Commentary on the San Diego Art Institute: When media distort events and history, just re-write the essay

Ben Sutton of Hyperallergic recently penned an essay, Rebirth of Stagnant San Diego Art Institute Riles Some of Its Members.  (I confess to being one of the riled.)

Much of what Sutton says has been distilled from a distance; despite that distance, he shows flashes of accuracy. 

However, his essay might have been more appropriately titled, Rebirth of San Diego Art Institute: It could have been achieved through collaboration instead of slash-and-burn and violating its City lease.

Let's take a closer look at some of the things Sutton said. This revisionist perspective is not intended to be complete, but rather to illuminate the challenges of writing about institutional change.

Revising the Sutton essay

By Sutton: 
These accusations, irrespective of their validity (or lack thereof), speak volumes about an institution that was long run like a members-only club in a city badly in need of a more inclusive and forward-thinking municipal art gallery.

Sutton's sentence should be revised as follows:
The institution was intended by the City Council to be run as a place for San Diego artists to develop, hone their skills and exhibit their work – this is far from a club; instead it is an incubator model that has its place in the City arts scene. Other institutions, like those run for the 1% elites, promote the clubbiness of the insular avant-garde.  .  .  . 

By Sutton:
“I’ve been in town for over 30 years, and during that period the Art Institute was a space with a terrific location in the heart of Balboa Park and a nice facility in terms of the height of the ceilings and quality of light and that sort of thing,” Hugh Davies, the director of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) told Hyperallergic over the phone. 

(Delete the sentence in Sutton's essay alleging a lack of quality in SDAI shows as opined by Davies and replace with a more informed observation)

Sutton's sentence should be revised as follows:
If Davies ever really took in the new shows at SDAI, he would have seen a new type of shoddiness with poor wall tags, poor use of lighting, and a taste for the bizarre.

Here are two exhibited images from the new Porcella regime. If you consider misogyny, religious intolerance and anti-Americanism the highpoints of artistic endeavor, well, there is much to applaud. However, if one is willing to tamp down the thrills of shock-art for actual professional competence, one comes away a bit disappointed at what the elites consider to be ‘good’ art.
    

By Sutton:
The organization of solo exhibitions was not up to a curator, but rather determined by a point system: members who received enough prizes in the juried shows were eventually rewarded with solo shows. “It’s almost like you get miles for flying on American and then you get a first-class seat,” said Davies. [Delete the following sentence] “It’s the most bizarre and primitive way to run an arts organization.” The point system, like much of the SDAI operations pre-2008, seems to have been a vestige of the institute’s early years — it was founded in 1941 as the San Diego Business Men’s Art Club to showcase members’ landscape paintings.

Sutton's sentence should be revised as follows:
Davies, whose salary is about $440,000, looks down upon an organization that continued its development after 1996 in the style of a grass roots organization – unlike its beginnings as a place for San Diego businessmen in the 1940s and 50s.

Sutton's summary of views he heard:
Most people Hyperallergic spoke to about the institute and its place in the San Diego art scene agree that the shift away from a “members first” approach is very welcome.

Sutton's sentence should be revised as follows:
Most people that Hyperallergic spoke to about the Institute were not lawyers (Nalven was a former litigator) and most failed to understand lease requirements. Apparently, if the City cannot enforce this lease with its clear requirements, how can the City be expected to enforce any of its leases whether in the Park or throughout the City?

Sutton's embracing of Porcella's opinion is one of those say-anythings:
“We’re not in violation of our bylaws or charter; we’ve even met with the city of San Diego, their lawyers, our lawyers, we’ve looked into it, we’re not doing anything untoward,” Porcella said.

A more informed perspective would have stated:
Porcella, who is not an attorney, apparently has failed to understand the provisions of the City’s lease. A close reading of the lease suggests that she, and SDAI, can do what they want, but just not in Balboa Park.

Perhaps, MCASD and Hugh Davies can offer SDAI a space in its downtown location. That would resolve the issue for the City as a win-win result.

Here is the BIG picture
Sutton fails to capture the sense that this crisis could easily have been avoided had the director, Ginger Shulick Porcella, and the Board of Directors invited collaboration with its artist members. Instead, many of the artist members were shunned and a top down management change was put in place.

As a former Chair of the Institute's Board of Directors, and as a former litigator, I realized that such a path could be followed, regardless of its organizational merits -- except for one sticking point. In order to follow that path, Porcella and the Board would have to leave its premises in Balboa Park as a result of violating its lease with the City of San Diego.  (See key lease provision below - 1.2 a)

Rebranding SDAI as running up to Los Angeles, as Porcella and the Board intend, was not part of the City's deal with this artist organization. It was intended for San Diego artists. 

This is where Sutton ought to have started his essay and, after many words, ended it on this point as well.

Comments (either from email or submitted to blog)

Jane FletcherGreat job, Joe! Unfortunately, the lack of opportunity at the San Diego Art Institute has left the art of many San Diego artists homeless. Sadly, the admired goal of many of today's "sophisticated" art elite is shock and baseness instead of beauty and upliftment, almost as if they are encouraging and applauding social decay. One wonders if they are just competing to see who can reach the lowest.