History
In 1922, Albert Barnes chartered the Barnes Foundation. He drafted
the Foundation’s Bylaws and Indenture of Trust which make
its purpose and activities clear: it was to be a school of art
and horticulture. The galleries were to be used five days a week “solely
and exclusively for educational purposes...” During the remainder
of his lifetime and that of his wife, Laura, the plans made in
1922 were realized: two schools were formed and two world class
collections were secured and arranged, one of art and one of plant
life. These collections consciously reflect and complement one
another.
Since 1925 the Barnes Foundation has existed at its present site
in Merion, PA. The splendid art gallery building, designed for the
collection by Paul Philippe Cret, includes exterior bas reliefs by
Jacques Lipchitz, an entrance surrounded by Enfield tiles in an African
motif, and a massive site specific mural by Henri Matisse. Inside
is a world-renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist,
modern and ethnographic art. The gallery is sited within a mature
arboretum, with unique and impressive collections of plant materials,
that was designed in relation to the
art collection.
The art gallery and the arboretum together constitute a unique cultural
heritage site. This is the location of its celebrated visual art
and horticulture programs which were constructed under the supervision
of America’s foremost educational philosopher, John Dewey.
In his Indenture of Trust, Dr. Barnes specified that after his death
the art gallery was to remain unchanged, which it has to this day.
In the words of Peter Schjeldahl, art critic for The New Yorker,
the Barnes Foundation is “a work of art in itself, more than
the sum of its fabulous parts.” To alter so much as a molecule,
continued Mr. Schjeldahl, would be “an aesthetic crime.”
Since 1961, regular admission to the Barnes Foundation has been available
to the public. For over thirty years, the Foundation’s neighbors
welcomed these visitors, and took great pride in the Foundation’s
presence in their community. During that time as well, the Foundation
remained solvent on its endowment from Dr. Barnes, even though it
charged only a nominal sum for admission and sold no commercial products.
Over the past decade, all this has changed. The Barnes Foundation
embarked on a program of complete building renovation, choosing to
raise money through an ill-conceived and litigiously executed world
exhibition tour rather than by a systematic development program.
The resultant publicity, fanned by the administration, created a
sudden spike in attendance that overwhelmed the Foundation’s
facilities and created severe traffic congestion.
When neighbors objected to their neighborhood being overwhelmed,
the Barnes Foundation filed suit against them and the Lower Merion
Township Commissioners on charges of “racism.” The Foundation’s
legal costs to pursue these and related lawsuits exceeded $7 million.
Ultimately, the charges were dismissed and labeled “cynical” and “frivolous” by
the courts. These unnecessary and exorbitant legal fees, coupled
with the expansion of administrative staff and salaries drained the
Barnes’ endowment. Despite a tenfold increase in the price
of admission, a new gift shop, a marketing program, and a professional
development office, the Barnes Foundation continued to spend beyond
its means.
This self-inflicted financial crisis was the reason the Barnes Foundation
petitioned the Court to overturn Dr. Barnes’ Indenture of Trust.
Local philanthropies, led by the Pew Charitable
Trusts-- which underwrote
the costs of litigation to drastically alter the Indenture-- have
now gained effective control of the Barnes Board of Trustees. Aided
by the Governor of Pennsylvania and the Mayor of Philadelphia, the
Pew Charitable Trusts, the Annenberg Foundation and the Lenfest Foundation
have formed an alliance with commercial and tourism interests to
move the Barnes art collection from its Merion home into Philadelphia.
In December 2004, Orphans Court Judge Stanley R. Ott granted the
petition of the Barnes Foundation which allows it to move the art
collection to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, and
to reconfigure the Foundation as a three-site campus with facilities
in Chester County as well as Philadelphia and Merion.
Judge Ott’s ruling was, in turn, a novel interpretation of
the law of deviation governing Pennsylvania trusts, which requires
that they be modified to the least extent compatible with fulfilling
their stated purposes--in this case, the preservation of the Barnes
Foundation as an educational institution with regulated public access.
The Judge cynically observed that he expected to see Barnes administrators
back in his court seeking relief from the likely consequences of
their plan, and of his own decision to authorize it.
The plan to relocate the art is built upon a commitment from the
three philanthropies to raise $150 million: $100 million to build
a new facility in downtown Philadelphia and $50 million to establish
an endowment. The final costs of the new building will surely be
much higher. The anticipated total of all costs, including state
and city subsidies to enable the move, is approaching $300 million.
This plan, one of most expensive and speculative projects in the
history of the region, is touted as the “least drastic” solution
to the problem of a $1 million annual operating deficit.
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Why the Gallery Art Should Not Move to Philadelphia.
Peter Schjeldahl’s objection to moving the Barnes collection is
echoed in many other quarters. Edward J. Sozanski, art critic for The
Philadelphia Inquirer, warns that the collection, if “ripped from
its historic context,” will be “just another ‘attraction’ on
Philadelphia’s . . . cultural midway.” Christopher Knight
for The Los Angeles Times says “as with Penn Station four decades
ago, so with the Barnes Foundation today. Fifteen or 20 years down the
road, people will look back on what was lost and scratch their heads:
What could Philadelphia have been thinking?” Thomas Freudenheim
writes in The Wall Street Journal that “The Barnes affair is one
of the great scandals in American art museums,” and one that “sets
a disastrous precedent.” Marie C. Malaro, in The Journal of Philanthropy,
calls Judge Ott’s ruling “a major setback to the long-standing
protection that the law gives to nonprofit groups.” This ruling
sets a dangerous precedent with grave implications for potential art
donors and museums seeking their bequests.
The rationale for violating the Trust is that this is the only means
to stabilize the Barnes’ finances and ensure its future. However,
the economic projections are based on an unsubstantiated assumption--
that moving the Barnes Foundation’s art gallery into Philadelphia
would more than triple current attendance to 200,000 per year. After
a flurry of initial excitement at a new location, there is no evidence
to support that number. The Barnes Foundation has not commissioned a
study to determine the likely demand for public visitation over time.
Additionally, the Foundation’s own testimony was that once it has
three locations to operate, its annual shortfall of revenue will be on
the order of $4 million per year; quadruple its current $1 million deficit
in Merion. Other evidence in court demonstrated that 90% of museums with
twice the projected annual attendance do not raise $4 million annually.
The Barnes Foundation is located only five miles from downtown Philadelphia
and just one block from the city limit. It takes less time to travel
from the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the Barnes Foundation than to
travel from the Philadelphia Museum of Art to the Liberty Bell.
It is a folly to replicate a building that already exists and that recently
underwent a total renovation at a cost of $12 million. A more wasteful
diversion of scarce resources would be difficult to imagine.
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What Should Be Done?
The Barnes Foundation’s self-created financial “crisis” can
be easily resolved in a number of ways:
• Increased Attendance in Merion At present, the Foundation is
limited to 62,400 visitors per year at its Merion home. Fewer than this
number attend, in part, because of the Barnes Foundation’s self-imposed
insistence on a reservations-only policy which makes it unnecessarily
difficult to gain admission. Simple changes in admission policy would
allow 100,000 visitors without disturbance to the neighborhood. The resulting
increase in annual revenues would approach $1 million.
• A Professional Development Program The operating deficit
could be erased with an endowment of $25 million, surely a modest fundraising
goal for a world-famed institution with billions in assets. Yet, the
Barnes has never operated a successful development program.
• Prudent Management The expansion of administrative programs
and functions, together with litigation costs, have created the Barnes’ deficit.
Costs can be retrenched with no impact on the core mission of the Foundation
or its accessibility to the public. Current programs and policies should
be reviewed.
• Sale of Non-Gallery Assets The sale of art from the gallery
collection is prohibited by the trust, but these art objects represent
less than one half of Albert Barnes’ collection. In addition, the
Foundation owns a 137-acre unused estate in Chester County. The sale
of appropriately scaled parcels of land from this estate would bring
in a conservatively estimated $10 million.
The sale of assets, however, is unnecessary to contemplate. Any reasonable
combination of development, increased attendance, and proper cost control
can eradicate the Barnes’ current deficit, and place it on a secure
financial footing.
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