Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. — Traci Archable-Frederick, quoting James Baldwin
Just next door to the Johns Hopkins Homewood campus, the Baltimore Museum of Art has been pursuing its transformation into a 21st century institution. In 2018, the museum moved toward deaccessioning some works to diversify its collection. This was controversial, but has made possible some real change at the BMA. This spring, the museum opened “Guarding the Art,” a exhibition that turned the curatorial reins over to security guards who on most days are silent sentinels, often overlooked by museum-goers. As art historian and curator Dr. Lowery Sims Stokes explained, the exhibit features the insights of “discerning caretakers and revelatory interpreters.”1
In the BMA galleries, visitors learn what happens when power is reconfigured — between professional curators and the security staff. And it is transformative. Mickalene Thomas’s “Resist #2,” was selected by Traci Archable-Frederick who explains: “I chose this work of art because I wanted to include something that encapsulates the idea of “Then and Now.” As the most contemporary piece in the exhibition, made the year after George Floyd was killed by police in Minneapolis … “Resist #2” suggests that nothing ever changes. Yet, mixed with the clash of bayonets and riot cops, we see images of people holding signs, chanting slogans, and holding the line. It is the image of resistance, both then and now.”2
While the buzz in the BMA’s galleries testifies to the success of “Guarding the Art,” elsewhere at the Virginia estate of James Madison, Montpelier, long-standing efforts to share governance are being undone. As the Washington Post reports, Montpelier’s board initially won national attention when it announced in 2021 that it would “share authority equally with descendants of people who were once enslaved there.” It was a bold restructuring of who would steer the site and its interpretation going forward. But the accord did not last. This spring, the board pulled-back from that commitment and then fired longtime staffers who publicly criticized the move.
The work of reckoning can be fraught, and there is more than one approach to the reparations that follow. Institutional power may or may not be redistributed. Likely you’ve encountered last week’s coverage of Harvard’s long-anticipated “Report of the Presidential Committee on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery.” In addition to a reported $100 million fund, Harvard unveiled an ambitious range of initiatives using terms such as partner, donate, provide, collaborate, share, acknowledge, support, promote and engage to characterize its new relationship with community members, stakeholders, and HBCUs, among others. Absent from this approach is any recommendation that, as was tried at Montpelier, transfers Harvard’s governance to descendants or other outside stakeholders. Who sits at the table of the Harvard Corporation or the Board of Overseers will not change.
Who sits at the table matters. At the BMA, security staff took their chance and re-set that table. Curator Chris Koo chose to exhibit Philip Guston’s 1974 “The Oracle,” a confrontation between the Jewish artist and members of the Ku Klux Klan. Koo admired Guston for his commitment to creating art “with freedom and honesty.” He also hoped museum visitors would see the BMA guards in a new light: “I also encourage our visitors to engage in conversations with the guards. Because change starts with conversation.”3
— MSJ
Traci Archable-Frederick, et al., Guarding the Art (Baltimore, Baltimore Museum of Art, 2022): 9-10.
Traci Archable-Frederick, et al., Guarding the Art (Baltimore, Baltimore Museum of Art, 2022): 40.
Traci Archable-Frederick, et al., Guarding the Art (Baltimore, Baltimore Museum of Art, 2022): 74.