Arts & Culture
Brandeis University Goes from “Liberal Arts” to Just “Liberal”
By Amy Schiller / January 28, 2009
My university is closing its world-class art museum and selling the collection to meet a budget shortfall.
Brandeis University- a bastion of liberal arts and intellectual inquiry, an institution whose motto is "truth unto its innermost parts"- is selling off its world-class collection of contemporary art, including such luminaries as Roy Lichtenstein, Pablo Picasso, and Dana Schutz.
Alumni feel a tremendous sense of loss and, in some cases, outrage. The Rose, an airy, contemporary-yet-intimate space, has been a special place at Brandeis for over 45 years. Speaking personally, the Rose is where I saw a number of provocative installations and schmoozed at countless events in a relaxed yet sophisticated atmosphere. It’s also where I first saw pieces by William Kentridge, who is now one of my favorite artists.
Granted, I am sure this was a wrenching decision for the Board of Trustees, and hesitate before condemning it wholesale without the benefit of the school’s financial records. The school has lost a reported 25-40% of its endowment, and has seen some of its biggest donors nearly wiped out by Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. I can understand the rationale of preserving the school’s core mission and services as an educational institution, rather than a sponsor of visual art.
I still have some fiscal concerns, namely, skepticism over how much money the school expects to make by selling art when we’re at the bottom of an already-hollow market. Add to that the long-term damage to the school’s reputation, which could depress alumni giving as well as application rate and admission yield, which determine a school’s ranking. Yet what concerns me most is the demeaning of art’s qualitative value at an institution that claims to operate on Jewish principles.
To clarify, Brandeis is not a Jewish school; it is a sectarian institution supported by Jewish sponsorship. But said sponsorship is not just financial in nature (if at all, given the present circumstances). It is the values that determine the university’s identity, the more humanistic values of Judaism, including social justice, pursuit of knowledge, passionate yet reasoned debate, glorification of the mortal world. These were all present in spades at the Brandeis I knew.
Jews have a long and treasured history as creators and patrons of art. Artists like Marc Chagall, Julian Schnabel, Judy Chicago, and mega-patrons like Ronald Lauder and Eli and Edythe Broad are just a few examples. One of the most protracted and emotional initatives after the Holocaust was the attempt to restore valued works of art stolen by the Nazis to the appropriate Jewish families. In fact, Ron Lauder’s Neue Galerie exists for the purpose of displaying these works and celebrating their return to rightful ownership.
So with all due respect to the leadership of my alma mater, I remind you that Jews did not sue the Swiss government for 50 years for repatriation of masterpieces only to now sell Warhols for pennies on the dollar. If we go forward with a fire sale on invaluable works, we will never get back the art itself nor the reputation of the university. A commentator on the Boston Globe, "sam-yanes," said it with brutal concision: "This move cuts the heart out of the respect for the humanities and the arts at the core of Jewish culture. It cuts the heart out of my feeling Jewish."
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This move is certainly going to decrease alumni donations. My dad, an alumnus of Brandeis, is absolutely livid by this decision and has written a couple angry emails to the alumni association stating that "they won’t get another dime from him". What he is mostly disturbed by is that the university never informed the alumni that they were thinking of closing the Rose, and never called for a major fundraising drive to prevent this. He would have certainly helped out, as I’m sure many other alumni would have.
My university is about to reopen our art museum after a multi-million dollar renovation (http://www.umma.umich.edu/). I feel so lucky to attend a school that values the arts and has the ability to generate the funds needed to not only preserve our art museum, but transform it into one of the most impressive university art museums in the country. I really think Brandeis could have prevented closing the Rose, and it saddens me that when schools are faced with economic hardships, the arts almost always the suffer the most.Â
I agree. This is an awful state of affairs. It seems there should be another way to raise cash without selling off priceless artworks.  I wish they would find another course of action.  Its prestige that is being compromised by undermining the value of this extrodinary asset.Â
I received an email from a friend, a member of the alumni of Brandeis.  The circulated notice from the university stated that in place of the museum would be a college of art and a gallery of student works. How ironic.  I quote from the Brandeis Alumni President’s letter:
As for the Rose, the museum building will be converted to much-needed
arts teaching and gallery space for Brandeis students and faculty.
Through an orderly process that might take years, pieces of the
collection might be sold. The University is well aware of market
conditions and is not planning a sudden and drastic sale of the artwork,
but rather a cautious approach with an eye towards the future.Â
Yes this is a sad sad day indeed. I used to be of the mind set that art
wasn’t moving. For some reason I had it in me to see the beauty of
music, to be emotionally connected by the words and melodies, but never
art. However, at my alma mater UC Santa Barbara they had a display of
all the sandals they had collected from the nearby beaches. For some
reason that grabbed me. It was as if you could see every single persons
journey in each abondoned flip flop, birkenstock, and rainbow in this
immense display case. I don’t know why and I know it’s cliche, but for
some reason the phrase "From many, one…" came to mind. After that I
loved art and the best part about it is I couldnt tell you why I liked
a particular piece or why one was better than the next. They just were.
I would be heartybroekn if they tore that display down today, and thats
something that until compiled was just garbage. Thanks amy and I feel
for you.
_________________
Chris
Forklifts
While in college (not at Brandeis), I spent three years working as a receptionist at the campus art museum. It wound up being one of my favorite things about college. I got to see and get close to priceless works of art. I got one-on-one explanations from the curators and art history professors about certain artists’ philosophies or the history of a particular painting. I know that it would break my heart if that museum – Weatherspoon Art Museum at UNCG – closed, and I really feel your sentiments here. It’s a hard choice for Brandeis, and I seriously doubt anyone on the decision-making committee was jumping up and down with glee at the thought of dismantling their art collection. While I wouldn’t have made the same choice, I don’t doubt that it was a very tough process for them.
I concur with Robin. It is a sad state of affairs when something like this, art and the venue that it was housed in for the last 45 years is now being sold. I have never been to Brandeis University, but from this well written piece I can certainly understand what the Rose, and all of the artwork that it has housed, must have meant to the generations of students and visitors of the university. I conquer with you both that this is not the ideal solution, I am sure that it pains the decision makers of Brandeis to have to take down all of the virtually priceless artwork and sell it for a price.
Amy, thanks for this article.
Beyond the emotional fondness I have the Rose and that fact that arts remain a personal priority, I think Brandeis is making an unwise financial and strategic move.
As you said, the art market is as undervalued as other markets. Not to mention the fact that art appreciates in value. I honestly understand nixing the museum’s functions, programing, staff, and space in light of this financial crisis.  I think auctioning off the collection, however, is a rash, irreversible decision that Brandeis will one day regret.
There are numerous legal & ethical questions when dismantling a collection like this, and those of us in the cultural repository profession know that this is not an easy way to recover some cash. I think Brandeis should explore permanently storing the collection (though this certainly still requires funding), loaning the bulk of the collection for a while (which requires insurance and professional oversight), or pursuing a cooperative institutional arrangement until the economy recovers – which it eventually will.Â
Surviving monastaries in postwar Europe sold off their manuscripts and incunabula to American institutions & are now wishing they had their Gutenbergs and Books of Hours back. It seems worth investigating and debating how the sale of such items helped or hurt these organizations in the long run.
In our time at Brandeis (2002-2006), we saw commitment to the arts soar. Brandeis rapidly developed and improved robust arts programs, events, and patronage. At the center was the Rose, which benefitted everyone in the Brandeis community.Â
I am very nervous that Brandeis is not only abandoning Jewish values but is shortsightedly abandoning sound financial and strategic planning!
 Robin M. Katz, ’06
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