In a message dated 1/28/2004 11:08:51 AM Eastern Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: there is something that comes along in terms of leadership or funding that makes it difficult or impossible for the public to have access to the wonders wrought by the people who came before us (mostly female). The leadership of museums would say that they are the slaves of the tastes and fashions of the public. There is a very complex dance that results in what is shown and featured in museums. Museums want to get people in the door. The curators might be interested in something, but they are not going to display it unless they think the public will come and increase their visitation numbers. In order to figure out what people are interested in curators follow auction markets to see what people are buying. Currently there is virtually no market for lace in America that I can detect. What makes people buy one thing and not another? For one thing, there is the entire area of what is being written about and published in magazines and journals. If people read about something in a magazine they might go out and bid on it at an auction. If they think they know more than the dealers they buy it. If they are totally in the dark about what to look for, they don't. Maybe stimulating lace outreach programs to teach people who might like to collect what to look for would benefit this market. Another source that curators look to in order to figure out what to display is "What do rich donors like to see?" A rich donor who comes in the door to see an exhibit may sponsor another exhibit. In the 1920's lace collecting was big. The Needle and Bobbin Club was, even more than a club of lace collectors, a club of "Big Donors to Museums". At the time there was an entire room devoted to lace at the Metropolitan Museum. As late as the 1960's the MFA in Boston sent limousines to pick them up at the airport when a bunch of them flew to Boston to see a textile exhibit there. The curator gave them lunch in the Trustees Dining Room. This huge passion for lace collecting is no more, which is why the lace at the Met is largely in the storage facility. But the problem is that the public supporters of the collection are all gone not that the curators are fickle. If the jet setters were all calling for lace, there would be a gallery of it again so fast it would make your head spin. The drying up of public interest in something could actually cause the demise of a smaller, more specialized museum. I think the answer to having a museum devoted to lace or even to having more access to the lace in collections that already exist is one that is entirely dependent on the market for lace. Typically we on this list are more interested in making lace than collecting it. But the state of lace collecting is not entirely beside the point as far as we are concerned, if we want to see more exhibits, and if we want Jeri to realize the dream of a museum specially devoted to lace and embroidery. What needs to happen to stimulate the lace market, I have no idea. It seems to be totally dead. Perhaps the IOLI, as the only American lace organization should try to reach out to collectors as well. Historically, it was a club for collectors as well as makers, but that seems to have declined, perhaps with collecting itself. At the Met now, we are getting in about one collector every other month who brings in things she has bought at auction and asks Gunnel and me what they are. These people are people who have a little extra money to spend on things and they want to be educated. They also might be people who would be in a position to make small donations. Gunnel and I are doing our best to send them to the Lace Fairy site and the IOLI site. But actually there is not much for them there. Devon proposing a universalist answer to a pressing present problem
- To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
