Last week, Experience Music Project/Science Fiction Museum and Hall
of Fame announced the hiring of a new
director and CEO: Christina
Orr-Cahall. A press release detailed “Noted Museum Leader” Orr-Cahall’s
efforts in the last 19 years at the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm
Beach, Florida, where she more than doubled the size of the permanent
collection, quintupled the endowment, built two new wings, and won a
National Medal for Museum and Library Service. What it did not mention
(and what the Seattle Times failed to report) is that Orr-Cahall
is famous—or infamous—in the art world for quite another
reason.
It happened overnight, on June 12, 1989, when her name hit the news
as the Washington, D.C., museum director who shut down a traveling
Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition rather than tangle with the religious
right. The outcry made world news. Giant Mapplethorpe images—the
most explicit of the more than 100 photos of flowers, celebrities, and
homoeroticism in the show—were projected on the sides of the
museum’s walls at night, and the exhibition itself went to another
venue in the city anyway. Artists who had been scheduled to show at the
Corcoran dropped out in protest. Membership fell. The museum lost a
$1.5 million gift, and its chief curator resigned. After six months of
turmoil, Orr-Cahall finally resigned. Her new employer, the Norton
Museum, declared the situation “a nonissue” when she was hired there.
EMP trustees seem to feel the same way; they did not respond to
requests for their opinion of the events, only releasing this
collective statement: “We are aware of Christina Orr-Cahall’s full
résumé, including her exemplary record of achievement and
success at the Norton Museum of Art. She is one of the country’s
leading museum professionals, and the museum is confident that she will
be an excellent leader for our institution.”
In a way, Orr-Cahall’s story is ancient history. And while the job
in Seattle may be plum in some respects—interim EMP director Josi
Callan made $339,192 in fiscal year 2007, according to tax
records—it’s also about as far as you can get from respected
centers of culture without getting out of the museum business entirely.
(A commenter on Slog, The Stranger‘s news and arts blog,
recently compared EMP’s relationship to museums with Geraldo Rivera’s
relationship to journalism, and that’s not far off.) EMP is its own
form of exile, not so different in some ways from South Florida.
Orr-Cahall continues to serve her term for the crime of abandoning the
art she was charged with defending when it needed her most (her job in
Seattle starts July 1). Seattle contemporary art museum directors don’t
want to touch the subject: Both Henry Art Gallery director Sylvia Wolf,
who curated a show of Mapplethorpe’s Polaroids that comes to Seattle
this fall, and former Henry director Richard Andrews, who worked as
director of visual art for the National Endowment for the
Arts—the agency most directly affected by the Culture Wars that
began that spring of 1989—refused to comment on Orr-Cahall’s
imminent arrival in Seattle.
Decorous silence is one option. But why not give Orr-Cahall a chance
to answer the lingering charges against her in a new city? If she had
it to do over, would she do it differently?
Orr-Cahall said through a spokeswoman that she was too busy for a
phone interview, but she wrote via e-mail that she had nothing to add
to what was printed 20 years ago. (She also wrote that she didn’t know
yet whether EMP will focus more on art under her direction.) When she
told the Seattle Times about EMP, “I really am interested in the
whole visionary side, the fact that it pushes boundaries,” Tyler Green
fired back on his blog Modern Art Notes: “Back in 1989, Orr-Cahall
wasn’t as interested in ‘the whole visionary side,’ or in ‘pushing
boundaries’… The Corcoran—and in some ways the art
world—still hasn’t recovered.”
Just as Orr-Cahall continues to live with what happened 20 years
ago, so does American art.
The NEA has been in the news lately because its opponents didn’t
succeed in cutting the cultural workforce out of the Obama stimulus
package. In February, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was
passed by the House and Senate with $50 million to be funneled to arts
workers through the NEA. The passage was important not just for the
money, but for the symbolic realignment of the arts with basic American
interests—the same interests that became so deeply divided in the
Culture Wars, when Jesse Helms and his cronies, like Hitler before
them, succeeded in linking artistic progressiveness with moral decay.
Critic Christopher Knight at the Los Angeles Times led the
charge in advocating for the symbolic readjustment, writing under the
politically charged heading “Arts jobs are real jobs.”
But this is only a fledgling start at repairing the profound damage
done by Helms and company during the Culture Wars, when American
culture was first neutered and then sent on a rightward drift. The NEA
stopped giving grants to individual artists, turning its support to
institutions, which are governed in part by business interests. More
broadly, the legacy of the Culture Wars—which culture
lost—was the implantation of anxiety in arts presenters and
suspicion in audiences, creating a self-perpetuating chilling effect
that still affects how art is exhibited across the country. In 1978,
when Mapplethorpe photographed himself as a demon with a bullwhip
dangling out of his ass like a tail, he was drawing attention to the
demonization of the gay man. What he couldn’t have known—he died
just months before his show, which had already been exhibited without
incident in Philadelphia and Chicago, was canceled in D.C.—is
that artists were about to join the ranks of the demonized. Artists
were an expedient way for right-wingers to get at the real targets: the
same uppity women and gays who Moral Majority leader Jerry Falwell
would later say brought on September 11.
“It was nasty,” said Stephan Salisbury, a Philadelphia
Inquirer cultural affairs writer who covered the Culture Wars, by
phone this past week.
He describes Orr-Cahall’s place in the chain of events this way:
“The primary function of a museum when you get beyond continuing the
institution is to organize exhibitions that engage the public and
perhaps educate, excite the imagination, stimulate discussion, enrich
people’s lives, you know, all the litany of clichés. Here she
had the ultimate opportunity to do all of those things, and what did
she do? She said no. She failed the test.
“What the Corcoran did by canceling that show was create an effect,
the desired effect of the right… Once that happened, the entire right
began jumping on every conceivable grant, every
artist, every show
you could imagine, looking to promote a similar effect: Shut it down,
create a lot of noise, and do so while seeming to be defending American
decency and values. But how do you defend American values, a core value
being freedom, by shutting things down? It’s an oxymoron. But we’ve
been ruled by oxymorons for a couple of decades now.”
Orr-Cahall is not the real villain of the Culture Wars: That role
must be reserved for the bigots who fomented the backlash that
eventually led to the strategic fracturing of the American populace and
the election of George W. Bush. But she occupies the role of the
stranger in the house of culture, and this house still needs
defending.
So what did she learn all those years ago? Without the
benefit of an interview with her, all we have are the public records in
newspaper archives. She defended her decision at first by saying she
and Corcoran trustees were trying to keep the art and the museum (which
was federally funded) from becoming politicized. Shortly after that,
under fire, the museum issued a cool statement of regret, but no
concession of wrongdoing. That only angered art supporters more.
Some of her final words on the subject came out a short time later,
in a sympathetic Washington Post feature that failed to generate
much attention. Here there’s a glimmer of a real apology: “Now I think
we should have done it, we should have bitten the bullet, we should
have stood up for artistic rights. We should have done the show and
seen what happened.” When she was hired by the Norton in 1990, she told
the Miami Herald, “You take with you what you as an individual
would do. You leave behind what you had to do as an administrator.”
In the Post, Orr-Cahall spoke of the moment as a crossroad,
and said she often wondered what would have happened if she’d taken the
other path. There was a museum director who did: Dennis Barrie at the
Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center. When the Mapplethorpe exhibition
made its next stop after D.C. in Cincinnati, the far-right group
Citizens for Community Values was waiting to pounce. Under direct
pressure, Barrie and his trustees refused to cancel the show, and when
it opened, the police swept in. Barrie became the first museum director
in American history indicted for putting on an exhibition. By a jury of
his peers, he—and Mapplethorpe—were exonerated. In the
movie version of the trial, James Woods plays Barrie. And in a strange
coincidence, Barrie went on to become director of a rock-and-roll
museum: He was the first head of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in
Cleveland.
What a difference a “nonissue” makes. 
More details about Orr-Cahall’s decision and the unbelievable mess surrounding which photograph accompanied this story are here and here.
Very interesting article – Thanks Jen
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It does not really matter who runs EMP. The incompetence is clearly at the top. Paul Allen and his sister Jody in essence won the lottery. Writing code at Microsoft and holding residency on a bar stool did not equip either of them to be leaders of a large portfolio of companies. This, mixed with the volatile relationship between them, creates a year round toxic environment. Paul is easily bored and unfortunately, the new car shine is off EMP. EMP is an albatross to Paul Allen at this point. It wouldn’t surprise me if they turned over to the city within 5 years and walked away.
the truly sad part of this story isn’t her being hired at EMP as a sort of final nail in her museum career’s coffin but rather her being hired as the final nail in EMP’s coffin. Could’ve should’ve been a cool institution that looks at music and science fiction and how these play/have played in popular culture. There could be great programming that touches on culture in ways museums traditionally don’t ..but instead it says nothing, does nothing and contributes very little.
sad ..just plain sad.
Dennis Barrie is indeed courageous and something of a hero, and you are right to compare his choice to Orr-Cahall’s.
But you say that Orr-Cahall’s arrival at the EMP is “a kind of exile” as a museum curator. Meanwhile Barrie was the first curator for the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame.
That’s basically the same thing, isn’t it? I mean, yeah the Hall of Fame commands greater respect than the EMP, but by your measure it is still “a kind of exile” in the museum world. Right?
Seems like a double-standard to me. Neither are respectable museums in your eyes. Or is there something special about the Hall of Fame we should know about?
You seriously wrote this article without an iota of reflection regarding the actions of Erica C Barnett?
Jen, you and everyone else at The Stranger need to STFU.
I don’t know, is it a good idea to project
“the most explicit of the more than 100 photos of flowers, celebrities, and homoeroticism in the show”
on the side of a museum where everyone is forced to look at it, even children? I’m pretty liberal but I think I have a right to not have to look at certain pornographic things. Ummm like this one: http://i159.photobucket.com/albums/t146/…
Gross.
@yeah: I don’t think that image was a Mapplethorpe so that wouldn’t really make any sense.
James, I understand asking a troll for an explanation is a fool’s game, but I’m feeling foolish: Do you really think the fact that Erica C. Barnett got busted trying to shoplift wine means The Stranger is never allowed to criticize anything again ever? Or do you just harbor enough resentment toward ECB/The Stranger you’re willing to let this resentment inspire you to ridiculous proclamations?
You can also say that she, unintentionally, created space for a new “Avant Garde”. She gave something for artists to reject/fight against. Unfortunately no one took advantage of that possibility.
Keep these kinds of articles coming! We need this kind of illumination here and now. Good work Jen!
This is a poorly written article that started with a premise and stuck to it, even though there is not much evidence to back it up. Where are the reasons the museum pulled the plug? Where are Orr-Cahill’s words about what made that decision necessary? Where are ANY real facts about the situation?
If you want to crap all over the EMP go ahead, but please use some journalism in the process…
David Schmader wrote: “Or do you just harbor enough resentment toward ECB/The Stranger you’re willing to let this resentment inspire you to ridiculous proclamations?”
I could say the same thing about the original article, just changing ECB/The Stranger to EMP…
The EMP was a joke the day it opened. Run by $300.000 grant writers and people who always wanted to “rock”, but were never cool enough. If it actually had to pay the bills with what it makes like every rock band, it would be out of business almost immediately.
Dear Jen,
Thank you for your Stranger article, “Grappling with a Nonissue,” April 2. It brought an important refocus to an issue we continue to live with today.
Christina Orr-Cahall’s decision to cancel the Mapplethorpe exhibition for clearly political reasons became the face of all conservative negativism that has since plagued the visual arts in America. She buckled at a time when committed strength was required. Her decision can hardly be called a non-issue when still, today America’s visual artists are penalized by the National Endowment for the Arts as untrustworthy to receive individual artist fellowships. The NEA gives individual fellowship grants to musicians, writers, actors, singers, poets, et al, but none to visual artists. Rather, their funding continues to be given to institutions that apparently are better trusted than visual artists.
As long as visual artists in America are relegated to this substandard category, Orr-Cahall’s 1989 political decision will remain front and center in the eyes of all those who really care for and defend the visual arts.
Beth Sellars
Great piece, Jen–It’s too easy for us to forget history
Here is something I wrote as a letter to the editor for the Rocket (old school rocks!) a week after the EMP opened. 2000? I think. Not saying its good. More just getting it off my hard drive
I’m Pissed! The EMP is nothing but another fat rich corporate-type who knows more about business than music telling the rest of us “How to rock”. It all started in 1983 when I walked in all giddy to my first “Hard Rock” Café and heard Madonna. Haven’t heard a “Hard Rock” song in there since. To REALLY Rock has absolutely nothing to do with sitting at some interactive pod pretending to be a rock star while electronics plays the right notes for you and morons offer you a poster of your “15 minutes” for $9.95. (Cross “Rock Star” off my list of busy executive things to do in life). To rock, you need to load gear into a stinky broken down van, arrive at a club on a Tuesday night at 4pm for a 11pm show and in the meantime eat crappy food, get beer spilled on you three times by cheap women, and get home at 3 am only to have to be in the studio at 8am. I want to give a big salute to the people Paul Allen failed to. The thousands to bands, promoters, agents, roadies, local magazines, recording studios, and other businesses and people who are way to busy trying to make a living and play for fun, passion and sometimes profit who started all this shit that fuckers like Paul Allen are trying to enshrine, but can’t because they just don’t…and never will understand. EMP has several people working for them who are working musicians and other industry pro’s. It disappoints me that no one stood up to this “Steve Wozniak/US Festival” wanna-be and told him that “rock & roll” has nothing to do with giving an “experience” to regular people. The term rock should be preserved for those things and people who make the sacrifice daily to give imbisills like this something to enshirne in the first place. Glad to see that you gave some fairly unknown bands (outside of the Northwest) some pop…But don’t you think denoting their achievements by buying a $2 ticket to their shows on a Tuesday night at the local club would have been a better way? It would give all those yuppie idiots who work for you and think they rock the opportunity to feel what rock is really about while doubling some bands draw in one feel swoop with all you friends. Nope. You and your glass guitar and all your Dockers clad employees will never know how to rock or will ever be willing to make the sacrifices that it takes to do so. Like a band that rocked their first album and got fat and happy and didn’t anymore, you don’t realize that “Rocking” is not something you can buy. It’s a feeling that the KOMO news team playing in your EMP studio and you, will never have. Please take Andy Whoppler and stay out of promoting yourself as a champion of local music. No struggling musician or music business professional that I know of has seen you anywhere near a smelly club on a Tuesday night. If you want to give EMP visitors a taste of what it is really like to “rock” then you are going to have to install sprinkler systems that pour beer and cigarette smoke on people, have people screem that they suck at them, and make their ears ring for a while. Or maybe it’s that the music business has gotten to the point where all you have to do is press a button and you “rock”…Glad I am out of it. Paul, you should be ashamed. To all you younger musicians out there. Being a rock star has nothing to do with going to some “master Class” in a museum or taking classes at the Seattle Art Institute. The real classroom is in the clubs and concert halls where it starts and ends for most.
It’s crazy that she makes that much money and she’s a zero when it comes to recognizing great art. I interviewed there several years ago and talked with Jody Patton. She was a total bitch and get this—she thought that Bowie’s career began in the 1980s and she’d never heard of the Velvet Underground. She was a combination of Heather Locklear on Melrose Place and Joan Collins on Dynasty. I couldn’t believe her lack of knowledge. Now they’ve hired another numbskull. I ended up working at the nonprofit, GLAAD, where the Executive Director made $280,000 a year. This was 1/20th of the organization’s income. Crazy shit like this happens a lot.