Art Museums’ Protest Response
Concerned and Welcoming and Not So Much
Museums are primarily white spaces—not merely aesthetically, but racially as well. The reason that Beyoncé and Jay-Z‘s 2018 music video “Apeshit” is set in Paris’s Louvre is that the African American duo symbolically expands a predominantly white establishment to include them. Another example is the speech that First Lady Michelle Obama made at the 2015 dedication of New York City’s Whitney Museum of American Art. She explained, “there are so many kids in this country who look at places like museums and concert halls and other cultural centers and they think to themselves, well, that’s not a place for me, for someone who looks like me, for someone who comes from my neighborhood…In fact, I guarantee you that right now, there are kids living less than a mile from here who would never in a million years dream that they would be welcome in this museum. And growing up on the South Side of Chicago, I was one of those kids myself.” Despite the claim that museums are for the greater public, that is a common perception.
Because of the role that major art museums have played in upholding white supremacy, it felt vapid and disconnected when many of them responded to the explosive protests that followed the murder of George Floyd. The Getty museum posted this statement on Instagram: “At this deeply disturbing time, our hearts go out to our beloved Los Angeles community and all those around the nation feeling the pain of this moment. We stand for equity and fairness, and we share your hope for justice and peace for all and a spirit of caring for one another,” it was criticized for making a bland, “non-statement” to which the museum’s president, Jim Cuno, later issued an apology.
Similarly, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMoMA) had to apologize for its social media behavior when it blocked a comment from a former employee Taylor Brandon—who resigned in March because of racism in her department—criticized the museum’s use of a quote from Black artist Glenn Ligon instead of the institution drafting its own statement. In the same vein, The Guggenheim Museum’s support of “Blackout Tuesday” was criticized by Chaédria LaBouvier, who was the first black guest curator at the museum last year. She used Twitter to say it was the “most racist professional experience” of her life.
Other museums, like the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, did a slightly better job in their responses. They blatantly called out the murder of George Floyd instead of subtly alluding to it. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) went even further with its reaction. It took responsibility in a statement by director Michael Govan, “We are part of that problem—the racism is within us—as institutions that are always telling our audience what’s good art and making choices that set up or reinforce cultural orders…We have an ability to critique and change those orders.”
However, the best museum protest acknowledgments came from those who took action. The Brooklyn Museum and MoMA PS1 now offer restroom access to protesters. The National Museum of African American History and Culture released an online educational platform, Talking About Race. Its purpose is to spark dialogues about racism and “human bias.” Two art museums in Minneapolis—the Walker Art Center and Minneapolis Institute of Art—pledged to stop hiring police officers for special events. Walker Art Center director Mary Ceruti told ARTnews, “It did initially feel like a little bit of a hollow statement to make, given the limited nature of our contracting with police, but as days went on and I had conversations with staff, artists, and other people in our community, I recognized it is a powerful statement to make.”
So why do all of these different museum reactions matter? As we mentioned, art museums have historically perpetuated institutionalized racism and not much has changed. A disappointing 2010 study by the American Alliance of Museums indicates that people of color will make up 46% of the U.S. population by 2033 but they are on track to represent only 9% of museums’ core audiences. If we genuinely want to see museums become more inclusive, they’ll have to do more than post on social media that #blacklivesmatter. These institutions need to diversify staff and board and offer more diverse programming. As ARTnews reported, critic Antwaun Sargent writes that museums “have to earn the right to say black lives matter.”
