The trouble with 'excellence'

Posted on March 5, 2010 at 8:20 a.m.

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The trouble with 'excellence'

Scores of people have signed a letter criticizing National Gallery director Marc Mayer for saying he wants the institution to be full of 'excellent' art. Paul Gessell explains why that's a problem.

By Paul Gessell, The Ottawa CitizenMarch 5, 2010


National Gallery director Marc Mayer is getting flack from Canada's art community for saying he wants to fill the federal institution with "excellent" art.

That's a problem? Yes, say some artists, because who decides what is "excellent?"

Should it be the same old gang that has filled the National Gallery with Monets, Rembrandts and the Group of Seven, or a new type of curator with a specific mandate to be more sensitive to Canadian art that is increasingly influenced, not just by European traditions, but by those from Asia, Africa and Latin America?

These are the questions at the heart of a growing controversy sparked last month when Mayer told the CBC he is colour blind when it comes to acquiring art and is only concerned with "excellence."

More than 150 people, many of them influential artists and curators, have lined up to sign a letter highly critical of Mayer. "There is a difference between being blind and just shutting your eyes," says the letter.

In an interview Thursday, Mayer said he got "goosed" on CBC, which he said tried to tackle an immensely complex issue in just a few minutes. The National Gallery collection contains hundreds of works representing diverse cultures and the works of new Canadians, he said.

"Every significant artist who was not born in Canada or whose parents were not born in Canada is pretty much already in the collection of the National Gallery and, if they're not, it's because we couldn't get our hands on the right one yet or we're looking for it," Mayer said.

"We're not a racist institution and diversity is Job 2 after making sure we have the right amount of money to do what we have to do."

The letter of protest directed at Mayer was penned by Emily Falvey, former chief curator of the Ottawa Art Gallery, and Winnipeg-based independent curator Milena Placentile. The signatories include such prominent Ottawa-area artists as Jeff Thomas, Howie Tsui, Marion Bordier, Nichola Feldman-Kiss and Michele Provost, Colwyn Griffith of Toronto, Diana Thorneycroft of Winnipeg, Jamelie Hassan of London, Ont. and Jayce Salloum of Vancouver. More names are added hourly.

This is not just a question of sour grapes by these signatories. Hassan and Salloum, for example, are of Middle Eastern origin and are both represented in the National Gallery's collection. Thomas is aboriginal and has had some of his works exhibited in the National Gallery.

Several of the country's top curators of aboriginal art have also signed the letter of protest. They include Lee-Ann Martin from the Canadian Museum of Civilization, Ryan Rice, an independent curator formerly of Carleton University Art Gallery, and Steve Loft, who recently completed a year-long curatorial residency at the National Gallery.

"I think the point of this letter is to bring to attention that artists from diverse communities have been largely excluded from the programming at the National Gallery," says Tsui, a Hong Kong native who has exhibited widely in Ottawa and beyond. "And this needs to change in the 21st century. Perhaps the hiring of a curator who specializes in art produced by minority populations would be a good start."

That suggestion is made by several other artists and curators. Currently, the National Gallery has a special curator for indigenous art but not for other minorities. And all artworks recommended for purchase by the gallery must be approved by the chief curator or the gallery director.

The furore started Feb. 2 when the CBC broadcast a feature on "diaspora art," or art produced by people in Canada who are not of European ancestry. The thrust of the story was that such artists are not well represented in major art institutions such as the National Gallery.

Questioned on camera by the CBC, Mayer emphasized that the gallery is only interested in "excellent" art and not the skin colour of the artist. As well, he suggested there is a paucity of excellent multicultural art because immigrants from non-European countries have to struggle financially when they come to Canada and simply cannot afford to be artists -- better paying jobs being necessary to feed their families.

Those comments prompted Falvey and Placentile to circulate the letter of protest.

"Whose excellence?" the letter asks. "This is what women and ethnic minorities have been asking for centuries."

In an e-mail exchange, Falvey said she is less concerned with who decides what should go into the National Gallery than with how those decisions are made.

"Curators working in institutions are guided by the mandate and policies of that institution," Falvey said. "I suspect that the curators currently working at the (gallery) have the professional wherewithal to seek out and exhibit the work of artists from a wide range of ethnic backgrounds, in a way that is sensitive to cultural diversity and the many social and political issues associated with it. Unfortunately, the existing 'policy of excellence' dissuades and even prevents them from undertaking this research in the first place."

Thorneycroft, an artist who has works in the National Gallery collection, said gallery curators should "seek out excellence in every realm."

"The decision about what a gallery collects should not be the narrow opinion of one person. Institutions are supposed to be run by directors, not dictators," Thorneycroft said.

Ottawa-area photo-artist Marion Bordier said the National Gallery has some very good curators.

"We just need to hire more of them, especially in contemporary Canadian art."

The National Gallery has traditionally focused on European art and Canadian art, both historical and contemporary.

Most of this "Canadian" art has sprung from European traditions. This is in part because of a long-standing bias toward European art by the Canadian art world. But it also reflects the fact most immigrants to Canada, in the pioneer days, were from Europe.

The gallery had been slow to accept aboriginal art as "fine art" and not as some second-class "ethno-cultural art."

But in the last few years, that attitude has started to change.

There have been major shows by such aboriginal artists as Norval Morrisseau and Daphne Odjig and the addition of more historical aboriginal art in the Canadian galleries.

But art from the so-called multicultural communities is still widely perceived as being ignored. Municipal galleries and collections are often considered to be more inclusive.

The Ottawa Art Gallery (OAG) for example, includes artists from various ethno-cultural backgrounds in its exhibitions. The gallery's mandate is, in part, "to explore and reflect cultural diversity and social change through a spectrum of visual art practices, focused on but not exclusive to the region, in a national and international context."

This has prompted the OAG to deliberately seek out "excellent" local artists of diverse backgrounds. The result has been the exhibition of the Asian-influenced work of Tsui, Venezuelan-born Juan Carlos Noria, aboriginal artist Jeff Thomas and many others.

The National Gallery's official mandate includes no reference to diversity, although Mayer says that is a distinct policy direction.

"In my opinion," says Falvey, "this mandate, and not the invented one that Marc seems to be talking about, needs to be changed to include cultural diversity and regional difference."

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