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Valparaiso University plans to sell three paintings, including a work by Georgia O’Keeffe, ARTnews reported. The university said it would use the funds to support the building of a new residential complex for first-year students.
The Association of American Museum Directors, the American Alliance of Museums, the Association of Academic Museums and Galleries, and the Association of Art Museum Curators said on Thursday that the plan is not consistent with their values. “College and university art museums have a long and rich history of collecting, curating, and educating in a financially and ethically responsible manner on par with the world’s most prestigious institutions,” the groups wrote in a joint statement. “That a campus museum exists within the larger ecosystem of its parent educational institution does not exempt a university from acting ethically, nor permit them to ignore issues of public trust and use the museum’s collections as disposable financial assets.”
Their statement came after the Brauer Museum, which houses the art, was told by its namesake, Dick Brauer, that he’d remove his name from the institution if the sale came to pass. “Nobody would have guessed they were going to do something like this,” Brauer said.
