Transcriber: Sara Piccardi Reviewer: Michael Nystrom
America’s 936 public community colleges
and other schools, too, can become dynamic community art museums.
I am going to show you why and how.
I’m Dr. Andrea Siegel, and I coordinate the Foundation Art Collection
at Hudson County Community College in Jersey City, New Jersey.
We’re on the western side of the Hudson River
behind the Statue of Liberty.
In 10 years,
our collection has grown from 25 installed artworks
to over 1,700 installed in 10 campus buildings.
We did this on a budget of fumes.
This Monet is not from our college.
For what that Monet sold for,
we could educate all 7,000 of our students for two years.
The history of Western art collections is largely a story of plunder.
Sotheby’s and Christie’s, the two great auction houses,
started in 1700s Britain.
James Christie offered rock-bottom prices to nobility
who were fleeing the French Revolution.
Sometimes he was at the battlefield offering cash.
In the 1900s, predatory American “robber barons,”
who wanted the glamour of royalty,
sent art dealers to Europe to buy paintings and sculptures
and, at times, whole chateaux.
They packed them up and brought them to America.
Countless collections have been destroyed and reformed
since the Industrial Revolution
and the democratic revolutions in France and Haiti and America
in the 1700s.
Right now, we're in a new Gilded Age.
We see the super-rich bidding up the art market
and putting their modern plunder in tax havens storage units.
Now, in contrast to this history,
community college art collections can form public exhibits
to benefit your community.
Now, I became aware of community college art collections about 11 years ago.
At the time, HCCC’s President, Glen Gabert,
said my task was to turn the entire college’s public areas
into an educational art museum.
He grew up around art, saw the benefit as a student and in his career,
and he wanted other people, our students, to have that benefit.
I had previously worked for a New York City gallery.
I became aware of the fact that our annual budget
was the equivalent of what we spent on one picture frame at my old job.
Today, major American artists’ and important regional artists’ work
make up the college collection.
Artwork is installed in thematic groups throughout campus.
And each student goes through a curated gallery on the way to every class.
Paintings, prints, photographs
and sculpture lined corridors devoted to Hispanic art, Japanese art,
abstract art, art about food, feminist art, etc., etc.
These works reflect back to our community all its diverse beauty.
Researchers Alice Anderson and Karleen Gardner
at the University of Minnesota
show that art fosters empathy and understanding.
Many studies link empathy to positive social outcomes, reduced prejudice,
decreased inequality, improved health.
Now, most colleges keep art collections under lock and key
in a dark storage area.
Studies show that art does the most good,
has the greatest social impact where economic deprivation is greatest.
When art is not in storage, it can be seen;
it can be experienced; it can be discussed.
Two out of three of our college students get financial aid.
At HCCC, we have a food pantry
because our students in America don't have enough to eat.
We have a closet full of free professional clothing
because our students can’t afford interview clothes.
So like food and clothes, cultural resources count.
Most of our students have not been introduced to fine art before.
It’s a big thing to offer people through art
the cultural languages of different classes
as they work toward a brighter future.
Our artwork gets installed where students go.
The work is seen, enjoyed and learned from.
That distinguishes our collection nationally,
and it appeals to civic-minded donors.
Here’s how you start to build your collection.
If you have no art, survey campus walls and spaces for possible installation.
Map out available space. Dream big.
I started with a one-page list of the works in the collection.
I walked the campus to see how art was doing.
I talked to staff and students.
I learned if you put something up staff hates,
it's going to mysteriously end up in a file cabinet.
Now, the great American art collections were built by a small group:
the Met had Morgan, the National Gallery had Mellon,
and the Frick had Frick.
My first day on the job, my boss tells me: “You’ve got a job. Go buy art!
Oh yeah and call Ben Dineen. He’s on the Foundation Board.”
Good administrators know who the key donors are in the community.
These donors get you started.
So I call Ben. We meet at the diner.
We sit down at the booth.
He pulls out a fat business envelope and slides it across the table.
I pick up the envelope,
and it’s full of discount coupons for art framing.
So I had found a soulmate
in an appropriate art-collecting kind of way.
Ben would call and say:
“Andrea, I’m driving by, and I’ve got art in my trunk.”
This was in his trunk.
So you need a Ben.
You need one foundation board member or trustee who supports your project.
Hundreds of works came through Ben and his partner, Dennis,
and friends we met through them.
Ben told me to draft a master plan,
so I googled “College Art Collection Master Plans,”
and I took what worked.
You find your mentors, and they find you.
Now, the Federal Work-Study program
pays work-study students’ salaries.
It should pay more.
But even so,
you get intelligent help,
students get work experience for their résumé.
And a dozen work-study students,
as well as many staff and over 120 donors, helped with our project.
There are over seven million millionaires in America
because baby boomers, those who are born between 1946 and 1964, are aging.
We are witnessing the largest transfer of wealth in our history,
and that is your historic donation opportunity.
Now, the IRS gives donors a great deduction if they give art away.
Never ask artists to donate their own art.
The IRS only lets the artists deduct the cost of materials.
So I’m installing at the college library, and a librarian says to me:
“What if I told you there was a group of local nuns
who had taken a vow of silence?
They’re living in a stone castle,
a monastery they designed themselves with 14-foot-high stone walls.
What if I told you they made their living selling art?”
I said, “I’m interested.”
I mean, why not? It’s a great story, even if it’s not true.
Well, this is the wall.
Thanks to the librarian
and dozens of other donors he helped bring in,
we have over 280 works by 20th-century nun artists.
From 1930 to 1990,
the nuns of the Blue Chapel in Union City made their living selling art.
The Nun Hall is one of our most popular exhibits.
Art comes from everywhere.
Our art department chair is out walking her dog.
She runs into a friend walking a dog,
and the friend is helping someone downsize.
Those people who downsize gave us 78 works of art.
You know, it’s not magic.
Building a community art collection takes hard work
incorporating curiosity, research, kindness,
patience, respect, and thank-you notes.
So there’s a saying in the art world
that only the three D’s make a real collector let go of art.
That’s death, debt, divorce, and I’d add disease,
downsizing, dementia, disasters.
People who make your collection great are often going through real trouble.
Be prepared to listen
and offer tissues.
This is real work.
Most of our collection is donated.
Some art we buy directly from artists,
galleries, cooperatives,
art fairs, auctions.
Because some unique pieces we can’t get any other way.
Because you need to know fair market value
to justify any proposed purchase to your committee,
hire a coordinator who has fine arts appraisal experience or certification.
Your college can buy works by major American artists for bupkis
if you are careful.
My favorite trick?
Look for art in the wrong place.
These Native American photogravures by Edward S. Curtis
were in a contemporary art auction.
We were the only people bidding.
They joined the collection at a bargain price: 50 bucks a pop, 100 bucks a pop.
If you have a list of artists that you’re looking for,
use the free bots at auction house aggregators like Invaluable.com
to tell you when the artist’s work is coming to auction.
The artwork has a top tier, Christie’s, Sotheby’s,
and there are many great second- and third-tier auction houses.
Use a search engine to get a list of the auction houses near you.
Scour online catalogues using a free website like Askart.com
to find artists from your area
so you can build a strong regional collection.
No one was going to give us this brilliant work by Willie Cole.
The few prints he made are in places like the Metropolitan Museum.
When I saw it coming to auction, they spelled the artist’s name wrong,
so the bots would be telling collectors.
When I looked in person, and you always look in person,
they put the three pieces in different rooms.
It was in great condition.
Some places students go are never unlocked unless a supervisor is there.
If you’re fortunate enough to be an inner-city school,
you have security at every door.
That benefit allows you great flexibility when displaying your collection.
This sculpture sits unboxed high on a wall
opposite a security desk that is always staffed.
Booker’s sculpture made out of tires has pride of place in admissions.
When sharing your collection with the community,
framing, plexiglass boxes and installation are most of your costs.
To cut costs, someone in authority is going to ask you:
“Why not buy frames at Target or IKEA?”
And you have to tell them that acid in those frames destroys art.
Hire a reputable framer who uses acid-free materials.
When I began at the college,
my boss said I had to put plexiglass boxes around every work.
I thought this was bad because it puts a barrier up between people and art.
In 10-plus years, not a single boxed work of art has been damaged.
Find a local fabricator to build these affordably.
If you're putting up art in a plexiglass box,
you want the work to stay straight inside.
Use brackets that will keep it straight,
and likewise, you lock every piece to the wall.
The whole kit costs you less than three bucks a picture.
At a college where I used to work,
they hung a huge painting in a tiny conference room.
Every time you stood up, your chair damaged the painting.
Hang your art safely.
No direct sunlight.
Far from heaters.
Thematic groups have real power.
For example, your area has local history that includes indigenous people.
Students and community find this important because it is.
A student turned to me and said about this picture: “My family’s from there.
This could be one of my relatives.”
Hardworking staff may get angry
when they see beautiful, important work on campus.
They may think art is a luxury the institution cannot afford.
Part of your job involves gentle reminders to faculty, staff and administrators.
Most art is donated.
Every cent we use to buy art is donated.
This does not come out of the college budget.
And be prepared to tell administrators:
“If your walls are bare, buy a poster! Fine art goes in public space.”
Someone will claim that the art in public areas is harassing them.
This is a Title Nine issue, and you need to be prepared for it.
For example, we have a statement at the entrance of our online art collection
that says: “We uphold the constitutional right to free speech.”
They enter the website knowing they will see controversial art.
The ongoing support of your college and foundation
makes your art collection possible.
Don’t forget to thank them.
Remember that Monet I showed you early on?
The young woman on the right holding the painting is Yamilka Garcia,
a former Hudson County Community College Federal Work-Study student.
Since completing her associate’s degree at HCCC,
she’s working full-time as an art handler at Sotheby’s
and earning her degree in Art History at Hunter College.
Yamilka’s exposure to and work with the college art collection
helped her find a career path and fulfill her dreams.
If you have further questions about creating a community art collection,
please contact me through the college website.
I’m here to help, and I want you to succeed.
Thank you, and best of luck building your collection.