Whitney Women and the Museum They Made

The building project Tom and I and many others had spent over ten years working toward was abandoned, without even being considered or rejected. The whole plan just drifted away.

The media lapped up the blood. “For the sake of the Whitney,” the Whitney’s public relations officer persuaded me to be photographed outside the museum with Jennifer and Bill. Jen’s smile is forced and mine is nonexistent. The Times headline:

In the article, Bill refers to “quickie show-and-tell operations” and Grace Glueck reports, “Neither Mr. Woodside nor Mr. Armstrong has ever said why the director’s resignation was requested.” She quotes me: “It was a nightmare. … But the Museum means a lot more than any of us does as an individual, and it’s important to start the healing process.”

John Russell, senior art critic of the Times, wrote an encomium to Tom: “Man-hunting, like bear-baiting, has no place in a civilized society. Yet in the last month or two the manhunt has become a fact of life in the cultural life of New York.” He listed other losses caused by “power in the hands of board members, managers or moneymen,” and went on to counter the criticisms of Tom’s exhibition program with high marks for its quality over the fifteen years of his directorship. Russell recalled adventuresome films we’d shown, our unique education program, Trisha Brown’s dances up walls. Ecstatic moments: “I can remember for instance, how at the end of his address at the memorial ceremony for Alexander Calder in 1976 James Johnson Sweeney looked at the Calder mobiles all around him and said, ‘Though the dancer has gone, the dance remains. …’ Besides, no museum director was ever as much fun as Tom Armstrong. Who else would have dressed up and paraded with the clowns in the Ringling Brothers Circus in Madison Square Garden to raise money for the purchase of Calder’s Circus? … There are ways to behave well, and there are ways to behave badly. And we know which are the ones that have lately prevailed.”

In New York magazine, Kay Larsen wrote a follow-up to her previous long article:

In retrospect, the way he was unseated was abysmal. The coup was begun by a small group of trustees, angry for their own personal reasons, who enlisted the discontent of the majority. The argument seems to have been transferred to “larger issues” as a face-saving device … the callous, arrogant, and supercilious attitude displayed to Armstrong by his president, William S. Woodside, chairman of Sky Chefs, who trod with the tact of a bull through the glass corridors of a humanist institution. Woodside’s quoted statement in the Times about “quickie show-and-tell operations …” betrays a barely concealed contempt for living artists. It’s an appallingly ignorant and insensitive statement for the president of the Whitney to make. If the trustees care about the Museum, they will ask Woodside to resign.

In the Nation, Arthur Danto wrote a review of the Whitney’s current exhibition, “The New Sculpture 1975–1985.” Here is the last paragraph:

This is a flawless exhibition, the Whitney at its best, doing what it understands, meticulously and theatrically. With it, the Museum’s trustees condemn themselves for the terrible way in which they fired the director of the Museum, Tom Armstrong, who was outstanding. It is everything the trustees said the Whitney was not under Armstrong’s stewardship: serious, historical, scholarly and resolutely as untrendy as the impulses of the work shown were. It is historical in an especially difficult way, giving historical shape to a period that would be difficult to grasp without it and the superlative catalogue that accompanies it. Had the trustees known about the show, they could not have said what they did about Armstrong. It follows further that the reasons they discharged this director must have been personal and frivolous, as everyone suspects, and the action itself one by men and women used to getting their own way, the institution be damned. They stand red-handed and shamed by an excellence to which they have no right.

Letters poured in. A few were encouraging, notably one that Adriana Mnuchin handed me on the day of the trustees’ meeting, urging board unity and healing, enclosing a special, unrestricted contribution to the Whitney of $200,000, asking that it be anonymous.

Some people resigned. Some foundations threatened to pull their support — and some did. Attendance dropped. Catherine Curran wrote a note with her letter of resignation from the print committee that expressed the feelings of many: “I’m sure you know what a difficult decision this was — I have so enjoyed my association with the Whitney. When I first came back to New York, it was like my club — it was welcoming and friendly and fun. I loved the gatherings, made friends, learned a lot by going to lectures and exhibitions. It had great style — yours and Tom’s.”

“I cannot but feel that any financial support that I might at present give to the Museum could only be considered tantamount to granting approval to the recent actions and decisions taken by the board. … I am horrified by what has happened, and even more, by the way in which it happened. … I must take my stand, however insignificant, on the side of the civilized values that some of us treasure.”

I will only quote one more letter, dated March 1990, a surprising and touching one, since I had assumed David Solinger’s disagreement with me.

Dear Flora,

I am delighted that you are serving on the Search Committee for a new director. Indeed, as the Museum enters yet another era, I am impelled to express how important I believe it is for you always to remain active in its affairs. There is a paucity of people who know the Museum’s traditions and understand the nature of its commitment to contemporary American art. Memories are short and firsthand knowledge of the past is more and more unavailable; and as the years pass there will be fewer and fewer of us to remind trustees and others what the Museum stands for.

I have genuine concern that, no matter how excellent it may continue to be, the Whitney may lose its character and unique place in the museum world.

The buzz word of the moment is “scholarship.” While scholarship is fine, there is no substitute for an eye, the ability to recognize quality and artistry (as distinguished from technical skills), and the importance of the biennial (which, fortunately, has survived many an assault) and the long tradition of friendship to visual artists.

It will be harder and harder with each passing year to sustain the Museum’s unique traditions, and I hope you will be there for many years to remind one and all what the Whitney stands for.

Affectionately,

David

I’d opposed the majority of trustees on a vital issue, and had lost. Should I resign from the board? David’s letter suggested one answer. Everyone was urging me to remain, to join the search committee for a new director, to stay involved with committees and with policy. The staff, especially Jennifer, argued for the importance of continuity and commitment to the institution.

Unfinished business, too, needed to be attended to: surely Bill would see he must resign. I hoped Leonard Lauder would take his place, even though he’d been one of those who had led the attack on Tom. Only Leonard, I felt, could unite the board and raise the funds necessary for the Museum’s survival. At that moment, being president of the Whitney wasn’t the glorious honor I’d hoped it would always be.

As a responsible human being, as a community leader, as a decent person with the skill, power, and personality to pull things back together, and also, surely, because he now wanted to balance his part in the coup by taking a positive role, Leonard agreed to become president.

He asked me to remain active, and I said I would, knowing he and the others were right, that this was still my heritage and my responsibility, and knowing, too, how much I still cared for the Museum. It had also become a way of life; so many friendships and loyalties were involved. Tom himself encouraged me to stay — yet further evidence of his genuine love for the Museum. And then, a new fear entered into my decision: if I left, would that seem to confirm the rumors about anti-Semitism? Would the Museum, as well as Tom and I, be further dishonored?

Somehow Bill’s resignation was arranged behind the scenes. I don’t know the details. On June 13, at the annual meeting, Leonard was elected president; I remained as chairman; and, in a gesture of reconciliation, Tom was elected and agreed to become director emeritus.

“The outstanding quality and variety of the programs presented by the Whitney Museum of American Art in fiscal year 1990 represent the accomplishments of Tom Armstrong, whose sixteen-year tenure as director ended in March. The Museum flourished under his leadership, with new programs, expanded constituencies, and the building of the permanent collection. To achieve his goals he delegated a great deal of responsibility to a relatively young staff. He challenged us, nurtured us, and gave us the opportunity to grow as professionals. The smooth continuation of the Museum’s exhibitions, publications, acquisitions, and public education programs following his departure testifies to the vitality and strength he left with the institution.”

Aftermath