Photography by Emily Bruhn. Courtesy of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
PHILLIPS: These times are unprecedented and challenging for museums across the globe. Yet, the current exhibitions highlight the Nelson-Atkins’ permanent collection and fascinating local collections. How has 2020 positively shifted the way in which the museum approaches exhibitions and public engagement?
JULIÁN ZUGAZAGOITIA: The pandemic caused us to reflect on the very essence of our mission as a museum and rethink our assumptions about exhibitions and public engagement. We quickly pivoted to enrich our online content with virtual tours, activities, and videos, but soon realized that we would require bigger solutions as we moved into the future, since the traditional model of loan-based, traveling exhibitions was financially unsustainable and logistically difficult. Fortunately, as an encyclopedic museum with a vast collection, we had many resources from which to tap and many cross-collection conversations to be had with our existing objects.
One of our special exhibition spaces will be devoted to showing works from an artist who lives in the Kansas City metro region, and we plan one or two installations per year in that space. Our featured exhibition space will be devoted to unseen or little-seen objects from our permanent collection in unexpected combinations. We will also use our collection to explore issues or moments in time, as well as look for opportunities for visitor interaction. Our Curatorial and Education departments have been working closely together to re-imagine Interpretation in this hybrid model. High-touch interactives will be eliminated and visitors will be encouraged to bring their own mobile phones and tablets to minimize sanitation issues. In the area of programming, we plan to engage audiences using existing virtual platforms and will pivot to onsite programming when health protocols and budgets allow.
Photography by Tiffany Matson. Courtesy of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
P: Acquisitions play an integral part in continuing the mission of a museum. Do you foresee changes (if any) in the approach to acquisitions going forward?
JZ: The museum continues to seek opportunities to build our collections, and that will continue. In recent years—and we have reaffirmed our commitment to it—we are especially eager to grow our collections with the goal of inclusivity, ensuring that the works we collect across time help tell all the stories of human creativity, including historically excluded or underrepresented makers or cultures, in order to embrace the full spectrum of our visitors. In contemporary art in particular, we have made an ongoing commitment to acquiring work by BIPOC artists in recent years. But we also have long-standing commitments to continuing to grow our extraordinary collections of Asian, African, and Native American Art, as well.
Photography by Don Ipock. Courtesy of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
P: What are some of the hidden gems in the Nelson-Atkins’ vast permanent collection?
JZ: With more than 42,000 objects spanning 5,000 years of human creativity, we have many hidden gems. One of our most significant holdings is the Burnap Collection of English Ceramics. At over 1,500 works in total, it is the largest collection outside of England of pottery made in Staffordshire from the 17th century to the beginnings of the Industrial Age and provides a full history of the medium. For those times when you need spiritual sustenance, we have exceptional South Asian sculptures that speak to the rise and development of Buddhism across the globe. These beautiful religious devotional works can provide not just aesthetic but also spiritual beauty.
Photography by Beth Byers. Courtesy of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.
P: Tell us about the exhibitions or programs that you are particularly looking forward to in the year ahead.
JZ: We plan to move our large panel of Monet’s Water Lilies to a different gallery and utilize the cutting-edge technology installed there to simulate the light and sounds of an entire day passing, so guests will be able to experience that masterpiece as though they were in Giverny. We are also working on reinstalling collection galleries, particularly in our Japanese gallery and Photography, to bring out works that are not seen as often. We know that guests expect variety and we don’t have any intention of letting galleries go dark, so rotations and cross-collection conversations will allow the Nelson-Atkins to continue its mission of being the place where art engages the spirit of community.
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