Uh oh.
A plunging stock market, shrinking endowments, disappearing visitors, evaporating donations, long-term declines in audiences… things are looking bleak for a lot of American cultural institutions. James Panero writes in City Journal that New York City arts organizations are only beginning to feel the punishing effects of the the Great Recession. Overly risky investments and poor management may also be factors. Even the wealthiest museums are barely keeping afloat. Quite a few of these centuries-old institutions may not survive:
To understand the current condition of arts organizations in New York City, visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There, you will find one of Winslow Homer’s most famous works, The Gulf Stream. Painted in 1899, the canvas depicts a solitary sailor lashed to his boat on a storm-tossed sea. The mast and bowsprit have snapped, the tiller and rudder are gone, and a school of sharks circles the boat in blood-red water. On the horizon are two images. On the left, through the fog, is the silhouette of a ship under full sail: a possible rescue. On the right, a looming waterspout presents a far more ominous outcome.Homer was no allegorist, but his work serves, unfortunately, as an all-too-appropriate metaphor. Just as the storm has knocked out the boat’s propulsion and steering, an initial wave—the downturn in the financial markets—has smashed the endowments of arts organizations. Now a second threat, the indirect effects of the downturn, is appearing on the horizon like the waterspout. Its full force will be felt by arts organizations in the months and years ahead.
The rest of Panero’s troubling story can be read here at City Journal (via Arts & Letters Daily).
