The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art May 1971 [antikvár]

Fifty-second May Show: May 5 through June 13 Annual Exhibition of Artists and Craftsmen of the Western Reserve The reception of 2,150 works by 1,214 artists and the selection of 277 works by 224 artists for display is a serious task of some complexity. The reception and arrangement of the works to be examined requires competent staff organization involving over thirty-five personnel, ably administered by the Curator of Contemporary Art, Edward B. Henning, and his assistant for the May Show, Patricia Wint. After the works have been selected, their display, labeling, and safety become the joint responsibility of the Curator and the Designer, William E. Ward—and these, too, are complex tasks requiring patience, taste, and professional knowledge of exhibition techniques. When the exhibition is ready for opening, a force including volunteers from the Junior Council, headed by Mrs. Nelson Talbott, is responsible for sales of the works, an historically successful operation. We have not yet mentioned the method of selection because this lies at the very root of the May Show and has been responsible for success or failure among the fifty-one past exhibitions. Since no exhibition was held in 1970 during the final stages of construction of the new Education Wing, there was time to reflect upon the method of selection and to analyze the successes and failures in the operation of that system. The result—after much discussion among members of staff, administration, and the Board of Trustees—was a decision to try a completely new system. The present exhibition is the first tangible result of this change. Why change? What was the change? In answering the first question, we begin by noting that all the processes of reception and presentation have always been the Museum's responsibility. Why then should we bow out when it comes to selection? There are two principal arguments. First, an outside jury brings objectivity and no conflict of interest to the task of judgment. Experience has shown this to be largely untrue on both counts. Any major regional exhibition is now sufficiently national or international in scope to present an outside jury with familiar styles and subjects in which the individual juror may be involved and which therefore affect, positively or negatively, objectivity or conflict of interest. The second point has been that the non-resident jury, like a scapegoat, assumes the burdens of complaint from the disap-130 pointed artists or the sometimes bewildered or incensed public. Again, experience shows these supposed benefits to be ephemeral; more often the Museum is left holding a bag containing things selected by others, but for which it is locally assumed to be responsible. It should be said further that outside jurors do not always provide the superior expertise that might be expected from their reputations. The depressed state of writing and criticism about contemporary art has added to the general confusion. In short, the jury system—whether a single juror, three, or any number, whether voting secretly by lights, computers, or vocally by lengthy disquisitions—has proven to be an increasingly unsatisfactory method of selecting a regional exhibition. The method used this year for the first time arises from three basic considerations. First, if we are to be held responsible for the exhibition, then we must be responsible for its selection as well as for its assembly, display, and elucidation. Secondly, the interested members of our curatorial staff have the knowledge and expertise necessary to be reasonable judges for selection since they are familiar with both local and national artistic elements and styles. Thirdly, they are here, not in and out, and more time can be made available for their deliberations. Meeting a too brief schedule leads to haste on the part of the visiting judge: departing plane schedules become a dominant factor on the final day of judging. The drawbacks of the new system of judging by Museum staff members are obvious. We are continuously visible targets tor criticism, we are concerned about the local art scene, and we do know many of the individual artists in the Western Reserve Front Cover Edwin Mieczkowski, Enigma Variations No. 6 $500 Special Award for Painting The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art, Volume LVIII, Number 6, May 1971. Published monthly except July and August, by The Cleveland Museum of Art, 11150 East Boulevard at University Circle, Cleveland, Ohio 44106. Subscription Included in membership fee, otherwise S5.00 per year. Single copies, 60 cents. Copyright 1971 by The Cleveland Museum of Art. Second-class postage paid at Cleveland, Ohio. Museum photography by Nicholas Hlobeczy and John W. Cook; design by Merald E. Wrolstad.