Glenn Lowry is the former Director of the AGO, and current Director of New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
The Varsity caught up with him during his quick visit to Toronto to deliver a lecture at the ROM.
The Varsity: Your official title is the Director of the Museum of Modern Art. What does that entail?
Glenn Lowry: A lot of travelling. I do a lot of lecturing and talking. I mostly work with the staff and the trustees to work on exhibitions and acquisitions. There is also strategic planning, and overseeing general operations of the museum. The MoMA staffs over 800 employees, and has 2.5 to 2.6 million visitors a year. I am, at least I hope I am, the catalyst in the middle of all this.
TV: Are there any important acquisitions that the MoMA is currently engaged in?
GL: There is always an important acquisition in process. I can’t tell you the specifics for fear of jinxing it, but the MoMA is a major collecting institution, and we are shaped through the modern and contemporary art objects that we acquire.
TV: Is there a need for the museum to balance its base of classic Modernism with constant developments in contemporary art?
GL: This is a central issue we struggle with—how to deal with the immediate past, the present, and the transitional future towards which art is moving. We are, you could almost call it isomorphs, half lives; and this reflects the ongoing tension between the well-known and the defined, which are at the core of our collection, and the progressive, new, and experimental in process of unfolding. The tension between those two animates what we do.
TV: You have been praised, and at times faulted, for bringing a certain entrepreneurial sensibility to the museum. On your watch, the MoMA underwent an $858-million expansion. What has this development meant for the museum?
GL: We did have a capital campaign of $858 million. But only half went to construction of [the actual] architecture. The other half went to endowments, and other programs and initiatives. The amount always gets lumped together, and I am hardly entrepreneurial! I come from an academic background, in the esoteric field of Islamic art, although [I have] always had an abiding interest in contemporary art.
For the last 15 years, I have tried to address the number of architectural issues that have precluded displaying the collections in the way we wanted to. When I was hired, I was not particularly interested in architectural projects. My focus was on generating major acquisitions, holding important exhibitions, and rethinking the way the collection needed to be displayed. So we talked to trustees, curators, friends of the community, and found that a more synthetic and nuanced reading of the modern art was needed.
Part of the intellectual goal of the institution is to be experimental. Once you embark on the [architectural] project, some are exhilarated, others are threatened. Some feel alienated and upset when they do not find their favourite artwork in its place. Others find the new [construction] utterly transfixing. After four years, criticism from those who were not pleased has abated. I welcome any kind of critical discourse. One of the things you learn is that criticism is essential to generating intelligent ideas. Part of our hope is that the MoMA remains a central [venue] for critical discourse.
TV: Art critics frown upon the close relationship certain artists share with auction houses, such as British artist Damien Hirst teaming up with Sotheby’s. What are your thoughts on this intersection of art and commerce?
GL: Art and commerce have been intertwined for hundreds of years. What has happened is that the money that has been thrown into art has increased dramatically. Artists are, in effect, making art for a clientele expecting a certain kind of spectacular object to satisfy their needs. The current economic [crisis] is going to [alter] some of these conditions fairly substantially.
TV: Is there a special role for art in times of recession?
GL: I don’t think art is shouldered with playing a special role during such times. But cultural institutions like museums and symphonies provide an opportunity to think differently. You are able to slow down, and perhaps for a moment, forget about your problems, and concentrate on thinking about how we express ourselves as a culture. I find that looking at works of art can be both meditative and informative. Seeing artworks that think through difficult situations—because that is what artists do, they pose complicated problems that require deep soul searching, and propose answers—can be helpful.
TV: Do you have a favourite piece at the museum?
GL: Working at the MoMA, you’re surrounded by some of the most important works of art—trying to pick a favourite is like trying to pick your favourite child. But if you have a lot of children, I suppose I do prefer one over the other. I always oscillate between Cezanne’s Bather to [his] Turning Road at Montgroult, to Pollock’s great No. 31, to Warhol’s Thirty-Two Soup Cans, to Kentridge’s films. For me, the greatest pleasure is walking through the galleries, and seeing the work of art that I know we own, not having paid attention to it before, and being pleasantly surprised. In essence, my favourites are changing all the time.
TV: You were the Director of the Art Gallery of Ontario from 1990 to 1995. What are your thoughts on the AGO’s recent renovation?
GL: The AGO was absolutely exhilarating. One of the great things about Toronto is that change is always taking place. What Frank [Gehry] has achieved is a significant clarification of the circulation system. [The AGO] was cut up before, but now the Dundas Strezet facade is utterly wonderful—it brings the street into the museum and the museum onto the street. The timber walkway presents a majestic moment in which one can pause and think about the art and culture of the city. It has really created a nexus of architecture in Toronto. Also, the Walker Court creates this wonderful way of moving around the building that was not there before.
TV: If you could offer one piece of advice for aspiring art historians and curators, what would it be?
GL: Follow your passion. The most interesting people I have met are all driven by deep passion. It does not make rational or logical sense. They feel committed, dependent, [and they have] the desire to learn, to think, to enjoy, and to pursue it, regardless of whether or not it makes rational sense. If you are really determined, ultimately, it leads somewhere. I think the hardest thing to deal with is that we live in a world that demands we matriculate, leave university, go to graduate school, get your first job, whatever, and we are pushed into paths. But actually, the most successful and interesting [people] are those who followed their passion and were brave enough to get off the grid.
