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| SOMEWHERE, ROBERT MAPPLETHORPE IS SMILING by Carol Joynt Word of the death spread through Washington with the urgency of something that had happened suddenly, unexpectedly, but the truth is the death of the Corcoran Gallery of Art has been slow and a long time coming. The death certificate won’t be signed until April, when the various pertinent boards are scheduled to give formal approval. After that, the organ harvesting begins by the National Gallery of Art and George Washington University, the two institutions through which the gallery’s legacy will live on. NGA gets the art; GWU gets the building and the school of art and design. Obituaries were written with a tone of heartbreak, and that’s fair for those who feel that way, but the other way to see it is as a rescue for an art collection, a board of directors who had no way out — from mounting debt, a shrinking endowment — and for a gorgeous Beaux-Arts building in need of significant and costly repair so it can stand proudly through this century and beyond. |
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Somewhere, though, the spirit of Robert Mapplethorpe is smiling. If you believe the dead can exact revenge, then this is just payback for him. His photographs, both beautiful and brutal, were a key factor in what may have been the beginning of the end for the Corcoran, way back in 1989. That’s when the Gallery’s timid board, caving to threats from Republican Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina, and other members of Congress, cancelled a posthumous exhibition of his work, “The Perfect Moment.” Helms, not to my knowledge an arts visionary, pulled together other members of Congress who were offended by the exhibition’s content and that it was federally funded by the National Endowment of the Arts.
That was 2005, when the Corcoran board voted to stop work on a planned and stunning $170 million Gehry addition to the main building. The project was so far along it had gone through the permits and approvals process. Corcoran president and director David Levy, who had shepherded the project, resigned, dismayed. “The board felt the Gehry building was a distraction; I felt the opposite,” he told The New York Times.“I saw it as a ... way of transforming a gray old institution.” Maybe “gray” and “old” were the Corcoran’s comfort zone, a traditional posture that worked in the last century but didn’t necessarily translate to now, compounded by the fact they charge for admission (not usually done in DC museums) and their location, nearly next-door to the White House, was slightly compromised by post 9/11 restrictions related to heightened security. It was not easy to drive there and find a parking space. The nearest subway stop is several blocks away. Tourists had to trek slightly off the beaten path. Levy believed the Gehry creation would have a “Bilbao Effect.” The board changed its mind about spending the money. The collection inside is a reported $2 billion in paintings, sculpture and photographs. The muscle is its American inventory, spanning the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, with paintings by John Singer Sargent, Albert Bierstadt, Gilbert Stuart, Frederic Edwin Church, Mary Cassatt, and Edward Hopper. |
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| For there to be a happy afterlife ahead a lot depends on the National Gallery of Art and what it does with its new bounty of some 17,000 works. The future of the big art should be obvious. But what about everything else? At this early stage no one is mentioning the word that strikes fear in the hearts of donors: deacquisition. Museums can be stealth in that regard, wanting what they want and not wanting what can bring some financial gain. Only last year the Corcoran itself put up at Sotheby’s a collection of Oriental carpets that brought $39 million. The early reporting on the deal says the NGA will keep in its East Wing and West Wing the art that fits with its overall collection mandate, noting the Corcoran provenance. NGA would also oversee two ongoing galleries at the Corcoran, one for exhibitions of contemporary and modern art and the other for shows of “legacy” works. The remaining pieces will be distributed to museums across the country, with museums in Washington having first dibs. If the plan sticks, it is a dismantling that will ultimately benefit many. The National Gallery’s director, Rusty Powell, called it “a huge gift to the nation.” |
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| Social Washington will be wondering what happens to the annual spring Corcoran Ball. Can it go on? Should it go on? Once upon a time it was one of the city’s most glittering formal social occasions, and the grand prom of what passes for the capital’s country club set, before the corporate dollar changed the landscape of exhibitions and museum fundraising. Like the Gallery, the ball is old school, run by a women’s committee who are listed on the program by their husbands’ names. There are fashion lunches in advance to help women choose their gowns. But that genteel quality was also part of the charm, plus dramatic and artful flower arrangements. It’s a seated candlelight dinner, followed by big band dancing after in the marble atrium. |
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| But even the Corcoran Ball has not been spared from the Gallery’s turmoil. Last year some notable women’s committee members, and some long time patrons, boycotted the ball, upset over the general management of the institution and the ball in particular, which they wanted made more accessible to others, meaning finding ways to attract younger people. One committee member wrote in an email: “I’ve had enough. The Titanic is sinking and the women keep dancing in the ballroom. If only they had looked further than their Junior League ways and had included the community.” The turnout last year was in the range of 700, down from 1,100 in 2007, before the Great Recession cast its long shadow on the gala scene. |
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| Whether the Corcoran ball continues — in its current or a more inclusive mode — the building will remain a terrific entertaining space. It seems to be rented out on a consistent basis. I’ve been there for weddings, and the setting was perfect. I’ve been there for large private hoedowns — pre-inaugural parties, holiday parties — that were over the top and, again, a perfect fit. |
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| Best memory of all, though, was a small, seated luncheon for the landmark 1982 vintage of Chateau Margaux, adorned with a label painted by the late film legend, John Huston. His daughter, Anjelica Huston, and Margaux’s owner, Baroness Philippine de Rothschild, hosted the party in one of the smaller galleries. We sat among beautiful paintings. Luncheon lasted for at least a few hours — delicious food, charming toasts and bottle after bottle of the ’82 Margaux, which now sells for many hundreds of dollars, if you can find it. Of all my Corcoran memories, I’d like to have that day back. There’s been no timetable announced yet on when the Corcoran Gallery as we know it closes and the new iteration opens for visitors. We do know that like the NGA, admission will be free. How about this for the first exhibition of contemporary art: Robert Mapplethorpe. |
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| Photographs by Carol Joynt. Follow Carol on twitter @caroljoynt |