The artists had come: the veterans such as Cindy Sherman and Marina Abramovic, the breakout photographer Lotus L. Kang, the always-on-brand sculptor known as KAWS. The donors had come: the former mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the young new board president Sarah Arison, and a whole clutch of Tisches and Rockefellers.
It was early June, one of those rare New York evenings where the sun still dazzles but the humidity has not yet saturated your tux or gown, and in the garden of the Museum of Modern Art, the city’s art world — or at least its most tax-advantaged stratum — was gossiping about a market slowdown, exchanging plans for Basel and voicing relief at a recent leadership succession.
Most years, MoMA’s annual Party in the Garden honors several artists and philanthropists who have made a difference to the museum. (The more honorees, the more tables they can guilt their friends into buying.) This June had only one: Glenn D. Lowry, MoMA’s outgoing director, who had overseen two major expansions of this building on West 53rd Street and everything that took place inside it. The man who had cajoled checks from these diners for 30 years was now the evening’s laureate — and Lowry, 70, kitted out in a floral scarf and one of his signature Nehru-collar jackets, grew emotional as a constellation of artists lauded his career.
“It feels very strange to be on the other side of the equation,” Lowry told the guests in an acknowledgment speech that was also a farewell address. He offered tributes to his board leaders past and present. Jocular, heartfelt recognition of his assistants, all thanked by name. And then, at the end, he took an unexpected turn from the celebratory, and offered a stark look at the future of American cultural institutions.
“Museums exist in the real world,” he told the diners, many of whom had paid $3,000 a plate. “They are willful efforts to imagine the world, through objects and programs that reflect their beliefs and commitments. In the months and years ahead, we will have choices to make that are consequential, perhaps more so than at any other time since the Second World War.”
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The post He’s Left MoMA Smarter, Richer and at a Crossroads appeared first on New York Times.
