The curator's eyes examine each detail of the painting. Will it fit in with the gallery's current collection? What is the price? How good is the condition?
These are a few things that curators must consider as they look for paintings to add to a gallery collection. Each museum goes about acquiring their works differently, and the process is sometimes a long journey.
"The BYU Museum of Art essentially operates on donations," said Chris Wilson, marketing and communications director at the museum. "We don't receive any tithing money from the university, which requires us to raise money because we don't have an acquisitions budget. Donors are essential to us in the acquisition process because we couldn't do it without them. Art prices are quite high, and so it's not trivial amounts of money that we are talking about."
Four curators at the MOA are in charge of the permanent collections. Curators oversee American art, religious art, photography, contemporary art and Southwestern art. Part of their responsibilities, alongside putting together exhibitions, is looking for a variety of paintings that will fit into each collection.
L. Tom Perry Special Collections must acquire new pieces to expand the collections they own.
"If we become aware of the fact that people have, or might have, historical records or materials or manuscripts in their possession, we will contact them and invite them to donate their collections to Brigham Young University," said John Murphy, curator of 20th and 21st century Western and Mormon Americana manuscripts.
Russ Taylor, director of reference services in special collections, said he finds the Internet a useful way of acquiring things. The three primary ways in which they acquire special collection pieces also include soliciting materials and people approaching them to donate.
The Hope Gallery, with locations in Provo, Park City and Salt Lake, has a large collection of old European masters. They also offer one of America's largest collections of original Scandinavian art.
The owner of the galleries, Soren Edsburg, travels for three months a year all over Europe looking for masterpieces. When people inherit the castles and manors in Europe, in order to be able to afford living there, they have to let go of some of art hanging within the buildings. Edsburg also has people working for him who know what he is looking for.
The Springville Museum of Art has been open since 1903, and throughout its existence, it has consistently expanded its collections. Vern Swanson, director of the museum, said a museum first needs to write a mission statement.
"What do you want to acquire? What do you want to say? What do you want to chronicle with the collections?" Swanson said referring to what should be included in a museum's mission statement.
Swanson has been at the museum for 27 years, and when he got there he looked at where the museum had been. The museum must expand the collections that it has, and build on its strengths.
He also said a museum might choose to collect based upon the expertise of the staff. Nineteen years ago, Swanson, as well as other people in the area, became interested in Russian art. People started to make donations and the museum added Russian art into the mission statement. It now has 150 paintings in that particular collection.
Swanson said before purchasing a painting, the curator must assess the quality, historicity, the condition and provenance (history of the painting). A board meets together and decides whether the painting is a good purchase.
"The institution has to be market savvy in order to know that, for example, this painting will not come up again for 50 years," Swanson said. "So if you want it now you better get it or forever hold your peace."
Copyright Brigham Young University 9 Apr 2008
