Director's Letter

At the biannual meeting of the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) last month, the members voted to change the temperature and humidity standards that art museums must maintain in the galleries to keep artworks from suffering undue stress. For many years the standards had been seventy degrees Fahrenheit, plus or minus five degrees, and fifty percent relative humidity, also plus or minus five percent. So, anytime the temperature goes above or below these set points, the heating and cooling system kicks in. Although we like to have all our galleries in compliance, the standards most frequently come into play with loans for special exhibitions.

The first time another museum requests a loan from us, we ask for a facilities report, an exhaustive questionnaire about all aspects of the institution's operations related to handling and exhibiting art. This report then goes on file for reference for future loans and may not need to be consulted for years. But for virtually every loan, we also ask for recent proof that the appropriate temperature and humidity ranges are being observed. This usually means a copy of the record made by hygrothermographs installed in the galleries to measure climate conditions. Once these were those smallish devices you may have noticed that consisted of a vertical drum wrapped with blue graph paper against which two inked needles scored shaky lines as the drum slowly rotated. Now, practically all museums use digital readings to create a graph, but in both cases, the resultant lines need to be as straight as possible and falling as near the middle of the temperature and humidity ranges as possible. Even the most well-regulated environment is not absolutely stable because of outside weather conditions, so the lines are always a little bit wavy, making it obvious when someone--and I've seen this a couple of times--takes a blank graph and draws a ruled line across the paper!

At the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, I was involved in organizing an exhibition with a heavy component of German loans and, very late in the day, discovered that the principal lenders were demanding seventy/fifty degrees, plus or minus three degrees. Feeling that this was unrealistic, I called my colleagues and told them there was no way our building could meet those constraints. They were unyielding and so a beautiful relationship ended and the exhibition was never presented in San Francisco. So, when a few years ago, we American directors began to discuss relaxing environmental standards I thought to myself, "the Germans will never accept it," and was subsequently amused to learn that European museums that wanted to make this kind of change believed "the Americans" would not agree.

In fact, there has been a series of national and international meetings (a DIA staff member was involved), whereby new interim standards were established that will immediately go into effect. While recognizing that some objects and materials require special handling, the new standards fall in the range of fifty-nine to seventy-seven degrees and forty to sixty percent relative humidity over the course of a year. This means, of course, that the heating and cooling systems will kick on less frequently, budgets will be helped, and, most important, we'll be a little bit more "green" across the board. Actually, as one of my AAMD colleagues mentioned, we sometimes could not maintain certain conditions even when we claimed we were doing so. Fifty percent relative humidity in a Michigan winter, for example, is nigh-on impossible. We were all indulging in an art museum version of "don't ask, don't tell." So, as well as removing a small amount of pollutants from the air, we've taken a little bit of hypocrisy out of our practices.

Exhibitions

Through African Eyes: The European in African Art, 1500 to Present

Special Exhibition Galleries: South
Through August 8

Africans expressed a broad spectrum of emotional responses to the presence of Europeans on their continent. Clearly, during the 500 years of contact between the two, some African groups were more receptive to European culture than others, and every African society had its beneficiaries and losers in its dealings with Europeans, which, in turn, influenced how art was created.

During the period of European colonial rule, between 1880 and 1960, African works of art illustrated how European objects became powerful indicators of rank and status among some African elite. A magnificent ceremonial cloth, once owned by an influential woman among the Ewe people of Ghana, is a fine example. The meaning and significance of the cloth seems entwined with the complex history of intercolonial rivalry. Following World War I, Britain and France competed for control of southeastern Ghana, which had been part of Germany's Togoland from 1884 to 1914. The French flag that the owner of this cloth, possibly a queen mother, included in the design served as a declaration of political affiliation and suggests that certain elite Africans were intimately involved in the politics of the era.

By 1900, the Ewe had adopted silk as their most prestigious medium, and persons of power and wealth naturally preferred their locally woven cloths to be of silk. But the scarcity of silk yarns forced Ewe weavers to create their own by painstakingly unraveling imported European textiles. Such was the source for each colored yarn used in creating this ceremonial cloth, which dates to the 1940s. European objects once considered exotic increasingly became part of the visual vocabulary of power when embroidered into such cloths. In this case, while the traditional stool readily communicated the owner's chiefly position, the European chair proclaimed her wealth and sense of self-importance derived from her connections with colonial authority.

The proverb in the center, "akpokplor (the seasonal plant) does not advise ago (the perennial tree)--"a young, inexperienced person cannot counsel an elder"--is the ultimate assertion of superior rank and status by a politically powerful woman. And writing, a key tool of Western literacy, speaks to another unique way by which the Ewe recalibrated power relationships within their culture.

The exhibition is free for members, although timed-tickets are necessary. For the general public, tickets are $12 for adults, $6 for youth, ages six to seventeen, and $10 for groups of fifteen or more. Price includes museum admission and a multimedia tour. Reserve and purchase tickets at the DIA Box Office, at dia.org, or by calling 1.866.DIA.TIXS (1.866.342.8497). A $3.50 handling charge applies to all nonmember tickets, except those sold at the DIA.

Above: Ewe culture, Ghana; Woman's Cloth, 1900-1950; silk, cotton, dyes. Private collection, Ghana.

This exhibition has been organized by the Detroit Institute of Arts. Generous support has been provided by the Friends of African and African American Art, the DTE Energy Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional support has been provided by the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and the City of Detroit.

Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this exhibition do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Detroit Film Theatre

The DFT's July schedule is marked by two special film series--one honoring the bicentennial of the founding of the Republic of Mexico and that country's rich cinematic history, and the other highlighting the work of African director Ousmane Sembène, shown in conjunction with the exhibition Through African Eyes: The European in African Art, 1500 to the Present. All films are shown Saturdays at 4 p.m. and are free with museum admission.


Nora's Will

Cinema Mexicano features Fernando de Fuentes's El Compadre Mendoza, the story of a hacienda keeper named Mendoza, a practical man who switches allegiance between Zapata's revolutionary army and repressive government forces whenever he feels his survival is at stake, and Luis Buñuel's El angel exterminador (The Exterminating Angel), about a group of friends invited to a dinner but then are unable to leave for some inexplicable reason. Although not part of the Saturday series, the DFT is also showing Spanish Drácula, which was filmed on the set of the Bela Lugosi version of the film, and the acclaimed new dramatic comedy Nora's Will from director Mariana Chenillo, winner of seven Ariel Awards (Mexico's "Oscars"). There is a charge for Nora's Will.

Cinema Through African Eyes: The Films of Ousmane Sembène includes Xala this month, followed by Ceddo and Moolaadé in August. Born in the former French colony of Senegal, Sembène (1923-2007) was one of Africa's leading novelists before turning to cinema as a more effective means of reaching a wide international audience. He is routinely listed among the most important filmmakers of the modern era.

DFT Meets DSO
The Detroit Film Theatre is teaming up with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra to present a free screening of Sparrows, starring Mary Pickford, America's first sweetheart. The symphony performs the music originally scored for this 1926 silent film, which tells the story of the Grimes family, who live deep in the swamps in the South and operate a farm where unwanted or lost children are cruelly worked and underfed.

This event takes place at Orchestra Hall, 3711 Woodward Avenue, Detroit, and admission is free to the public.

For the complete DFT schedule, click here.
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Concert of Colors

The Concert of Colors, metro Detroit's annual diversity festival, kicks off its eighteenth season July 16 at the DIA with concerts by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra (DSO), a performance by a renowned Mexican folk group, and the showing of the film Spanish Drácula. This is the first year the museum has participated in the popular event.

The symphony performs two different forty-five-minute concerts, one at 4 p.m. and the other at 5:30 p.m., in the Great Hall. The first concert features the music of Charles Gounod, Johann Strauss, Jr., and Edvard Grieg, among others, as well as symphonic impressions of the score of The Music Man and highlights from John Williams's soundtrack from Jurassic Park. The 5:30 concert includes works by Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Copeland, and Rossini, and a reprise of The Music Man score.

The action then moves to the DFT Theater for two shows by Tlen-Huicani (left), folk musicians from Vera Cruz, Mexico. With their traditional costumes and instruments, including the harpa jarocha or folk harp, they provide a journey through Mexican music, time, and place.

Finish the evening with the Spanish-language version of the classic Dracula story. Filmed on the set of the 1931 Bela Legosi Dracula after production had shut down for the day, Spanish Drácula had a completely different cast, featuring primarily Mexican and South American actors.

All programs are free, as is entrance to the DIA after 3 p.m.

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