Collecting Art is Easy. Running a Museum, Not So Much.

Sometime this fall, a new art gallery dedicated to contemporary Native American art will open in Katonah, New York, with a name yet to be decided. “We’re in brainstorming mode,” Laura Phipps, the newly appointed director of the as-yet-unnamed space, told the Observer. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this art space—besides the fact that there will be no entrance, cafe, gift shop or other usual money makers—is that the entire collection of 750 pieces of paintings, drawings, sculptures, prints, installations, film, textiles and wearable art comes from one collection: The Gochman Family Collection. The Gochmans join Albert Barnes, Henry Clay Frick, Eli Broad, Peter Brant, Norton Simon, Christian Levett, Henry Walters, Raymond Nasher, David and Carmen Kreeger, Sterling and Francine Clark, Emily and Mitch Rales and several others who have chosen to build their own museums to display their collections rather than donate works to an existing institution.

The Gochmans could have followed the example of New York Historical board chair Agnes Hsu-Tang and her husband Oscar Tang, who donated 150 works of contemporary Native American art to that museum. Endowments solve the problem of older collectors whose children may not want what their parents collected and who don’t want to pay a large inheritance tax; selling everything generates a capital gains tax of up to 40 percent. (Donating the works to worthy nonprofits also allows collectors to deduct a large portion of their value from their estate tax, which keeps many accountants and museum officials busy this time of year.) But the family decided to keep their collection together, refusing to let museum curators pick and choose what they wanted or thought was important to display, leaving other items—perhaps too much—to decay in storage. Their vision and support of Native American artists of the time proved to be worth more than dollars and cents. That said, the Gochman Family Collection site won’t be a museum, although, according to Phipps, it will have “exhibitions, and programs like readings, performances, concerts, workshops, kind of a broad spectrum of different kinds of programs.” And like a museum, it has a mission, which is to make “the appearance of the artists in the collection.” The galleries will also serve as a kind of showroom. “We are working hard to make the collection more accessible for lending and easier for institutions and other places to borrow.”

Many other art collectors have taken this approach, not all of them have been successful. Chicago businessman and President Reagan’s ambassador for cultural affairs, Daniel Terra (1911-96) created a museum—actually two museums, one in Chicago and one outside Paris—to display his collection of 750 works of Hudson River Valley and American Impressionist painting. Both are closed, the result of failure to achieve financial efficiency. The Terra Foundation for American Art then donated the bulk of its collection to the Art Institute of Chicago and shifted its focus to giving money. Donald and Shelley Rubin, collectors of Himalayan art, opened a museum to display their 1,000-plus items in a Manhattan building that was a former Barneys department store, but 20 years later, they closed the business due to budget constraints. The Rubin Museum of Art now functions as a “museum without walls,” lending objects to institutions that want to display and research Himalayan art.

Another cautionary tale is the Hammer Museum, which was opened in 1990 by Occidental Petroleum Corporation chairman Armand Hammer (1898-1990) three weeks before he died. His large collection of Old Master and 19th-century European paintings and drawings was praised, but in 1992, those who managed the museum negotiated with the University of California, Los Angeles, to take over the entire thing. Running a museum cannot be just a vanity project for someone with money and ego.

Having your name on the museum entrance is one thing; keeping the area open and financially stable is another. The Barnes Foundation was founded by Dr. Albert Barnes (1872-1951), who established his collection of 2,500 works of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist and modern art in a museum in the city of Merion, Pennsylvania, and required strict adherence to his often unpleasant rules. The museum was open to visitors by invitation only, only two days a week. Would-be visitors had to apply for permission to come, swearing to certain artistic theories held by Barnes. In the 1960s, the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s office encouraged Barnes, as a tax-exempt educational institution, to be more accessible to the public, but admission was still limited—100 visitors per day. As a business model, it looked promising.

In 2002, the Barnes board, faced with a rapidly shrinking mandate, asked the courts to amend the institution’s constitution to allow a move to Philadelphia, where several foundations and philanthropists had pledged $150 million to build a new building and provide a replanted institution. That new building opened to the public in May 2012, without those restrictions, and it would not be far from the wishes of Dr. Barnes, who wanted nothing to do with the Philadelphia community – but continuing the course that Barnes had set at the beginning was no longer possible. Today, there are many engaging programs at Barnes, including a monthly First Friday evening program with music and access to the collection, film series, lecture series and classes and workshops. Highlighting Barnes’ commitment to racial equality and social justice, the shows and films celebrate Black, indigenous, people of color and women artists, many of whom were “overlooked during Dr. Barnes’ time,” a spokeswoman said.

The experience of these museums for one collector has taught other wealthy collectors to plan ahead and perhaps be more humble. In 1955, 68-year-old Marjorie Merriweather Post (1887-1973) bought a 36-room mansion on 25 acres in the northwest part of Washington, DC to display her collections of Russian Imperial art, Sèvres cevres and English porcelain, English pottery and English pottery. and tapestries. His original plan was to donate his entire collection to the Smithsonian Institution, and the Smithsonian held on to the collection for four years, but in 1977, the estate recovered everything and set up his house and grounds as a museum. “Making Hillwood a museum was Plan B,” said Kate Markert, executive director of the Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens, and that required a rethinking of what should happen there and how it should be supported.

The Post left $10 million in cash to cover Hillwood’s operating budget in the 1990s, but at some point, the interest on the money provided could no longer keep up with the costs of maintaining the building and grounds. The museum began fundraising, seeking membership, holding special events, charging admission and producing exhibits that not only displayed items collected by the Post Office but also items on loan from other institutions. Most importantly, Hillwood dropped its admissions policy that limited the number of guests—110 in the morning, 110 in the afternoon—requiring advance reservations, per the Barnes Foundation. This new business model helped them earn more money and more repeat visitors.

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