that added five stories and 3,000 square feet of gallery and studio space. That same year, it closed a $29 million capital campaign—its first ever—some $2 million over its target and two years ahead of schedule. Last year's announcement that director Jay Gates would retire sees the Phillips Collection's fifth director departing as a hero.

But here's what I had to say for the Washington Post Express at the time, back when the director resigned:

JAY GATES RAISED THE ROOF of the Phillips Collection, in a literal sense: The director oversaw the museum's 30,000–square–foot expansion, completed last year. But Gates also threw open the doors of the venerable collection by lending works to casinos on the Vegas strip.

What happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas. The decision to lend principal works from the collection to the Bellagio in 2000 stunned observers, who thought that Gates' decision indicated that the museum was straying too far into the commercial realm. It's hardly that casinos are seedy and historic Dupont Circle townhouses aren't; it's that casinos don't offer the license to hang whatever piece of art that belongs, whereas museums do (or ought to).

[ . . . ]

So it's a somewhat mixed legacy that Gates leaves as he resigns from his position with the institution.

It's not that I changed my mind or forgot that Gates made some poor decisions as director. For certain, the buoyant state that the Phillips enjoys today does not excuse Gates's decision to strike an arrangement with the Bellagio at the risk of injuring Duncan Phillips's original vision or sacrificing the integrity of the institution by renting out curatorial decisions about the works.

Nevertheless, his legacy is a positive one. Dorothy Kosinski begins her tenure as director with a vastly larger museum, strong budgetary footing, and most importantly, an institution whose reputation has withstood some rocky moments.

I might have curbed my enthusiasm. But, between between villain and hero, Gates belongs in the latter camp. There are other institutions that have underwent expansions, capital campaigns, and renovations and come out less secure and self-sure for it.

Posted by Kriston at March 27, 2008 3:07 PM