Museums vs. The Market
If there was one thing that all of the participants could agree on, it was that museum collections are undergoing an exceedingly rapid transformation. Whilst the art market is experiencing unlimited inflation, Chris Dercon, Director of the Tate Modern, highlights that financial support from governments is dwindling, signifying a sorry future for our public museums. Bernard Blistène director of the Centre Pompidou, urges the audience to remain positive, “contemporary art has never been so trendy” he rejoices. He clarifies however that “whilst serious collectors have always existed, having built their collection on pure passion, there are increasing numbers of self-proclaimed collectors who are in it for the speculation.” Highlighting the absurdity of current market prices, he seems even less content, “it makes me so angry when people clap in the auction room!” Faced with the difficulty of this current context museums must be sensitive of the history and “the presence” of a collection and its role in the life of the institution that houses it. Chris Dercon goes further, placing the responsibility on public institutions to make judgements on the mass of artistic production being churned out today, playing the role of the mediator. If numerous private collectors are happy to accumulate just to accumulate, worrying more about short-term profitability, they then paradoxically feel a great need for institutional recognition, “we must establish new norms. Public museums must take care of private collectors.”
Compatibility or competition?
Nancy Spector has confidence in the complicity between public and private, a vision shared by Philippe Vergne, president of the Los Angeles MoCA, who sees the opening of the Broad Museum - private collector Eli Broad’s private museum, due to open opposite MoCA - as an opportunity for increased activity at his own museum.
In a world where applications such as Snapchat reign- an iphone application in which photos disappear forever after 10 seconds - Philippe Vergne ponders the question of collecting. “Museums are there to slow down time which is rapidly accelerating,” he explains. So museums are more necessary than ever then? Notably through the development of the interdisciplinary? Hervé Chandès, Director of the Fondation Cartier, cites additionally the soirées nomades program at the Cartier foundation, in response to Philippe Verne’s remark that “when a performer enters a museum, it is not only to validate his work, for the symbolic path that it signifies. Museums also present a space for independence, a harbour of peace in a world that is moving too quickly.” The debate was concluded poetically by Bernard Blistène who described the public institution as a space for “poetry activation of thought”.
“Les clefs d’une passion” is on display until July 6.
Louise Fudym
