149 thoughts on “The search for a new Executive Director at el Museo del Barrio. What are the issues?”
Concerns over the search for a new director
I wondered if you are aware of the concerns over the search for a new director by El Museo del Barrio. The latest news is that the deputy director has been chosen, and who knows where they are going with the director search. They have contracted a human resource agency that knows very little about Latino issues or our community.
My Puerto Rican and Latino/a curator contacts in major U.S. art and cultural institutions had not heard about the search even though they already started interviews. This leads me to believe that there are problems with outreach. The fear of many, that I share, is that they are going to hire someone with no connections to the Latino/Puerto Rican community that would help them take the museum to yet another stage of revamping and reconstitution, that will forever distance it from its past. Some of you may know that the Cultural Affairs Committee of the Community Board 11 (representing East Harlem), has mounted a “We are Watching You” campaign asking for accountability.
It’s important that all of us engage in a common message that there should be community involvement in the selection of the director, and that such director should represent the history and mission of El Barrio, as a Puerto Rican and U.S. Latino, not a Latin American or Caribbean institution (as the description for the position states, entirely obviating ‘”Puerto Rican”) .. That the director should be representative of this community, U.S. Latino, whose art, history and culture is still marginalized as it was in the 1970s. In contrast, Latin American art and artists have always had few but well established
connections in the art/history world and establishment. I will not elaborate here because I’ve written academic publications on these issues elsewhere.
My biggest concern is that based on what I’ve been reading in the news and my discussion with people in El Barrio, I fear that community concerns about this important issue have been ignored as “petty, narrow or nationalistic.” Hence the importance that we “intellectuals” , students,activists, etc. engage in this debate, and that the museum board understands that the issue is not about Puerto Ricans versus Latinos. What’s at stake is vision and direction (will this be an elitist Latin American museum or one that represents the needs of the Puerto Rican and Latino community culturally, historically, artistically etc?). In other words, there are issues of class involved here, that always impact on the evaluation and study of art –as we all know — and most importantly, that have important political implications for our community.
Our Puerto Ricanand Latino community is old and mature enough to see the real interests seeking to disavow the past and history in favor of that which is more marketable to corporate sponsors or private foundations. Now more than
ever there is a need to embrace the Puerto Rican vision of the museum, and to be both assertive and inclusive, but only in informed, and politically engaged ways that will *empower* our Puerto Rican and Latino community, not subject us to elitist hierarchies that we have so long sought to overcome.
Arlene Davila
American Studies
New York University
The next ED must be a Puerto Rican
The next ED must be a Puerto Rican. Not one of the current Board members lives in El Barrio; less than half are Boricuas.
RE: Concerns over the search for a new director
Estimada Dra Davila:
Me imagino que estos comentarios seran compartido entre personas de hablar ingles igual que personas bilingue. Por esa razon le envio mi comentarios en ingles.
It is but a scant thirty to forty years ago that Puerto Ricans, the largest Latin American segment of the northeast population and the second largest nationally, were left to device our own means of providing services across the board (education, health, social, etc.) as well as create our own institution to provide our artists with space in whcih to exhibit and perform their works.
We, Puerto Ricans as well a Latinos, the African diaspora, Asians, and Native Americans were not welcomed into the mainstream institutions. It is in this climate that organizations such as Aspira, Promesa, Boricua College, Puerto Rican Education, Legal Defense Fund, were established. In that mix ARE also EL MUSEO DEL BARRIO and EL TALLER BORICUA/THE PUERTO RICAN WORKSHOP and to cross the ethnic lines, THE STUDIO MUSEUM IN HARLEM and the ARTURO SCHOMBERG CENTER FOR AFRICAN RESEARCH.
These institutions were born out of the (civil rights) struggle for self sufficiency and acceptance. They were the bold statment of self worth in the face of the neglect and oppression demonstrated against all ethnic minorities. In the face of this neglect these institutions struggled to survive, develop, prosper (yes, prosper), and service the community that gave it its purpose.
In the aftermath of the “Latin Explosion”, not 911, our institutions have come under unforeseen pressure to “open” their doors and make themselves visible and accessible (palitable) to the non-ethnic minority community, whites. Now, as always, and seemingly throughout the world, acceptance by them gives our community an assurance of (self) worth that we have not enjoyed before.
Since the ethnic majority is now interested in Latinos, and with that said all ethnic minorities, we are facing the opportunity for acquiring wealth, more than anything else and this includes respect and admiration.
Erroneously it is thought that without the attention and approval of the ethnic majority, we, Latinos (Asians, natives, and the African diaspora) will continue to hold up the rear of social progress and cultural development.
Without it needing to be said, the attention to our communities and their (economic) development relies soley on our efforts to give the appearance of welcome. To show the ethnic mayority familiar (stereotypic) images and expressions that will seem unthreatening and induce them to spend their money in our neighborhoods. Here is where me comment’s jaws clinch.
Spending money in our neighborhoods does not translate into spending money ON our neighborhoods. A $5.00 cup of coffee spent in Spanish Harlem (El Barrio), the South Bronx, LOISAIDA, Los Sures, does not mean that money has been spent ON our neighborhood not when for the same 3, 4, 5 in some cases six decades, Juan Valdez (Burro and all), El Exigente, Bennie el Bodegero, and others established their businesses, fought of depression, inflation, civil rights violence, and the drug trade without respit or salvation from the powers or communites that still are.
The situation that El Museo del Barrio and El Taller Boricua as well as others find themselves in is one in which their existence depends on their “buying in” not “selling out”. That is what they are leaning to do as a result of the explosion and possibility of accumulating the funds, acceptance and attention so preciously sought for so long. Be mindful that these pressures to bear rest only on institutions of “color”. MoMa, the Guggenheim, the Met, Lincoln Center, and others are under no obligation to “open their doors” to neither our communities as patrons or artists. We deceive no one but ourselves if we think in any way, shape, or form that this attention and “opportunity” will gain Latinos (Puerto Ricans) anything but embarasment and shame for having spent the only $500 billion (the expected national Hispanic consumer potiential/tanto que nos cogio en alcanzarlo)on something that is not intended to provide lasting benefit or relief.
We are only repeating our own history to be played out be a generation that will have to re-create the wheel of providing institutions once thought created.
LOCATION LOCATION
ive always been puzzled why El Museo has remained in a space that it does not own, and which provides zero room for expansion of exhibition space. i would have expected a fund raising campaign for contructing a building of its own to have begun the day after El Museo moved to Fifth Avenue.
If there was ample space to liberally display the art by Puertorriquans in its sizable Permanent Collection, the question of identity would not exist. If 70% of the display area was dedicated to Puertorriquan artists, there woudl not be an issue of the museums identity. Even if only 60% of the space were utilized in this way, the issue would be resolved.
A museum with a [so-called] ethnic or racial focus is identified as such by the work that is on display on a regular basis, not by occasional or periodic exhibitions.
All of the work that is displayed at El Museo is worthy, and the Frida Kahlo exposition is only one of any number of ‘blockbusters’ that should find their way there.
Not only would that solve the debate over identify, but the remaining display area would be more than ample to present the work of other Latino-origin cultures in the Americas. However, as the situation stands, El Museo has not developed a program that would place Puertorriquen art as the anchor.
The fact that El Museo is at this juncture of its history (not having a place to move to) should be an embarrassment to the Board of Directors. What have they been doing all of these years. What have they been thinking!
With respect to a new director, I would like to include not only input from the local community, but also from the major cultural institutions in Puerto Rico.
The question of residency is more elusive. I am more concerned that the Board of Directors be sensitive and protective of our culture than I am of where they live. Any one of us can run down a list of ‘ratas’ who have boasted local residency.
An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo
An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo del Barrio
This letter is to express our concern over the search for a new director of El Museo del Barrio and to call for active public involvement in the selection process. We are concerned that Latinos with knowledge of El Barrio/East Harlem’s history and culture have been increasingly under-represented in important positions in the administration and the staff. Similarly, El Museo del Barrio’s Board of Directors has contracted a human resources agency that knows very little about Latino/a issues or our community. Many Latino/a curators in major U.S. art and cultural institutions have not heard about the search even though the interview process has already begun. And most importantly, there has been no community input in the selection of the new director. El Museo‚s Board has failed to reach out to and consult with Puerto Rican and Latino/a scholars, arts administrators and the larger community.
The recently published chronology of El Museo del Barrio in the catalog „Voices from Our Community,‰ documents that there is a precedent for >community involvement in choosing a director for El Museo del Barrio. The closed door practice of hiring directors of El Museo began in 1986 when the museum was facing a fiscal crisis that necessitated the city’s intervention. Since then, the closed door practice has continued in ways that have distanced the institution from its history. We fear that the board will hire someone with no connection to the Latino/Puerto Rican community and that El Museo may be forced through yet another stage of revamping and reconstitution, which is sure to distance it further than ever from its historical roots. Now more than ever, the election of El Museo’s future director calls for a transparent and public process as had occurred in the past.
We must ensure that the person chosen reflects the unique history and inclusive vision of this community-based Puerto Rican/Latino institution. We maintain that the new director should represent the history and mission of El Barrio, as a primarily Puerto Rican and U.S. Latino/a institution, not a „Latin American or Caribbean institution,‰ as stated in the description for the position, entirely ignoring the institution‚s past. We strongly believe that the director should be representative of this community, U.S. Latino/a, whose art, history and culture are still largely marginalized, as they were in the 1970s when the Museo was initially founded to correct this marginality. Most importantly, the museum‚s board should understand that the issue is not about „Puerto Ricans versus other Latinos,‰ or Latin Americans, or about a local vs. an internationalist perspective. The issue here, we insist, is about fulfilling El Museo’s founding mission to represent a historically and culturally marginalized community and, in so doing, connect with other Latino, Latin American, and Caribbean communities. What’s at stake, in other words, is a vision of El Museo’s future. Will this be an elitist institution, or one that represents the needs of the Puerto Rican and Latino/a community culturally, historically, and artistically? In other words, the directorship of the Museo cannot be viewed in isolation from the community that gave birth it to and which continues to depend on it. To do otherwise would only serve to further exacerbate its historical marginalization, with serious political implications for us all.
Aware of these issues, the Cultural Affairs Committee of Community Board 11 (representing East Harlem) has mounted a “We are Watching You” campaign calling for accountability on the part of the board and the selection process. We therefore wish to add our voices of concern in a common call for community involvement in the selection of the director. Our Puerto Rican and Latino/a community is fully aware of the interests seeking to disavow this past and history in favor of that which is more marketable to corporate sponsors, art collectors, or private foundations. Now more than ever there is a need to embrace the Puerto Rican and community-based vision of the museum, and to be both assertive and inclusive. In this spirit, we encourage people to contact the board, elected officials and community at large to bring attention to this issue. We further ask the Board of Trustees to present the top three finalists for the position of director of El Museo del Barrio in a public forum so that they can present their views and positions to the wider community, and that feedback from this forum be taken into account in selecting the director.
This letter was drafted by a group of university professors, curators, writers and doctoral students in solidarity with community groups from El Barrio/East Harlem and beyond.
Signed,
Arlene Davila, Luis Aponte Pares, Juan Flores, Gabriel Haslip Viera, Wilson Valentin, Miriam Jimenez Roman, Arnaldo Cruz Malave
RE: An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo
Judith,
thanks for the info. I fight every day to keep our
culture up, I do understand the requirement for this
position.
There is more to it. Our community needs to be
educated the right way. Only a few of us, including
you, have the vision of how to do it. I seek avery day
help from here to Washington DC on this. I will like
to share some of my ideas and some how help each
other.
The main problem amoung us is that we want to control
everything on our own. Be what in Puerto Rico we call
a ” Cacique”. People do not understand that, it is not
about opening a “Colmadito” on the corner, but their
is so many people and communities out there that if
you try to run a business on your own you will get
burned. However, if you get the right people you will
be able to accomplish more on an easy way. That is the
NUEVA YORK – En medio de la controversia en torno al futuro de El Museo de El Barrio, ya se han comenzado a presentar nombres para sustituir a su directora, Susana Torruella Leval, que abandonará el puesto el 30 de este mes.
Hay quienes piensan, como el conocido ex juez John Carro -miembro de su junta de directores- que “no se puede ser excluyente” y que el Museo debe dar cabida a otros grupos latinoamericanos.
Carro recordó la exitosa exhibición que todavÃa presenta el Museo, de las obras de los fenecidos artistas mexicanos Diego Rivera y Frida Khalo, que ha sido visitada por 16,200 personas.
El Museo logró una destacada reseña en The New York Times, donde fue catalogado como “un indispensable recurso” para la ciudad de Nueva York.
“Como miembro de la Junta le escribà a Russell Reynolds y les dije que estando en una comunidad puertorriqueña y siendo un Museo puertorriqueño, es un factor importante que tienen que tener en cuenta al seleccionar un nuevo director ejecutivo”, afirmó.
La Junta de Directores tiene la responsabilidad de elegir al nuevo director para sustituir a Torruella Leval, quien por ocho años dirigió el Museo y que renunció alegando razones personales.
Carro, que favorece que el Museo permanezca en El Barrio -en la famosa Milla de los Museos en la Quinta Avenida-, cree firmemente que esta institución ha cumplido la misión para la cual fue creada.
“Hubo tiempos muy malos, en los que apenas tenÃa dinero, pero creo que hemos superado todas las dificultades y que el Museo está mejor que nunca”, sostuvo.
El presidente de la Junta de Directores, el pintor Tony Bechara, señaló por su parte a el diario La Prensa que el Museo tiene la obligación moral de ayudar a otras comunidades en desarrollo.
Kultural Genocide and other Juracanes……..
The conventions of euro-western society have created implications of identity crisis in its determinist attitude toward restraining any Pan American political, aesthetic and or cultural pluralism. A Museo representing a community is in need of like minded ambassadors and diplomats. Puerto Rico and Boricuas have come of age and have opened the pathways for generations of Latino Americanos and other people of Caribbean descent; our very own unclassifiable physigonomy has allowed us the proctorship and to be procurers of our mutual Latino aesthetic destinies and evolution.
As an artist actively politically grass-rooted I am appalled by the idea of this evident colonial mentality.
Building EL MUSEO has been the efforts of many in this community now called an ethnic corridor.Give me a break! Lets not let this one slip through all the bogus paper chase. And I don’t want to hear that there aren’t or weren’t any qualifiable professionals in Museum Management of Puerto Rican descent. Even the decision to attach a Deputy of sort without the consent or a communal public forum is suspicious. This free market attitude is a white-washed excuse for the further abuse of power by a cadre of intellectual facist art mongers. there isn’t an identity crisis in the Puerto Rican community never was and lets take a look at how much we have through our struggles as a Puerto Rican nation changed and improved the entry to countless of others after us. We deserve the right to representation after all the exploitation, and our crucial and criticla role in both North and Latin American History. The Museo of el BArrio for EL BARRIO and todos los Barrios of the world. Need I translate!? Remember the PARK PLAZA -remember the home of the MAMBO and or the Smithsonian dipping their fingers into our vianda. The Raices Museum needs to be addressed as well! We are all not defeated theres a contigency of advocacy out here and axe y miles(yes miles & kilometros) of gracias to all of you concerned and this sophisticated cyberforum of PRDREAMS. As i heard while walking across the central mountains east to west post the biggest Hurricane in recent years: “TODAVIA VIVO!” Do you want me to translate-NO ya basta -APRENDE!
Kultural genocide el otro terrorismo.
Support from other Latinos
The question of who will become the next executive director of el Museo del Barrio has really brought home the changing demographic of el Barrio and of New York in general. It seems to me that only those who are Puerto Rican or of Puerto Rican decent have an issue with what is unfolding. Other Latinos seem to basically fall in line with the move towards elitism, commericalism and the conscious effort to “de-puertoricanize” the museum–which is basically read as creating a more generic Latino and Latin American identity.
This is really just a lay impression from conversations I’ve had and does not reflect any survey or objective evaluation or collected data.
The idealism and courage of the founders
I’ve been away and just read Carolina Gonzalez’ self-described “long post” on el Museo del Barrio. At the risk of being the final word, much of Carolina’s observations are consistent with my previous comment, however, I
would not characterize 25 years of struggle to keep el Museo del Barrio responsive to the community “a mythical moment.” It really does a disservice to those artists who, denied access to normal exhibition channels, invented their own. The Museo’s exhibition history will substantiate that it has a long and representative history in El Barrio and
it will also reveal when this fine institution started veering away from its mission.
A little known fact is that prior to the founding of the Museo, many of these same artists had gone into the Metropolitan Museum of Art and taken over its administrative offices to demand representation. Their idealism and courage to challenge the prevailing cultural elitism and to invent that which had never existed before is worthy of admiration and reflection. This history provides a context to the issues we are confronting today.
It is not unlike the history of the founding in 1972 of “Realidades,” the first Latino-produced show on PBS, which took place after another group of Puerto Rican/Latino cultural activists took over the broadcasting studio of
Channel 13 during one of its proverbial pledge drives. There are many lessons to be learned from this history.
In the near future, PRdream.com will be presenting this history — in case people are interested. Actually, EN FOCO’s book signing party to celebrate its NUEVA LUZ Commemorative Issue, this coming July 12, might be a good way to begin to become familiar with that history.
Coping with changing Latino demographics
NALIPsters,
I’ll stick to addressing the Museo issue, since I actually have had very positive experiences with NALIP.
I actually got to see an earlier draft of the El Museo letter — which incidentally, I don’t think Judith had a hand in composing — where Puerto Rican was emphasized over Latino, and mentioned it to those who asked for my
comments. The reference was changed throughout to “Puerto Rican/Latino” and that’s fine by me.
There are a number of institutions — museums/galleries, academic departments, political advocacy groups — nationally that were founded by a specific group — primarily by Puerto Ricans in the East Coast and Chicanos in the West Coast. And of those that have survived, all have had to cope
with changing Latino demographics. Each insitution has dealt with these changes — and their changing constituencies — differently. Some people get defensive, others adapt. Most Chicano Studies departments are still called Chicano Studies departments, even when they offer classes on other groups, and it was a big discussion to add “Hispanic Caribbean” to Rutgers’ Puerto Rican Studies Department, which is currently headed by a Dominican scholar and covers all the Caribbean equally. Personally, I get tired of spending a lot of time fighting about the names of things and prefer to fight over the content and vision. It’s been a long time since El Museo only displayed local work or Puerto Rican work, if there ever really was this mythical moment. And some of the direction that it has moved in of late I thought was
healthy.
To me the question is deeper — how do El Museo and other Latino organizations make their programming and administration true to its original and evolving mission and vision? How do these organizations appeal to a Latino public (and guess what? A lot of us don’t patronize these institutions as much as we could or should) and also appeal to other constituencies? I’m not Chinese but always get a lot out of exhibits at the Museum of the Chinese in the Americas (which changed its name when it started work on Chinese emigration to Latin America), and the Bronx Museum
of the Arts has also done a great job in representing its local constituency but finding ways to raise its profile with other audiences (see the recent show where you could have pieces in the Museum’s permanent collection manicured onto a set of nails — cheeky and smart).
Sorry for the long post, but I do think about the present and future of Latino organizations a lot, and think it’s important for NALIP, which I think is a very promising organization, and its members, to understand the larger issues and trends. It can only make us stronger as Latino artists and institution builders.
Thanks for yr patience, Carolina Gonzalez
RE: The idealism and courage of the founders
I am in agreance with Judith in that little is known of the history of institution such as El Museo Del Barrio, El Taller Boricua, “Realidades (which was produced by recently pardonned nacionista, Dylcia Pagan), and other organization that now provide the services previously denied to people of color & foreign languages.
It would be too easy to jump on the generation bandwagon and talk about “silver spoons” but, I am not. What I will re-iterate is the ease with which many are willing to join in the ethnic explosion bandwagon and buy into the trend of gentrification and globalization without fully understanding or researching the ramifications of what is lost and who gains the short & long term benefits. If organizations like The Studio Museum in Harlem were to follow suit, many artists will , again, be excluded, as they were during the civil rights era from exhibition & performance spaces.
The demand for INclusion has historically been that of who Judith has written of Latinos, Asians, Natives, and the Africans diaspora into the mainstream institutions. We deserve to be patronized by the mainstream as much as we have patronized their system, institutions, and society. It should be nothing else than equity and civil respect to ask that the mainstream that has ignored and disregarded ethnic communities qualified themselves to be inclusive & supportive as we have been.
Today, we (Latinos) have leverage, $500 billion. We would also be playing “los pendejo” if we believe or think that there are other incentives and motivations, or interests. If it were not for the national consumer power and/or vote, there would be no explosion and the question of whether or not the Director of El Museo continues to be a Puerto RIcan would not be an issue.
A Museum for the People
A Museum for the People
By Aurora Flores
9 July, 2002
The revolution is back and this time… it’s cultural. The search for a new director for El Museo del Barrio has begun behind closed doors excluding the community that gave it birth. Notwithstanding, educators, activists and professionals in harmony with Community Board 11 are clamoring for representation in the selection process that has locked them out since the new board took over in 1986.
Sprung from the pain of heretofore voiceless Puertorican artists, activists and educators struggling for identity, history and expression 33 years ago, El Museo del Barrio today enjoys increased funding, personnel, prestige and professionalism over any other Latino arts organization. Yet, there are no Puerto Rican curators or educators employed at El Museo. A rehabbed firehouse at 104th between Lexington and Third, founded in 1979 as a community art
school once run by local El Museo artists, stands abandoned. The Three Kings Day parade, initiated as an East Harlem tradition since 1978, has not grown in funding, stature or pageantry since El Museo=92s new board took over. This is even more telling when not one board member was present for this historically and racially diverse parade into East Harlem even while newly elected
[multibillionaire] Mayor Michael Bloomberg made this event his first public appearance.
The bigger issue then becomes how to reconcile the needs of a still marginalized community with the demands of the fine arts world? Without people of color and community artists on this elite and powerful board, that issue will remain unresolved. El Museo del Barrio will eventually follow the lead of The Museum
of the City of New York to an “improved location” (code word white) unless the City and politicians intervene to revamp this board.
Yet, El Barrio is growing so fast culturally that the “nubohemian” movement of the cultural corridor will pick up where El Museo leaves off. El Taller Boricua, ironically enough instituted in response to the elitist exclusion of Nuyorican artists by another now defunct institution (Friends of Puerto Rico that also placed more value on Eurocentric Latino artists than the
urban up and coming Latinos), is leading the new movement of community arts organizations committed to establishing a social consciousness for identity. The collective mission of these organizations mirror El Museo’s nascent calling to educate, communicate and demonstrate a bond of solidarity that is Puerto Rican in focus and Latin American in scope. Here in the cultural corridor,
art doesn’t necessarily need to be in galleries as much as it needs to be directly connected with the everyday reality of its people.
On the longest day of the year, June 21st, an “open door” art and cultural showcase took place on 106th and Lexington that recalled the bohemian Village days of the 70s. Led by young artists and poets of Mixta Gallery, artistic doors were flung open to the streets where El Taller brought the gallery outdoors while individual artists opened their studios to the public.
Musicians and performers danced and played on the pavements from 105th to 107th while community folks stopped, stared, inquired and participated in the mirth. The Graffiti Hall of Fame sported a brand new tag for the evening. La Fonda and La Cantina restaurants displayed art and artists on their menus while James de la Vega’s chalk scribblings lined the pavements to his shop. Every Thursday,
Taller Boricua hosts “Julia=92s Jam” a cultural smorgasbord of art, music, dance, poetry and literature at a formerly abandoned elementary school rescued from “shelter status” and salvaged as the Julia de Burgos Cultural Center, sporting art galleries, a theater in the round, and artists residencies.
The mission East of Fifth Avenue is clear for these arts organizations
that truly are the “souls of the cultural community.” As for El Museo del Barrio, well… “let them eat their cake.” Once inside the lofty gates of the fine arts world, they’ll soon discover they are neither equal in status or funding to the mainstream institutions that have kept us out for so long.
Aurora Flores is a journalist, educator and cultural activist living in El Barrio.
Rambling discourse on el Museo and class struggle
El Museo del Barrio embodies Latino class struggle in the United States. Within the context of the U.S., el Museo stands perfectly poised, if not teetering on a tightwire, of class struggle, between los hacendados and los campesinos, los patrones y los trabajadores, the white and the brown, the cosmopolitan and the communal. It is currently one of the most fascinating American institutions to watch as it reinvents itself again: From a community organization to a city institution, representing Puerto Rican artists and other Latinos and Latin Americans, to a city institution, representing Latino and Latin American artists.
It is comparable to the situation occurring within the Latino Studies departments in the university, although, here it is an internal matter.
Part of the eternally nagging problem is that Art is by its very nature elitist and class bound. Ergo, the art appreciator, the connoisseur, the art consumer is historically and presently the rich or the upper-middle-class.
Of course, there are always exceptions–and markets are invented, where none exist.
With art, when markets are invented or where there is an attempt to market more widely–as is the trend in museums today–without the concommitant education or actually, cultivation–what happens is basically a kind of “dumbing down.” The commercialization of art is by no means to be mistaken for truly creating an art of and for the people.
Elite images are appropriated and placed on T-shirts, posters, fingernails, tatoos. This may be fun and great but it is not accessing art for the people or the masses. It is the kind of appropriation Latinos and other Third World people have always been accustomed to brought home to roost. That is, a tearing down or pulling asunder of what a society considers of value, sacred, etc., to serve the purposes of capital.
Within the context of el Museo and its own struggle with the institutional establishment of art museums of NYC, where it must face off against the likes of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, etc., it has “stayed in the ring,” to use a boxing metaphor. But joining Museum Mile has meant moving further away from its original community El Barrio. Thus, rather than, affirming its heritage and community roots while professionalizing itself and attracting greater funding while clearly maintaining its roots and demarcating its turf, as in the case of the Studio Museum of Harlem, el Museo del Barrio has sought to join Museum Mile and has wanted to drop the “del Barrio” part of its name to add something to the effect of “el Museo Nacional de Latinoamericanos” or the “National Museum of Latin Americans,” not unlike the National Museum of Native Americans, clearly demarcating a national turf that has no connection to its original founding community.
Arguably, foundations and African Americans see Harlem as the center of black cultural life in the U.S. which is not the case with El Barrio. Most importantly, private foundations, public or government funders and private corporate donors, pressure at least Puerto Rican organizations to generalize their names to justify their spending by extending “the market.”
This is to say, that partly for survival and partly because the museum envisioned itself as a Fifth Avenue institution and, therefore, I think rightfully, identified itself as comparable to the Met or MOMA, in order to say we are indeed of the dominant culture’s caliber, these reasons would necessarily, move el Museo away from its historically, non-elitist roots in the artistic community that existed in El Barrio.
El Barrio itself, however, has also changed and is currently undergoing a tremendous transformation that may in fact cause it to lose its Puerto Rican identity altogether and, potentially, its Latino identity. Ironically, el Museo reflects this community in transition and nearly mirrors it except for–perhaps–the loss of Latino identity in its entirety. Although, there is no reason to believe that the board or the administration has to be Puerto Rican, Latino or Latin American in order for it to be a museum of Latin American Art.
Within this context of trends in American museums, pressures from funders, and vision issues, el Museo embodies the class struggle of Latinos carried forward to the U.S. The artists who founded el Museo were not from the upper classes of Puerto Rico, they were the sons and daughters of the jibaros, los campesinos de Puerto Rico.
This is very important to understanding el Museo’s class struggle in relation to el Barrio, its community of origin.
El Museo is inherently an elite institution that was founded by non-elite artists and community activists who may even have had socialist leanings as the youth and intelligentsia of the period did. This has implications for today and is at the heart of the conflict today between the community and el Museo. More later.
Search for New Director
I want to express my concern over the search process for the new director of El Museo del Barrio. As a cultural warrior of color who has seen numerous cultural institutions of color lose their identity and alter their mission in order to fit into the latest “national initiative”, it concerns me that the search committee for this prestigious and important cultural institution does not represent the very people it was founded to serve. The mission of this museum is clear and should remain unaltered, regardless of the “latest cultural trends”. All too often the fate of our history and the cultural memory of our people rests in the hands of people who are not us. Our stories, whether told visually, literally, or musically, must be told by us. The vision of El Museo del Barrio must remain clear and focused on the people for which this institution was founded, Puerto Ricans! It is not as though we have a plethora of such institutions and can afford to lose one to the multicultural craze (translation: anything but the original group an institution was designed to serve!) I urge you to recompose the search committee to represent the constituency and artistic community El Museo del Barrio was intended to serve.
A Luta Continua,
Vicki Meek, artist, curator, cultural critic
Colonized and cannibalized
Picture this: A colonized people, who to this day, remain so, for better or for worse, half a century ago, sends half of its sons and daughters to its colonizer’s land in search of a better life.
Picture this: Among those who settled in New York City were artists and artesans. They came to El Barrio too — but in order to paint, sculpt, write, direct, act, photograph. Finding no place to exhibit, they agitated, demonstrated, and eventually created spaces of their own, El Museo del Barrio among them. Other Latinos too were invited to exhibit, but the museo’s heart and head remained Puerto Rican–reflecting its historical legacy and its surrounding community.
Picture this: Thirty years later the community around el museo has altered. While predominantly Puerto Rican, or Nuyorican, there is a substantial presence of African Americans, Mexicans, Dominicans and other Latinos. The board changes, Puerto Ricans are nolonger a majority. The leadership eventually changes, and will Torruellas-Leval be the last Puerto Rican Director, presiding over its most radical transformation? She has not groomed anyone to replace her and, thereby, has left el museo vulnerable to being cannibalized by Latinos who do not reflect the community–whether the Puerto Ricans, Nuyoricans, Mexicans, etc. These are rich Latin Americans, of varying ethnicities, not even necessarily Latin-based, who are ignorant of the struggles of the Latinos stateside, let alone, Puerto Ricans, and have more in common with the residents of the Upper East Side–and I don’t mean the Northern part–I mean all the streets between the East 80’s and East 50’s.
There is a mission here to cannibalize El Museo and it seems, somewhat inevitable unless there is a clear trajectory that involves some members of the board of trustees and staff of the museo who might feel the current changes are undesirable.
Message to El Museo Del Barrio
“We Are Watching You!”
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Please join concerned community residents, merchants, artists and cultural activist regarding the practices of EL Museo Del Barrio. Born in School District #4, the Museo Del Barrio educational program was created in response to the growing concerns of East Harlem Puerto Rican parents and community activist for the need to celebrate and respect the richness of the Puerto Rican community. Incorporated by Marta Moreno Vega, as Los Amigos del Museo del Barrio it created the transitional process and evolution of the program into a cultural advocacy institution that had never existed before. Though their tireless and selfless efforts they created a voice and opportunities for the Puerto Rican artist community to be valued and respected. Thirty years later the Museo the mission has changed, the Board of Directors has no community representation, and local artist access is limited.
We ask for:
-Community participation in search for a new director
-Board Policies for the community distribution of unwanted catalogues instead of throwing them away
-Policies to promote local Puerto Rican artist, history, culture and preservation efforts for Puerto Rican art and artifacts
A ‘Museo’ Moves Away From Its Barrio Identity
A ‘Museo’ Moves Away From Its Barrio Identity
July 21, 2002
By DENNY LEE
The neighborhood north of East 96th Street is sometimes
called East Harlem or Spanish Harlem, but local Puerto
Ricans affectionately call it El Barrio. So in 1969, when
local artists and activists created a scrappy museum in a
city classroom, the museum virtually named itself: El Museo
del Barrio.
But now, as the 33-year-old institution searches for a new
director, some are wondering if the museum has symbolically
dropped the words “El Barrio” from its name in pursuit of
broader goals.
“There is too much focus on Eurocentric Latin American
artists,” said Aurora Flores, a Puerto Rican activist and
former public relations consultant for the museum. “The
board wants to eliminate its Nuyorican identity, which to
them means lower class.”
At issue are matters of both substance and style. Critics
contend that recent exhibitions have strayed too far from
the museum’s ghetto origins, focusing on artists from
Mexico, Brazil and other Latin American countries. Its
officials, they say, are more comfortable in boardrooms
than bodegas. The neighborly sense of belonging, they
lament, is no longer.
“People don’t see themselves on the wall anymore,” said
Juan Flores, a professor of black and Puerto Rican studies
at Hunter College. “It’s not their museum, but someone
else’s.”
The controversy dates to 1994, when the museum amended its mission statement to expand the focus to “all Latin
Americans,” not just Puerto Ricans. The departure last
month of its dynamic director, Susana Torruella Leval, who
had held the post for nine years, has given critics a focal
point.
“We want to be a part of the selection process,” said Debby
QuiÃ’ones, a member of Community Board 11, which has
embarked on a campaign called, “We Are Watching You,” to
influence the hiring of Ms. Torruella Leval’s successor.
But museum trustees say they have a moral duty to transcend El Museo’s humble beginnings. The city’s Latino population, they note, now includes immigrants from many Caribbean and Latin American countries.
“If the criticism is that we’re not an ethnocentric gallery, then that’s fair,” said Tony Bechara, the chairman of El Museo’s board. “But our ambition and our mission demand that we become a world-class museum, open to all people.”
Mr. Bechara also rejects the notion that El Museo, which
has an annual budget of $3 million, has grown apart from El
Barrio. In keeping with its classroom origins, the museum
teaches students throughout the local school district about
art and Latino culture. Moreover, he argues, works by him
and other Puerto Rican artists represent 60 percent of the
museum’s every-other-year survey of Latino art and other
shows.
Still, tensions are expected to rise as the choice of a
successor to Ms. Torruella Leval draws near. “It’s a natural part of a museum’s growing pains,” said Anne Ackerson, director of the Museum Association of New York. “When you’re singled out as the representative of an entire community, you carry a lot on your shoulders.”
Some talking points re: El Museo del Barrio
These talking points were went from Yasmin RAmirez. It’s important that we become as informed as possible so they don’t continue to dismiss our arguments when we go to the press. We’re writing a response to NYTimes piece. but if any of you has opportunity to be heard, here’s more ammunition.
Some talking points re: El Museo del Barrio
A short article entitled A Museo Moves Away from its Barrio Identity was published in Sunday’s New York Times City Section on July 21 regarding El Museo del Barrio’s search for a new director (and new direction). Written by Denny Lee, the article suggests that the point of contention between El Museo del Barrio‚s board and the Puerto Rican community is rooted in issues of class-that the board’s elite composition has steered the museum away from its “ghetto” or better said community based working class origins. However, because Tony Bechara is quoted at the end of the article, the average reader is left with the impression that the Puerto Ricans artists, activists and scholars who express discontent with the museum‚s Latin American focus are “ethnocentric” and that the museum is simply trying to fulfill its “moral” duty to represent the cultural heritage new immigrants to the city. Of course, we know there is much more to the story than this but how can we get our broader concerns across?
Reviewing at the articles that have been written about El Museo’s conflicts with the community we come across the some myths and sound bytes being repeated over and over that need some “deconstructing.” The following is my response to two claims that mythologize the history El Museo del Barrio.
Myth number 1. El Museo del Barrio was founded by local artists, educators and community activists in a city classroom.” El Museo del Barrio’s origins are “humble.”
Problem – this summary account of el museo’s origins, which el museo del barrio publicizes in one form or another in all its promotional material, eliminates the radical objectives that lay behind the founding of El Museo, namely to form a community based museum run for and by working class people and artists of Puerto Rican/Latino descent. Moreover, this account of El Museo del Barrio eliminates the name of the world renown vanguard Nuyorican artist who founded the institution-Rafael Montanez Ortiz thus participating in the erasure of a Latino artist from cannon of art history in the United States. Of all things, a museum that reputedly wants to protect and preserve the history art and culture of the Latin Americans in the United States must be reproached for what is by now a deliberate omission of this valued artist’s name.
Some background info
El Museo del Barrio was the outgrowth of a city-wide effort on the part of Puerto Rican and African American artists, educators and community activists to gain community control over education and social services. Because El Museo would not have been funded by the City without agitation on the part of these activists, it is right that we should think of the origins of El Museo as a community based working class institution . However, we should also recognize that it was founded and directed by a sole individual in 1969, the vanguard artist Rafael aka Ralph Montanez Ortiz, a first generation new york born Puerto Rican or Nuyorican. Ortiz was by no means a humble individual but rather a very well respected and established artist who pioneered the genre of performance and video art in the United States and indeed the world. Although Ortiz was already in the collections of the Musuem of Modern Art in 1962, he did not want to be part of the conservative white identified art market. Instead, he was part of the art workers coaliation and other radical organizations that protested the elitism and racism of New York museums and galleries. Ortiz promoted the idea that cultural institutions that garnered public monies must take the public into account in their programs and policies-thus, from the beginning El Museo del Barrio was conceived as a community based institution that would offer an alternative to institutions that were run by upper class elites. Although El Museo has had different directors since Ortiz, it is safe to say that Marta Moreno Vega, Jack Augueros, and Petra Barreras shared this fundamental belief that El Museo del Barrio should be accountable and open to the Puerto Rican/Latino community. Ironically since the “expansion” of El Museo’s mission in 1994 under the direction of Susanna Leval and current Chair Tony Bechara we have seen the constriction of community participation by Latinos in El Museo. At present there is no active community advisory board and no artist in residence program for Latino artists. Indeed, The last artist in residence at El Museo del Barrio was Pepon Osorio back in 1991. He credits his work at El Museo with contributing to immense success today as an artist and McArthur Fellow-Imagine how many other artists of Pepon’s caliber El Museo could have been nurturing all these years-the lost opportunities are disheartening. El Museo has also failed in its outreach to Latino scholars. It does not sustain collegial relationships with other Latino Cultural/Educational institutions. And, recent attempts by certain centers to collaborate with El Museo have fallen on death ears. Lastly, the Dominican community, which rivals the Puerto Rican community in size and influence in New York has no representative on the board and Dominican artists have not had much exposure in El Museo’s exhibitions. African Americans and Afro-Latinos are also conspicuously absent from the board, staff and exhibitions in El Museo del Barrio save the occasional show on Afro-Caribbean religions like Santeria. On the other hand, non-Spanish speaking white North Americans have become commonplace in El Museo’s executive staff and board while Latino scholars and professionals are relegated to temporary “consulting” positions.
Myth no. 2 – “El Museo has to transcend its Puerto Rican roots.” Puerto Ricans who criticize the expansion of El Museo‚s mission are ethnocentric and/or anti-latin American
Problem: These statements assume that El Museo was once Puerto Rican and now it is not. The facts are much more nuanced. Firstly, Latinos from other groups participated in Museo exhibitions even when it was reputedly a Puerto Rican museum; (2) El Museo del Barrio continues to be Puerto Rican Institution despite all attempts to eliminate the presence of Puerto Ricans on the staff and board because its permanent collection is largely made up of ancient and contemporary Puerto Rican art and artifacts- (3) Critics of El Museo are not ethnocentric. Practically all the Puerto Rican artists, activists and scholars that I have spoken to about El Museo do no subscribe to the idea that El Museo del Barrio should be exclusively Puerto Rican.
info
A cursory look at El Museo del Barrio’s exhibition history over the past 30 years will prove that Latin American artists have been participating in exhibitions even when it was a “Puerto Rican” museum. The Puerto Rican centered-mission never precluded other Latinos from being part of El Museo del Barrio if they so choose just as Puerto Ricans and now more Dominicans have been welcome at the African American based Studio Museum. The expansion in the mission has been more a case of a fiduciary duty on the part of the board than anything to do with morality or transcendence. It is clear that these elite board members would not give to largely working class Puerto Rican institution unless some modifications were made to its mission and staff. And, of course insulting to suggest that we must transcend being Puerto Rican as though originating from Latin American was a higher stage of evolution.
El Museo may try to transcend its Puerto Rican origins but its permanent collection remains about 75 percent Puerto Rican, a factor which makes it a Puerto Rican institution regardless of what the board now desires it to be. El Museo does not have a sizable Latin American collection at present and there is no acquisition plan or donation in the wings that I am aware of. The board will have to pony up a lot of money to buy enough pieces of Latin American art to make El Museo a “Latin American Museum” and so far the board is doing nothing but fronting a Latin American façade via temporary exhibitions.
We can and must insist that there be some Puerto Ricans or latinos/even Spanish speaking north americans with demonstrable knowledge of Puerto Rican art and culture on the curatorial, education and public relations staff of El Museo del Barrio because the history and permanent collection of this institution demand people with such a background. If you have a collection from a certain region or ethnic group or artistic movement then you must hire curators and educators that are conversant with the subject matter. This is not ethnocentricity at work but just good museum practice and plain old common sense.
At the same time, I have not met one person who has said El Museo should be exclusively Puerto Rican. Rather, the greater concern is that El Museo remain “community” based which in this case means that it be responsive and relevant to “working class NY Latinos” and their culture and lifestyle, .that there be more programs for artists, community involvement and exhibitions that seriously deal with issues that affect Puerto Ricans/ latinos. This can and is being done at other institutions.
The fact is that mainstream museums like MOMA/PS 1 and the Americas Society are putting on much more radical exhibitions dealing with Latin American and Latino culture than El Museo. Take a look at the Mexico City show at PS 1. It will blow you away with its display of artists who examine the way class affects how bodies (people) are valued and evaluated in contemporary Mexico. Meanwhile the Americas Society is sponsoring a vanguard gallery of artists that formed a space called La Panaderia in Mexico City. If El Museo were putting on shows like that I would have no problem with it going “Latin American” because it would be bringing artists and art to El Barrio that that are relative to El Museo’s socially conscious roots.
I wish I had the ability to write a pithy sound-byte which conveys that critics of El Museo del Barrio’s current policies are not opposed to Latin Americans per se. Rather what people are reacting to is that El Museo’s new “expanded” board is bringing to our table old unwanted baggage related to nexus between race, class and privilege in Latin America that is absolutely contrary to the progressive values of this community based institution. There is good reason to protest the whitewashed composition of its board and staff and the condescending and sometimes outright false statements that the board has issued about the origins of the institution and the objectives of the Puerto Rican community. Lastly, it is justifiable under the circumstances to insist on community involvement in choosing a new director since it is clear that the board of directors is steering the institution in the wrong direction.
Rally to save El Museo del Barrio
Rally to save El Museo del Barrio
There will be a community rally on Thursday, August 15, 2002 7p.m. — 8:30 p.m. @ 104th Street and fifth Avenue at the garden gate.
Call Debbie Quiñones for more information: 212.831.8929.
The revolution is back and this time it’s cultural. The search for a new director for El Museo del Barrio has begun behind closed doors excluding the community that gave it birth. Notwithstanding, educators, activists and professionals in harmony with Community Board 11 are clamoring for representation in the selection process that has locked them out since the new board took over in 1986.
Sprung from the pain and struggle of heretofore voiceless Puerto Rican artists, activists and educators struggling for identity, history and expression 33 years ago, El Museo del Barrio today enjoys increased funding, personnel, prestige and professionalism over any other Latino arts organization. Yet, there are no Puerto Rican curators or educators
employed at El Museo which is housed in a city-owned building. A rehabbed firehouse at 104th between Lexington and Third, founded in 1979 as a community art school once run by local El Museo artists, stands abandoned. The Three Kings Day parade, initiated as an East Harlem tradition since 1978, has not grown in funding, stature or pageantry
since El Museo’s new board took over. This is even more telling when not one board member was present for this historically and racially diverse parade into East Harlem even while newly elected Mayor Michael Bloomberg made this his first public appearance.
The bigger issue then becomes how to reconcile the needs of a still marginalized community with the demands of the fine arts world? Without people of color and community artists on this elite and powerful board of “culture vultures” who have excluded the community that created their positions, that issue will remain unresolved. El Museo del Barrio will
eventually follow the lead of The Museum of the City of New York to an “improved location” (code word white) unless the City and politicians intervene to revamp this board who doesn’t know anything about our cultural struggle for social identification and whose only concern is their own prestige and power.
Yet, El Barrio is growing so fast culturally that the “NuBohemian” movement of the cultural corridor will pick up where El Museo leaves off. El Taller Boricua (the Puerto Rican Workshop, Inc.) for example was, ironically enough, instituted in 1969 in response to the elitist exclusion of Nuyorican artists by another, now defunct institution,
Friends of Puerto Rico that also placed more value on Eurocentric Latino artists over the urban up and coming Latinos of New York. Today, El Taller Boricua is leading the new movement of community arts organizations committed to establishing a social consciousness for identity. The collective mission of these organizations mirror El Museo’s nascent calling to educate, communicate and demonstrate a bond of solidarity that is Puerto Rican in focus and Latin American in scope. Here in the cultural corridor, art doesn‚t necessarily need to be in galleries as much as it needs to be directly connected to the everyday reality of its people.
On the longest day of the year, June 21st, an „open door‰ art and cultural showcase took place on 106th and Lexington that recalled the bohemian Village days of the 70s. Led by young artists and poets of Mixta Gallery, artistic doors were flung open to the streets where El Taller brought the gallery outdoors while individual artists opened their studios to the public. Musicians and performers danced and played
on the pavements from 104th to 107th while community folks stopped, stared, inquired and participated in the mirth. The Graffiti Hall of Fame sported a brand new tag for the evening. La Fonda and La Cantina restaurants displayed art and artists on their menus while James de la Vega’s chalk scribblings lined the pavements to his shop. Every Thursday, Taller Boricua hosts “Julia’s Jam” a cultural smorgasbord of
art, music, dance, poetry and literature at a formerly abandoned elementary school rescued from “shelter status” and salvaged as the Julia de Burgos Cultural Center, sporting art galleries, a theater in the round, and artists residencies.
The mission East of Fifth Avenue is clear for these arts organizations that truly are the “souls of the cultural community.” As for El Museo del Barrio, well “let them eat their cake.” Once inside the lofty gates of the fine arts world, they’ll soon discover they are neither equal in
status or funding to the mainstream institutions they so covet that have kept us out for so long.
Aurora Flores
El Museo: Its ours, so let’s go into our pockets!
I sincerely support and believe that the new Executive Director for El Museo del Barrio should be Puerto Rican and one that can enhance & create a Puerto Rican agenda & perspective relating to our Puerto Rican contributions; however, the whole Puerto Rican community in New York City (and in the state and nation with proper marketing and promotion to reach them), must increase the level of participation and attandence as well as provide financial support. The fact is that we are very bad at supporting our own institutions. That’s why we have very few.
Meeting to discuss el Museo
Dear colleagues: On August 15th there will be another protest at El museo and another round of articles is sure to come out. I am hoping that you can make a meeting on ****Wednesday, August 7 at 6:00 ****at the Center for Puerto Rican Studies Solarium. The idea is to talk over ideas on how best to put pressure on el museo for some community involvement and to respond to the board’s unfair characterizations of the protesters and, most importantly, to consider how we can be more effective critics and advocates for Puerto Rican issues in the Latinized and neoliberal City, all in the spirit of inclusivity. These issues will likely continue to be pressing and important in the future. Please come, RSVP and most important, spread the word to others you think can contribute to discussion.
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Message to El Museo Del Barrio
“We Are Watching You!”
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Please join concerned community residents, merchants, artists and cultural activist regarding the practices of EL Museo Del Barrio.
Born in School District #4, the Museo Del Barrio educational program was created in response to the growing concerns of East Harlem Puerto Rican parents and community activist for the need to celebrate and respect the richness of the Puerto Rican community. Incorporated by Marta Moreno Vega, as Los Amigos del Museo del Barrio it created the transitional process and evolution of the program into a cultural advocacy institution that had never existed before. Though their tireless and selfless efforts they created a voice and opportunities for the Puerto Rican artist community to be valued and respected. Thirty years later the Museo the mission has changed, the Board of Directors has no community representation, and local artist access is limited.
We ask for:
–Community participation in search for a new director
–Board Policies for the community distribution of unwanted catalogues instead of throwing them away
–Policies to promote local Puerto Rican artist, history, culture and preservation efforts for Puerto Rican art and artifacts
RE: Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Debbie, please scroll down & see my coments. Are you going to post on online petition.
Information flyer for demo
As some of you know there is another demonstration by community board 11. Some of us, including people from El Barrio, students and artists, met to draft an info flyer. While there are obviously a lot of different views about this issue, we wanted to be as informative as possible, in order to avoid being misconstrued by our ëfriendlyà press (see below). Please note that it is important to be positive at the demo because of the September 11 function that is also taking place then (it would be easy to look bad by attacking el Museo when it is extending a gesture of support to the Latino community that suffered from the WTC disaster). Please forward to others.
Community Board # 11’s
Cultural Affairs Committee
Invites You To:
Send A Message to
El Museo del Barrio
“In The Search For A New Director,
We Are Watching You!”
The Community Must Be Involved In The Process
Community Rally
August 15, 2002 **From 7-8:30 p.m.**
104th Street & Fifth Avenue
At The Garden Gate
Information Flyer:
As Puerto Rican and Latino/a Artists, community members, scholars, writers, and members of the Puerto Rican and Latino community at large we express discontent that El Museo del BarrioÃs expanded mission to represent all Caribbean and Latin American cultures has resulted in a constriction of community participation.Â
Why We Care:
-The Museum’s collection houses the largest collection of Puerto Rican art in the United States, comprising at least 75% of its collection. The collective culture and visual evidence of Puerto Rican art, and a history against elitism in the art establishment are housed in this institution.
– El Museo was created by a group of Puerto Rican artists and community activists to exhibit the works of U.S. Latino artists and provide arts education to the Latino community. It provided an innovative and groundbreaking alternative to the elitist art museums and galleries of New York.
-Puerto Ricans, Latino and U.S. born Latin American artists are still marginalized in mainstream art museums and galleries. There is as much need for El Museo’s founding mission to represent the Puerto Rican and Latino artistic community and provide creative exhibitions for the Latino constituency today.
-The board and staff raised nearly a half million dollars for the present exhibition of Frida Khalo and Diego Rivera (the Gelman Collection) while exhibitions of U.S. Latino and Puerto Rican artists are woefully underfunded.
What we Want:
-Adherence to El Museo’s current mission which is “to represent the arts and culture of Puerto Ricans and Latin Americans in the United States,” in a balanced and equitable basis.Â
-A comprehensive exhibition policy that is consistent with the nature of the collection and with the make up of the U.S. Latino community which is primarily Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban and Mexican-American.
-Puerto Ricans and Latinos in Upper Management positions.
-An Artist-In-Residence Program and an acquisition policy for the work of U.S. Latino artists.
-That at least 25% of El Museo’s Board of Trustees be made up of Latino/a artists, scholars and community members.
-A permanent exhibition space for the Puerto Rican works that were contributed to establish the museum.
-Fiscal accountability of public and private sector monies.
-Community involvement in the selection of the new director.
meeting on 21St and Townhall meeting on *9/26*
The room at the Centro is not available on the 22, but we are booked for *Wednesday 21 from 6-8.* Make a note of the change. As some of you know, the demonstration was a success! And there is a ****Townhall meeting (organized by the Cultural Affairs Committee of Community Board 11) for September 26 at La Guardia House (307 116Street, between 1 and 2 avenue), @ 6:00 PM, ***** We had said that Wednesdays meeting is to strategize re: a possible meeting and for this important event.
letter Yasmin sent to El Museo
Below is a letter Yasmin sent to El Museo. Please remember that we agreed to meet at the Centro on Thursday, August 22 at 6:00 to discuss how to proceed from here. See you all tomorrow! a.d.
From: RAMIREZ, YASMIN
To: ‘sdelvalle@elmuseo.org’; ‘stlpnl@aol.com’
Sent: 8/13/2002 5:48 PM
Dear Susan R. Delvalle, external affairs coordinator and Susana Leval, director emeritus:
I am writing to give you an update on last wednesday’s meeting at the Center for Puerto Rican Studie where artists,
scholars and community activists gathered to discuss their concerns about El Museo del Barrio and plan for the August 15th rally. Firstly, I am happy to inform you that is was a postive and productive meeting. We were able to reach consensus on several key issues that we would like
the board to consider. They are outlined below in the “information sheet” that is being circulated over the internet by the Puerto Rican Studies Association and will be handed out at the demonstration on Thursday. The group decided that they want to meet a week after Thursday’s rally to discuss how best to pursue meetings with the board ,
>set down some possible times and dates, etc. In the meantime, I will be glad to forward your comments and concerns to the group at the next meeting. Since I am temporarily acting as a conduit between the community at large and El Museo it would be good to set some groundrules
so that there are no misunderstandings.
Firstly, you should be aware that I am sending a blind copy of this email to several members of the group in order to keep this process transparent.
Secondly, please send any correspondence you want circulated at the next meeting to my email yramirez@gc.cuny.edu and/or to my home XXXXXXXXX but address the letter in a way that it can be shared with others i.e. to: “Supporters of Community Board 11 Cultural Affairs Committe”.” Also, please bear in mind that I am primarly serving as a conduit between the scholars and artists in the group and El Museo. Ms. Debbie Quinones, who is spearheading the We Are Watching YOu campaign in district 11 should continue to be contacted individually. My role at this time is to lift the burden of passing information from Ms. Quinones’s staff to artists and scholars that live outside District 11.
Thanks again for offering to keep the lines of communication open…yasmin ramirez
El Museo
You ask “why do we need to share” the institution, why not keep it “our own”? The answer is fairly simple: because from Day 1, el Museo had exhibitions about other cultures! Look up the list (of the last 32 years) of all the exhibitions mounted on the walls. It was, is, and will remain a Puertorican museum OPEN to others, to show them about us, but also to show how much we have in common with others….
The founders of el Museo, most if not all were Puertorican, had a compelling vision back then and it continues to this day. Practically the entire board of trustees IS Puertorican. In Manhattan the perception is that it is a “Puertorican museum”.
That, for example, wooden scultptures from Puerto Rico–“santos de palo” which were and still remain in the permanent collection were a cultural phenomenom of Puerto Rico were ALSO found in other countries–therefore they would show the santos from Puerto Rico but also explain and illustrate that that tradition was SHARED by other countries. That it had come from Spain and the Catholic church; That by making sure that children could see these connections to many other cultures they were not alone. That our culture, specifically from PR and its diaspora, was part of a bigger world beyond: it is rich and huge.
Another example is that the famous “Vegigante” masks from Ponce, which el Museo has in its collection to this day were ALSO linked and related to the mask-making traditions of Mexico and other Caribbean cultures. These exhibitions were in place decades ago inside el Museo!
Your children and our children and all children of Puertorican heritage will ALWAYS have access to that permanent collection, they are taking care of it for generations to come.
I think that instead of worrying about “which direction” el Museo is going, we need to support it by going to visit it as often as we can, becoming members (and therefore we become part of el Museo’s community), and make constructive suggestions and recommendations. We need to show el Museo that we are willing to roll up our sleeves to work with them to make it even better: MORE gallery space so that MORE art & culture can be exhibited. This will require MORE $$$$.
I think we can be and do BOTH. el Museo is our premier cultural institution–lets not “tear it down” by having a petty family squabble in public. That only damages the institution.
If you remember there were dark days for el Museo some time ago: its doors were shut down and its director escorted out the door by Marshalls. Do any of you remember THAT? How soon we forget. He was accused of missapropriation of funds–this was a media spectacle from which el Museo had to spend YEARS and YEARS to recover from. No funder wants to give $$$ to controversies, nor does the city of New York.
I think el Museo has done a great job!
UNNECESSARY HYSTERIA
I am very surprised to read some of the claims put out by some people who wish to “re-claim” el Museo del Barrio.
Perhaps settting the record straight might be helpful on some issues:
FACT: El Museo del Barrio WAS founded in a classroom in East Harlem/El Barrio by a group of parents, educators, artists and community leaders. Among them, there WAS Ralph Montanez Ortiz–who WAS Director of el Museo at one point.
From the material put out by el Museo, and the material that is available to those who bother to ask for it in el Museo’s archives, the above FACTS have never been denied, changed, hidden, or distorted. This is a FACT not a “MYTH”.
As to the claim that the importance of the artistic legacy of Ralph Montanez Ortiz, who now teaches at Rutgers University, is being “denied” by el Museo seems to me to be overblown rethoric. The artistic legacy, importance, of any artist (Latino, Puertorican or any descent for that matter)is rarely if never in the hands of a single institution, on the one hand–it requires the building of a consensus by scholars, critics, artists, etc., etc. over a long period of time– and if the artist is alive (which here it is the case) then the artist himself/herself can be looked at for further support and evidence of that vision (does the artist continue in a similar,seminal, trajectory? does the artist vision reach a critical mass? and so on). As far as I know Mr. Montanez Ortiz is very satisfied with his teaching role and the work he produces and has not made any accusation, himself, against el Museo. El museo in fact assisted in the exhibition of his work in other venues and lent its pieces from its own collection to broaden the knowledge base of his work over the last 30 years.
FACT: The current board of trustees did not “take over” el Museo in 1986.
Any museum board of trustess advises, and sets overall policy and has fiduciary responsibility to its institution. The day-to-day management of any institution is delegated to its Executive Director. The board is also heavily responsible for fund raising. Members of any board do not come and “take over” anything….members are added over long periods of time usually 1-2 at a time. By nature a board is very conservative body–they tend to be cautious, not prone to making speedy, “knee-jerk” decisions. Board meetings throughout the world are behind closed doors…it can get boring in there! This applies to universities, museums, not-for-profit institutions, etc. I do not know of any museum board of trustees that holds “open meetings” with anyone outside. It is its own prerogative to conduct its business in the manner they see fit–if you want open doors you can go to el Museo itself every day it is open to the public its doors are always OPEN. That is what a museum does.
As far as I know, Taller Boricua’s board meetings are also behind closed doors. The selection of its executive director is not done by a process of consensus with the community nor in an “open town hall” type meeting, nor is the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Bronx Museum, or any other comparable institution, culturally specific institution.
So the questions comes up why complain about something which follows standard practice? If the gripe allegedly has been there since 1986, why raise it now? Did the complainer(s) register this with the Executive Director, Susana Torruella Leval? Are they also “Watching” the other non-for-profit groups when they select a director? Did they do this with the search for an Executive Director at the Museum of the City of New York? At Mt. Sinai Hospital? at Taller Boricua?
FACT: Aurora Flores runs Aurora Communications a public relations and advertising agency in el Barrio. She has worked for el Museo in the past and has received contracts for promoting exhibitions at el Museo over many years. She did not get the contract for public relations for the Frida Kahlo/Diego Rivera exhibition.
Ms. Flores has been quoted as saying that el Museo promotes “eurocentric Latin American artists” (whatever that means) which I assume is referring to Kahlo and Rivera. But I am puzzled by that claim. Neither artist would never have considered themselves “eurocentric” in their lifetimes nor have I come across ANY written material by bona fide art critics, art history scholars, other artists which deal with this issue of their alleged “eurocentrism”….. so the jury is still out on that one.
FACT: El Museo has presented CONSISTENTLY (go to http://www.elmuseo.org) and SYSTEMATICALLY the art and culture of Puertoricans AND Nuyoricans for 32 years. El Museo has about 7,500 square feet of exhibition space.
Ironically the fact remains that others–non Puertorican and Nuyoricans–perceive and consider el Museo a PUERTORICAN museum and institution to this day. Some artists, who shall remain nameless, including some from el Barrio have refused to be shown at el Museo when invited because they believe that el Museo is too “narrow” for them and those same artists believe it would be detrimental to their careers to be shown there. This is as recent as 6 months ago.
FACT: The overwhelming majority of board members of el Museo ARE Puertorican (100%). There IS an African American board member. Until recently there WAS a Dominican American–she submitted a letter of resignation because she wanted to raise her children. Nominations to the board are open to anyone and there is a process involved.
There is more, much more, of course but my recommendation to the community leaders is that the gripe they have brought before the community at large ought to be re-directed to: the mass media for ignoring us (everyone from the New York Times to ABC News); the wealthy Puertoricans and Latinos (those that are NYC based) who decline to support financially el Museo or visit it; the new Bloomberg adminsitration for for taking away the Tweed Courthouse from the Museum of the City of New York thus preventing el Museo from making a quantum leap–into a much bigger building–by moving next door when MCNY was scheduled to move downtown.
It may well be a case of complaining at the wrong window.
Positions to be presented at town hall meeting
Both sides will be able to present at the town hall meeting scheduled this coming week, on Thursday. I saw the event posted in Corrientes. Will you be there?
reminder of townhall
Don’t forget that ***Community Board Eleven’s Town Hall Meeting on El Museo del Barrio*** will be held at La Guardia Community Center this Thursday, September 26 from 6:00-8:00PM. The Center is located at 307 East 116th Street, between 1 and 2nd Avenue in El Barrio.
If you want to speak you MUST register before tomorrow, Tuesday September 23 by calling District Manager at 212-831-8930. Otherwise, just come and spread the word! **Que circule la palabra!**
BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
This is a ridiculous idea promoted by a small, disgruntled, hysterical, and non-residents of East Harlem.
Whatever petty complaints can be filed directly with the staff of the institution.
I am not going to waste my time nor my neighbors’ to go see (or hear) a monologue.
Get a life girls!
What Positions?
Clara: What positions? This is a meeting called by one side only–while it appears to be an opportunity for both sides to “present” their positions it does not have any consent from anybody else.
Its like Olga Mendez saying she is going to call for a “debate” but does not ask anybody else if the other side will agree to one. She “debates” herself and then claims the other side did not show up?
I live in East Harlem and this so-called “town hall meeting” is of no interest whatsoever to many residents.
Debbie Quinones should get a real job and stop harrassing others. That’s why I would never vote for her–too petty and narrow in her views.
BOYCOTT “Town Hall Meeting”
Mi Gente: There are emerging voices and more people rallying and supporting el Museo del Barrio.
You can help by becoming members, attending shows, and taking your kids there as we East Harlemites are doing.
3-4 hysterical women do not a movement make: the town hall meeting is a hoax and a waste of people’s time.
We vote with our feet by going to lots of activities & programs at el Museo, we submit constructive ideas to the people who are in a position to implement positive change, volunteer with our time and encourage others to go there as well, etc.
Therefore, stay home on the nite of 9/24: why waste your time?
el Museo is poised
El Museo is poised to be a great institution going forward.
The foundation has been well laid.
RE: el Museo is poised
As a “puertorriqueno”I feel very proud of the Museo’s accomplishments throughout these years. I believe that its time to accept that we don’t live alone in this world, that we are participants in a much larger scheme. I believe that we must integrate ourselves into the bigger space of the arts, in
conjunction with our Latin American brothers and sisters. Le’s put aside those sterile “nacionalismos” and let’s work for the benefits of all Latinos regardles where they come from. La unidad mas que la division es la clave del exito.
VENUE VENUE VENUE
Dear EGG,
I do not agree with your comment about not being from the community.
I certainly do not agree that [the girls] should get a life.
I do not agree that anything should be boycotted.
However, I do agree that that particular forum didnt need to take place at Town Hall…if you wouldnt mind my approaching the question in the inverse.
The issues around the leadership of El Museo are sound & significant. The theme of ethnocentricity or multiculturalism, as it applies to inclusion, as opposed to exclusion (or apartheid or “seprate but equalism”) is worth as much intellection as we can get into the airways; but Im not sure that Town Hall was a venue for this particular activity. The Hecksher auditorium would have been, for sure. The auditorium or gymnasium of a local school, of course…St Cecilias.
Anyone who can relate to the issues relating to the future of El Museo would easily have been willing to make it to El Barrio.
RE: VENUE VENUE VENUE
You may have been misinformed:
The venue itself was NOT the well-known Town Hall theatre near Times Square.
The “town hall meeting” style meeting already took place: it was at the basement of La Guardia, a local community center in East Harlem.
Of course the 4 amigas could have made it at el Teatro Hecksher giving the proceedings a more logical & thought out presence.
In their hysteria they missed the boat.
RE: BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
The townhall meeting which was organized by community board #11 was quite successful. Quite successful because the follow-up is really critical. The board members who were part of the panel, Tony Bechara and John Caro, as well as Susana Toruella Leval were responsive–sincerely responsive and moved, I believe, by the outpouring of the community, over 150 people, residents, artists, activists, as well as academics and others from “outside” El Barrio. The fact is, that the Museo del Barrio is important to the Puerto Rican community and the Barrio is a much bigger concept than simply the area comprising Manhattan’s East Harlem area. You should know better than posting such a disgruntled comment.
RE: BOYCOTT “Town Hall Meeting”
El Museo was founded in 1969 not only as an alternative exhibition space for Puerto Rican artists whose art would not be shown by mainstream or canonical museums, but also to fulfill a social role within the Puerto Rican community of New York. This social function consisted in establishing an institution that supported and diffused the richness and complexity of Puerto Rican arts and history. For many years El Museo served as a landmark of the Puerto Rican presence in NY, and presented–to the Puerto Ricans and to international art consummers– the potential and talent of a population that had been historically marginalized and underestimated in the United States both culturally and socially. In addition, the close relationship between El Museo and the community of El Barrio was significant in presenting an art deeply shaped by the living experience of this marginalized population and which consequently was very loaded with social and political meaning–a characteristic that also fits in other Latino art expressions in the US, such as Chicano art. It would be therefore very irresponsible to deprive the Puerto Rican community of any participation or direct representation in El Museo, since it will decontextualize the work of many Puerto Rican and Latino artists whose art has so much to do with their urban experience as underpriviledge citizens. At the same time, it will mean a total erasing of the original mission of El Museo which was meant to be a socially aware institution that took account of the needs and concerns of the Puerto Ricans in New York.
Mr. Garcia Gutierrez, with all the respect that you deserve for been an important Puerto Rican art historian and critic, I have to admit that I am deeply offended by your very misogynist and reductive comment on the “3 or 4 hysterical women” who were advocating for more participation of the community in El Museo. Having been at the Town Hall meeting on a stormy thursday night, having listened to many long-time members of the Puerto Rican community in NY, including hard working Puerto Ricans, internationally known artists like Diogenes Ballester, Jose Morales, and Juan Sanchez (among others), and new important intellectuals like Arlene Davila and Yazmin Ramirez, having seen the presence of our major scholar of the Puerto Rican diaspora, Juan Flores, I can tell you that the movement is big, strong, well articulated and above all non-hysterical. If such would have been the case, the results of the Town Hall meeting would not have been so productive, as to get Chairman of el Museo, Mr. Tony Bechara, and former executive director, Mrs. Susana Torruella Leval compromise on instituting community representation on the board of El Museo.
el museo del barrio
CUANDO LA PAPA
ESTA CALIENTE NO
LA DEJES ENFRIAR
I CAME OUT OF THE MEETING
WITH THE FEELING OF PRO CESO
THE TEMPERAMENT OF ESPERAR
PALABRAS COMO NEXT WEEK
EL PROXIMO MEZ DE TEN FE
SI PERO LA VIDA ES ASI
M’IJO/A
PERO QUE SE PUEDE HACER
CON MI MENTE DE BASTA YA
SO I ATE THE PAPA CALIENTE
WITH CON AJO DE BREA
AND DURING THE MASTICATION
PRO CESO BORINCANO
WITH LLUVIAS OF PROGRESO
I THOUGHT OF A CONSTITUIONAL
CONVENTION DURING PUERTO
RICAN HERITAGE MONTH
AT THE HECKSCHER THEATRE
WHERE THE ENTIRE BOARD
OF EL MUSEO DEL BARRIO
WILL BE ON STAGE CON LA COMUNIDAD
TO CLARIFY LA MISION
I THOUGHT THAT TOMAS YBARRA
FROM THE ROCKEFELLER FOUNDATION
SHOULD HOST A LUNCHEON ON
OCTOBER BETWEEN THE EXECUTIVE
BOARD OF EL MUSEO AND SIX
COMMUNITY NOTABLES TO SET THE
NOVEMBER ENCOUNTER
NOW I FELT INTELIGENCIA
AN AMICABLE SOLUTION
BUT I REALLY FELT LIKE
CANDLELIGHT DEMONSTRATIONS
AND THAT EVERY PUERTO RICAN
SHOULD RESIGN FROM THE BOARD
UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
I WALKED TO EL MUSEO DEL
BARRIO WITH GOTAS OF THE
RAIN MILITARY COMPANIONS
AND WHAT I REALLY
FELT WAS THAT EL MUSEO
DEL BARRIO IS ON FIRE
CON LOS BORICUAS
HAY QUE APAGARLE LA LUZ
BUT I WILL RESIGN MYSELF
TO WAIT UNTIL THE PUERTO
RICAN HERITAGE MONTH
CONVENTIONAL ENCOUNTER
NO HAY MAS NA
The Puerto Rican Legacy
Most people were neither there nor know of the long and difficult struggle to bring this wonderful institution to New York City by Puerto Ricans. It is only fitting that its leader be Puerto Rican and the Board of Directors have significant Puerto Rican representation. This, in and of itself, does not make the institution exclusionary nor “nationalistic”. The record speaks for itself on that subject as the Museum has always exhibited and promoted the arts from ALL Latino cultures. It does help establish the Puerto Rican legacy and their contribution to our society in general. We should and must pay homage to those who have blazed this trail for ALL Latinos. A “Puerto Rican Museum of Latino Arts and Culture” would be a worthy tribute to those who built the Museum lest we forget who we are in our collective memory and lose our heritage in the process.
RE: RE: BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
Thanks for your defense and lucidity, Clara. As artist Juan Sanchez said in one of the meetings of the “We are watching you” campaing, “el barrio” is not only East Harlem, but a metaphore of every Puerto Rican community in NY, from Harlem to Staten Island, passing by Brooklyn and Queens. El Museo just happens to be in 104th St and 5th Ave, so the residents of East Harlem should have something to say regarding its functionment. However, residents from other parts of NY or from PR who are sincerely concerned about the preservation and diffusion of Puerto Rican culture are welcome to contribute.
Yesterday’s historical meeting went on for two hours with a good, constructive and RESPECTFUL debate between the community and El Museo. I don’t see the reason why we should be disrespectful to each other in order to expose your concerns in this forum. Even when you don’t agree with someone, be respectful, please, and avoid comments such as “get a life, girls!” or “hysterical women” when you want to refer to any community member or any member of the new generation of serious intellectuals who are making significant contributions to Puerto Rican scholarship.
RE: UNNECESSARY HYSTERIA Response
You claim a fact about me that is NOT A FACT but misinformation. First of all, I DID have the contract for the Frida Kahlo show and it was breached by the Executive Director and the board. In fact, not only was it breached but the Director lied about not having money to hire any public relations firm and that the work for that show would be done “pro bono” by a board member. Not only was this a bold faced lie, they received an unrestricted grant and hired a top ten P.R. Madison Avenue firm that has a relationship with one of the Board members. They were so guilty about doing this behind my back while they were claiming poverty that the Director wrote me a glowing letter attesting to the wonderful work done by my firm. I realized she was lying to me when she called me a month later to get copies of all my previous reports to her as well as my contact lists so that she could share this with Fuder – Finn, the firm that was hired to promote an event that needed no promotion. Wasn’t that wonderful of her?
Prior to that I witnessed first hand how the Director and the Board totally ignored, disrespected and patronized the supposed Community Advisory Board that was to have worked alongside El Museo for the Three Kings Day Parade. As a matter of fact, El Muso wanted me to directly intervene and negotiate with this board after they had ignored them for more than six months. I refused to do this since I was hired directly by the Executive Director to do P.R. not to lie on their behalf. Some of us do have ethics, morals and scruples. In any event, it became very obvious to me that the Director and the Board have absolutely no regard or respect for the community and the Puerto Rican founders of the museum. They also have no respect for the surrounding Mexican community as I also witnessed the total rudeness and lack of any “class” or “courtesy” when el Museo’s former education director quite brutally disrupted the Mexican Aztec Fire Dancers from their Dia de Muertos ritual dance because they were making too much noise and were disrupting the talk that El Museo had simultaneously scheduled with Isabel Allende.
Anyone that has worked for this cadre of “Culture Vultures” will attest to these truths. The result of the Three Kings Day Parade was the appearance of the newly elected Mayor in El Barrio for his first public appearance, and the absence of ANY board member accompanying the Mayor — or anyone else — into the East Harlem Community.
I don’t know who you are Mr. Enrique Gutierrez but you should learn some basic manners first and journalistic principles later that before you go off quoting or talking about someone — you should get your FACTS directly from that person. I have no problem meeting you FACE to FACE if you should want to see any of the REAL FACTS I am quoting to you now. This is also not the first time I have worked with EL Museo. I have had a long history with the institution since its inception — as a member and as a businesswoman. And the fact that you went off “half cocked” without checking with me first taints any credibility to the rest of your fabricated and totally inarticulate story.
As for myself, I am a long standing community member, cultural activist, entrepreneur, writer and the great grandneice of Eugenio Maria de Hostos.
And I will DEMAND respect from you or any other self-hating, provincial thinking, psudeo intellectual colonialist slave that pretends to speak on my behalf. I do not need you or anyone else for that matter to define who I am.
Aurora Flores
Town Meeting Here or There
GPena…thanks for the clarification. Somehow, I recall the notice i received saying Town Hall — but it makes sense that you are right.
Now about The Hystericals. Interestingly, Hecksher would have fired them up but in a contextual way ‘eh…& appropriately.
My question to you is, why are The Hystericals in a position to determine these things: Agenda, When, Where, &c. Did a vacuum make room for The Hystericals to take the lead (Life Abhors a Vacuum — in fact there can never be a vacuum, if you think about it. The moment there is an opening, it is filled by the last best choice. But then again, that is another conversation.)
Can you appreciate the Symetry: a Vacuum of Leadership at El Museo = a Vacuum of Leadership in the Loyal Opposition.
Are all the Good Effective Leaders ‘comprao’ or what. Are they in Academia (that has always been my suspicion; their literati aspects notwithstanding.
The issue is Puertorican Pride and respect”
Puertorican pride and respect has been turned into a mockery in this country. The streets of New York City are paved with the blood of great Puertorican Artist who never made it because of racial bigotry and racism. We have now, and have had, many great leaders who have struggled to build our image as hard working creative,caring, sensitive and loving people. I’m from the Lower East Side where we have struggled for over 50 years to establish a piece of the rock for ourselves. When no one wanted to visited LES, or Loisaida as we call it, we were the ones saving the buildings,cleaning the streets, and chasing the drug dealers out. We saved an abandoned school building, created a magazine,”The Quality Of Life In Loisaida” and began a housing cultural artistic movement that blossomed into what we see today, total gentrification. El Museo del Barrio would not exist if it were not for groups like Charas/El Bohio. I feel we need a PuertoRican Executive director in El Museo Del Barrio because Charas was evicted from their building after twenty years of hard work by the Guliani administration. We longer have affordable rehearsal space for the Latino and struggling artist. El Museo Del Barrio should be dedicated to continue the work we have given our lives to establish PuertoRican Pride and Respect. It should not be allowed to turn into another gentrified institution that is solely dedicated to serving the status quo. How much do we have to lose before we realize, no one is going to do anything for us, except ourselves. Must we lose El Museo too…Haven’t we lost enough…Can’t we we get it together to save our hard earned effort. Divided we fall, united we stand.
The issue is Puertorican Pride and respect”
Puertorican pride and respect has been turned into a mockery in this country. The streets of New York City are paved with the blood of great Puertorican Artist who never made it because of racial bigotry and racism. Julia De burgos, one of our most illustrious famous artist was almost buried in Poters field. We have now, and have had, many great leaders who have struggled to build our image as hard working creative caring, sensitive and loving people. I’m from the Lower East Side where we have struggled for over 50 years to establish a piece of the rock for ourselves. In the early 70’s when no one wanted to visit LES, or Loisaida as we call it today, we were the ones saving the buildings, cleaning the streets, and chasing the drug dealers out. We saved a City abandoned school building 605 East 9th street, created a magazine,”The Quality Of Life In Loisaida” and began a housing cultural artistic movement that blossomed into what we see today, total gentrification. El Museo del Barrio would not exist if it were not for groups like Charas/El Bohio, Loisaida and the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. I feel we need a PuertoRican Executive director in El Museo Del Barrio because Charas was evicted from their building after twenty years of hard work by the Guliani administration. We no longer have affordable rehearsal space for the Latinos and struggling artist in the City. Charas was the only affordable space. El Museo Del Barrio should be dedicated to continue the work we have given our lives to establish PuertoRican Pride and Respect. It should not be allowed to turn into another gentrified institution that is solely dedicated to serving the status quo. How much more do we have to lose before we realize, no one is going to do anything for us, except ourselves. Must we lose El Museo too!..Haven’t we lost enough!..Can’t we we get it together to save our hard earned effort. Must our history be wiped out to make way for gentrification. Gentrification is a form of bombing like the bombs falling in Vieques. When our people are being displaced because of skyrocketing rents, over twenty thousand families in Loisaida in the past 20 years, were is the justice for our hard earned contribution. If we don’t stand up and fight for what is ours one day our neighborhoods will be like Soho, Noho and Moho.
“Town Meeting: NOT Here NOR There
Very good questions indeed….let me share some of my thoughts re: Las 4 Amigas [aka: Las Histericas, Las Lloronas]:
Yes, it appears that the minute it became known that the Executive Director of el Museo was retiring [for compelling health reasons], this group of opportunistic parisites/viruses infected the situation.
The timing is CLEAR. Now, what do they choose to do? How they chose to proceed?
They chose to do a damaging, vociferous, and antagonistic campaign ON THE STREETS, and ON THE PRESS without bothering to go directly to the source and communicating directly with the principal players.
In other words, it is like calling for a meeting, orchestrating a demonstration against the mayor (or any public institution) without bothering to write/speak/engage/file the complaint with the mayor’s office (or public institution’s CEO).
Indeed they went ahead and scheduled their own meeting, unilaterally, with ALL “their” people and THEN announced it to the world and el Museo that they were holding a so-called “town hall meeting.”
This was (and became) a charade. The meeting was interesting for ALL THE PEOPLE WHO DID NOT SHOW UP!!!!!
RE: The Puerto Rican Legacy
Beautiful words and deeply meaningful.
I too believe that that is the greatest legacy of el Museo, a living and growing institution.
However, the above does not require a Puertorican executive director. Instutions live on, directors do not.
“Town Hall Meeting”
Another large group of Puertorican leaders, artists, scholars, community activists, and other stakeholders stayed home.
After seeing the true motives and misguided attempts to polarize our community, many decided that they would rather attend the shows, become members, support with their sweat and dough this magnificent institution.
If you are “offended” that others have a different point of view from yours, including “our own kind” and people of our own flesh and blood, then this argument is not about one institution but rather about something much bigger: race, class, education, power, etc.
It appears, from your description that you have some nostalgic sense of what it was like to struggle to sustain such a mission. Ity appears that during these entire 3 decades you have not once gotten involved.
Where were you during th last 10 years? Where were you when Jack Agueros was escorted out the door by Marshals? Where were you when el Museo was shut down, under investigation for misappropriation of funds?
Concerns over the search for a new director
I wondered if you are aware of the concerns over the search for a new director by El Museo del Barrio. The latest news is that the deputy director has been chosen, and who knows where they are going with the director search. They have contracted a human resource agency that knows very little about Latino issues or our community.
My Puerto Rican and Latino/a curator contacts in major U.S. art and cultural institutions had not heard about the search even though they already started interviews. This leads me to believe that there are problems with outreach. The fear of many, that I share, is that they are going to hire someone with no connections to the Latino/Puerto Rican community that would help them take the museum to yet another stage of revamping and reconstitution, that will forever distance it from its past. Some of you may know that the Cultural Affairs Committee of the Community Board 11 (representing East Harlem), has mounted a “We are Watching You” campaign asking for accountability.
It’s important that all of us engage in a common message that there should be community involvement in the selection of the director, and that such director should represent the history and mission of El Barrio, as a Puerto Rican and U.S. Latino, not a Latin American or Caribbean institution (as the description for the position states, entirely obviating ‘”Puerto Rican”) .. That the director should be representative of this community, U.S. Latino, whose art, history and culture is still marginalized as it was in the 1970s. In contrast, Latin American art and artists have always had few but well established
connections in the art/history world and establishment. I will not elaborate here because I’ve written academic publications on these issues elsewhere.
My biggest concern is that based on what I’ve been reading in the news and my discussion with people in El Barrio, I fear that community concerns about this important issue have been ignored as “petty, narrow or nationalistic.” Hence the importance that we “intellectuals” , students,activists, etc. engage in this debate, and that the museum board understands that the issue is not about Puerto Ricans versus Latinos. What’s at stake is vision and direction (will this be an elitist Latin American museum or one that represents the needs of the Puerto Rican and Latino community culturally, historically, artistically etc?). In other words, there are issues of class involved here, that always impact on the evaluation and study of art –as we all know — and most importantly, that have important political implications for our community.
Our Puerto Ricanand Latino community is old and mature enough to see the real interests seeking to disavow the past and history in favor of that which is more marketable to corporate sponsors or private foundations. Now more than
ever there is a need to embrace the Puerto Rican vision of the museum, and to be both assertive and inclusive, but only in informed, and politically engaged ways that will *empower* our Puerto Rican and Latino community, not subject us to elitist hierarchies that we have so long sought to overcome.
Arlene Davila
American Studies
New York University
The next ED must be a Puerto Rican
The next ED must be a Puerto Rican. Not one of the current Board members lives in El Barrio; less than half are Boricuas.
RE: Concerns over the search for a new director
Estimada Dra Davila:
Me imagino que estos comentarios seran compartido entre personas de hablar ingles igual que personas bilingue. Por esa razon le envio mi comentarios en ingles.
It is but a scant thirty to forty years ago that Puerto Ricans, the largest Latin American segment of the northeast population and the second largest nationally, were left to device our own means of providing services across the board (education, health, social, etc.) as well as create our own institution to provide our artists with space in whcih to exhibit and perform their works.
We, Puerto Ricans as well a Latinos, the African diaspora, Asians, and Native Americans were not welcomed into the mainstream institutions. It is in this climate that organizations such as Aspira, Promesa, Boricua College, Puerto Rican Education, Legal Defense Fund, were established. In that mix ARE also EL MUSEO DEL BARRIO and EL TALLER BORICUA/THE PUERTO RICAN WORKSHOP and to cross the ethnic lines, THE STUDIO MUSEUM IN HARLEM and the ARTURO SCHOMBERG CENTER FOR AFRICAN RESEARCH.
These institutions were born out of the (civil rights) struggle for self sufficiency and acceptance. They were the bold statment of self worth in the face of the neglect and oppression demonstrated against all ethnic minorities. In the face of this neglect these institutions struggled to survive, develop, prosper (yes, prosper), and service the community that gave it its purpose.
In the aftermath of the “Latin Explosion”, not 911, our institutions have come under unforeseen pressure to “open” their doors and make themselves visible and accessible (palitable) to the non-ethnic minority community, whites. Now, as always, and seemingly throughout the world, acceptance by them gives our community an assurance of (self) worth that we have not enjoyed before.
Since the ethnic majority is now interested in Latinos, and with that said all ethnic minorities, we are facing the opportunity for acquiring wealth, more than anything else and this includes respect and admiration.
Erroneously it is thought that without the attention and approval of the ethnic majority, we, Latinos (Asians, natives, and the African diaspora) will continue to hold up the rear of social progress and cultural development.
Without it needing to be said, the attention to our communities and their (economic) development relies soley on our efforts to give the appearance of welcome. To show the ethnic mayority familiar (stereotypic) images and expressions that will seem unthreatening and induce them to spend their money in our neighborhoods. Here is where me comment’s jaws clinch.
Spending money in our neighborhoods does not translate into spending money ON our neighborhoods. A $5.00 cup of coffee spent in Spanish Harlem (El Barrio), the South Bronx, LOISAIDA, Los Sures, does not mean that money has been spent ON our neighborhood not when for the same 3, 4, 5 in some cases six decades, Juan Valdez (Burro and all), El Exigente, Bennie el Bodegero, and others established their businesses, fought of depression, inflation, civil rights violence, and the drug trade without respit or salvation from the powers or communites that still are.
The situation that El Museo del Barrio and El Taller Boricua as well as others find themselves in is one in which their existence depends on their “buying in” not “selling out”. That is what they are leaning to do as a result of the explosion and possibility of accumulating the funds, acceptance and attention so preciously sought for so long. Be mindful that these pressures to bear rest only on institutions of “color”. MoMa, the Guggenheim, the Met, Lincoln Center, and others are under no obligation to “open their doors” to neither our communities as patrons or artists. We deceive no one but ourselves if we think in any way, shape, or form that this attention and “opportunity” will gain Latinos (Puerto Ricans) anything but embarasment and shame for having spent the only $500 billion (the expected national Hispanic consumer potiential/tanto que nos cogio en alcanzarlo)on something that is not intended to provide lasting benefit or relief.
We are only repeating our own history to be played out be a generation that will have to re-create the wheel of providing institutions once thought created.
LOCATION LOCATION
ive always been puzzled why El Museo has remained in a space that it does not own, and which provides zero room for expansion of exhibition space. i would have expected a fund raising campaign for contructing a building of its own to have begun the day after El Museo moved to Fifth Avenue.
If there was ample space to liberally display the art by Puertorriquans in its sizable Permanent Collection, the question of identity would not exist. If 70% of the display area was dedicated to Puertorriquan artists, there woudl not be an issue of the museums identity. Even if only 60% of the space were utilized in this way, the issue would be resolved.
A museum with a [so-called] ethnic or racial focus is identified as such by the work that is on display on a regular basis, not by occasional or periodic exhibitions.
All of the work that is displayed at El Museo is worthy, and the Frida Kahlo exposition is only one of any number of ‘blockbusters’ that should find their way there.
Not only would that solve the debate over identify, but the remaining display area would be more than ample to present the work of other Latino-origin cultures in the Americas. However, as the situation stands, El Museo has not developed a program that would place Puertorriquen art as the anchor.
The fact that El Museo is at this juncture of its history (not having a place to move to) should be an embarrassment to the Board of Directors. What have they been doing all of these years. What have they been thinking!
With respect to a new director, I would like to include not only input from the local community, but also from the major cultural institutions in Puerto Rico.
The question of residency is more elusive. I am more concerned that the Board of Directors be sensitive and protective of our culture than I am of where they live. Any one of us can run down a list of ‘ratas’ who have boasted local residency.
An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo
An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo del Barrio
This letter is to express our concern over the search for a new director of El Museo del Barrio and to call for active public involvement in the selection process. We are concerned that Latinos with knowledge of El Barrio/East Harlem’s history and culture have been increasingly under-represented in important positions in the administration and the staff. Similarly, El Museo del Barrio’s Board of Directors has contracted a human resources agency that knows very little about Latino/a issues or our community. Many Latino/a curators in major U.S. art and cultural institutions have not heard about the search even though the interview process has already begun. And most importantly, there has been no community input in the selection of the new director. El Museo‚s Board has failed to reach out to and consult with Puerto Rican and Latino/a scholars, arts administrators and the larger community.
The recently published chronology of El Museo del Barrio in the catalog „Voices from Our Community,‰ documents that there is a precedent for >community involvement in choosing a director for El Museo del Barrio. The closed door practice of hiring directors of El Museo began in 1986 when the museum was facing a fiscal crisis that necessitated the city’s intervention. Since then, the closed door practice has continued in ways that have distanced the institution from its history. We fear that the board will hire someone with no connection to the Latino/Puerto Rican community and that El Museo may be forced through yet another stage of revamping and reconstitution, which is sure to distance it further than ever from its historical roots. Now more than ever, the election of El Museo’s future director calls for a transparent and public process as had occurred in the past.
We must ensure that the person chosen reflects the unique history and inclusive vision of this community-based Puerto Rican/Latino institution. We maintain that the new director should represent the history and mission of El Barrio, as a primarily Puerto Rican and U.S. Latino/a institution, not a „Latin American or Caribbean institution,‰ as stated in the description for the position, entirely ignoring the institution‚s past. We strongly believe that the director should be representative of this community, U.S. Latino/a, whose art, history and culture are still largely marginalized, as they were in the 1970s when the Museo was initially founded to correct this marginality. Most importantly, the museum‚s board should understand that the issue is not about „Puerto Ricans versus other Latinos,‰ or Latin Americans, or about a local vs. an internationalist perspective. The issue here, we insist, is about fulfilling El Museo’s founding mission to represent a historically and culturally marginalized community and, in so doing, connect with other Latino, Latin American, and Caribbean communities. What’s at stake, in other words, is a vision of El Museo’s future. Will this be an elitist institution, or one that represents the needs of the Puerto Rican and Latino/a community culturally, historically, and artistically? In other words, the directorship of the Museo cannot be viewed in isolation from the community that gave birth it to and which continues to depend on it. To do otherwise would only serve to further exacerbate its historical marginalization, with serious political implications for us all.
Aware of these issues, the Cultural Affairs Committee of Community Board 11 (representing East Harlem) has mounted a “We are Watching You” campaign calling for accountability on the part of the board and the selection process. We therefore wish to add our voices of concern in a common call for community involvement in the selection of the director. Our Puerto Rican and Latino/a community is fully aware of the interests seeking to disavow this past and history in favor of that which is more marketable to corporate sponsors, art collectors, or private foundations. Now more than ever there is a need to embrace the Puerto Rican and community-based vision of the museum, and to be both assertive and inclusive. In this spirit, we encourage people to contact the board, elected officials and community at large to bring attention to this issue. We further ask the Board of Trustees to present the top three finalists for the position of director of El Museo del Barrio in a public forum so that they can present their views and positions to the wider community, and that feedback from this forum be taken into account in selecting the director.
This letter was drafted by a group of university professors, curators, writers and doctoral students in solidarity with community groups from El Barrio/East Harlem and beyond.
Signed,
Arlene Davila, Luis Aponte Pares, Juan Flores, Gabriel Haslip Viera, Wilson Valentin, Miriam Jimenez Roman, Arnaldo Cruz Malave
RE: An Open Letter About the Future of El Museo
Judith,
thanks for the info. I fight every day to keep our
culture up, I do understand the requirement for this
position.
There is more to it. Our community needs to be
educated the right way. Only a few of us, including
you, have the vision of how to do it. I seek avery day
help from here to Washington DC on this. I will like
to share some of my ideas and some how help each
other.
The main problem amoung us is that we want to control
everything on our own. Be what in Puerto Rico we call
a ” Cacique”. People do not understand that, it is not
about opening a “Colmadito” on the corner, but their
is so many people and communities out there that if
you try to run a business on your own you will get
burned. However, if you get the right people you will
be able to accomplish more on an easy way. That is the
Puertorican dream.
Eddie Santos
article from El Nuevo Dia
Acéfalo el Museo del Barrio
miércoles, 19 de junio de 2002
Por Agencia EFE
NUEVA YORK – En medio de la controversia en torno al futuro de El Museo de El Barrio, ya se han comenzado a presentar nombres para sustituir a su directora, Susana Torruella Leval, que abandonará el puesto el 30 de este mes.
Fundado en 1969 por puertorriqueños en la zona hispana del barrio de Harlem, para dar a conocer su cultura, el Museo abrió sus puertas para recibir a otros grupos étnicos que se han establecido en esa comunidad, lo que ha sido motivo de controversia por varios años.
Hay quienes piensan, como el conocido ex juez John Carro -miembro de su junta de directores- que “no se puede ser excluyente” y que el Museo debe dar cabida a otros grupos latinoamericanos.
“El Museo ha estado ampliando su programa a través de los años. Eso no significa que dejemos de ser una institución puertorriqueña. Muchas de nuestras exhibiciones son puertorriqueñas, esa es su misión”, dijo Carro a EFE y destacó que es importante la unidad entre latinos en esta ciudad.
Carro recordó la exitosa exhibición que todavÃa presenta el Museo, de las obras de los fenecidos artistas mexicanos Diego Rivera y Frida Khalo, que ha sido visitada por 16,200 personas.
El Museo logró una destacada reseña en The New York Times, donde fue catalogado como “un indispensable recurso” para la ciudad de Nueva York.
Después de la renuncia de Torruella Leval, el Museo -con un presupuesto de 3 millones de dólares y 25 empleados- ha delegado en la firma Russell Reynolds Associates la búsqueda de un nuevo director, que a juicio de Carro debe seguir siendo puertorriqueño, aunque ese requisito no fue estipulado al
crearse la institución.
Carro explicó que ya hay varios candidatos para el puesto y que él recomendó a Gladys Peña, quien en una ocasión fue curadora de El Museo, trabajo que también desempeñó para la ciudad de Nueva York.
“Como miembro de la Junta le escribà a Russell Reynolds y les dije que estando en una comunidad puertorriqueña y siendo un Museo puertorriqueño, es un factor importante que tienen que tener en cuenta al seleccionar un nuevo director ejecutivo”, afirmó.
La Junta de Directores tiene la responsabilidad de elegir al nuevo director para sustituir a Torruella Leval, quien por ocho años dirigió el Museo y que renunció alegando razones personales.
Carro, que favorece que el Museo permanezca en El Barrio -en la famosa Milla de los Museos en la Quinta Avenida-, cree firmemente que esta institución ha cumplido la misión para la cual fue creada.
“Hubo tiempos muy malos, en los que apenas tenÃa dinero, pero creo que hemos superado todas las dificultades y que el Museo está mejor que nunca”, sostuvo.
El presidente de la Junta de Directores, el pintor Tony Bechara, señaló por su parte a el diario La Prensa que el Museo tiene la obligación moral de ayudar a otras comunidades en desarrollo.
El Museo cuenta con diversos programas, algunos de los cuales se desarrollan en las escuelas, que benefician a unos 15,000 estudiantes a través de la ciudad, el 37 por ciento de ellos, hispanos.
Kultural Genocide and other Juracanes……..
The conventions of euro-western society have created implications of identity crisis in its determinist attitude toward restraining any Pan American political, aesthetic and or cultural pluralism. A Museo representing a community is in need of like minded ambassadors and diplomats. Puerto Rico and Boricuas have come of age and have opened the pathways for generations of Latino Americanos and other people of Caribbean descent; our very own unclassifiable physigonomy has allowed us the proctorship and to be procurers of our mutual Latino aesthetic destinies and evolution.
As an artist actively politically grass-rooted I am appalled by the idea of this evident colonial mentality.
Building EL MUSEO has been the efforts of many in this community now called an ethnic corridor.Give me a break! Lets not let this one slip through all the bogus paper chase. And I don’t want to hear that there aren’t or weren’t any qualifiable professionals in Museum Management of Puerto Rican descent. Even the decision to attach a Deputy of sort without the consent or a communal public forum is suspicious. This free market attitude is a white-washed excuse for the further abuse of power by a cadre of intellectual facist art mongers. there isn’t an identity crisis in the Puerto Rican community never was and lets take a look at how much we have through our struggles as a Puerto Rican nation changed and improved the entry to countless of others after us. We deserve the right to representation after all the exploitation, and our crucial and criticla role in both North and Latin American History. The Museo of el BArrio for EL BARRIO and todos los Barrios of the world. Need I translate!? Remember the PARK PLAZA -remember the home of the MAMBO and or the Smithsonian dipping their fingers into our vianda. The Raices Museum needs to be addressed as well! We are all not defeated theres a contigency of advocacy out here and axe y miles(yes miles & kilometros) of gracias to all of you concerned and this sophisticated cyberforum of PRDREAMS. As i heard while walking across the central mountains east to west post the biggest Hurricane in recent years: “TODAVIA VIVO!” Do you want me to translate-NO ya basta -APRENDE!
Kultural genocide el otro terrorismo.
Support from other Latinos
The question of who will become the next executive director of el Museo del Barrio has really brought home the changing demographic of el Barrio and of New York in general. It seems to me that only those who are Puerto Rican or of Puerto Rican decent have an issue with what is unfolding. Other Latinos seem to basically fall in line with the move towards elitism, commericalism and the conscious effort to “de-puertoricanize” the museum–which is basically read as creating a more generic Latino and Latin American identity.
This is really just a lay impression from conversations I’ve had and does not reflect any survey or objective evaluation or collected data.
The idealism and courage of the founders
I’ve been away and just read Carolina Gonzalez’ self-described “long post” on el Museo del Barrio. At the risk of being the final word, much of Carolina’s observations are consistent with my previous comment, however, I
would not characterize 25 years of struggle to keep el Museo del Barrio responsive to the community “a mythical moment.” It really does a disservice to those artists who, denied access to normal exhibition channels, invented their own. The Museo’s exhibition history will substantiate that it has a long and representative history in El Barrio and
it will also reveal when this fine institution started veering away from its mission.
A little known fact is that prior to the founding of the Museo, many of these same artists had gone into the Metropolitan Museum of Art and taken over its administrative offices to demand representation. Their idealism and courage to challenge the prevailing cultural elitism and to invent that which had never existed before is worthy of admiration and reflection. This history provides a context to the issues we are confronting today.
It is not unlike the history of the founding in 1972 of “Realidades,” the first Latino-produced show on PBS, which took place after another group of Puerto Rican/Latino cultural activists took over the broadcasting studio of
Channel 13 during one of its proverbial pledge drives. There are many lessons to be learned from this history.
In the near future, PRdream.com will be presenting this history — in case people are interested. Actually, EN FOCO’s book signing party to celebrate its NUEVA LUZ Commemorative Issue, this coming July 12, might be a good way to begin to become familiar with that history.
Friday, July 12, 6PM – 7:30PM
International Center of Photography
1133 Avenue of the Americas
(at West 43rd Street)
For more info: http://www.enfoco.org
Coping with changing Latino demographics
NALIPsters,
I’ll stick to addressing the Museo issue, since I actually have had very positive experiences with NALIP.
I actually got to see an earlier draft of the El Museo letter — which incidentally, I don’t think Judith had a hand in composing — where Puerto Rican was emphasized over Latino, and mentioned it to those who asked for my
comments. The reference was changed throughout to “Puerto Rican/Latino” and that’s fine by me.
There are a number of institutions — museums/galleries, academic departments, political advocacy groups — nationally that were founded by a specific group — primarily by Puerto Ricans in the East Coast and Chicanos in the West Coast. And of those that have survived, all have had to cope
with changing Latino demographics. Each insitution has dealt with these changes — and their changing constituencies — differently. Some people get defensive, others adapt. Most Chicano Studies departments are still called Chicano Studies departments, even when they offer classes on other groups, and it was a big discussion to add “Hispanic Caribbean” to Rutgers’ Puerto Rican Studies Department, which is currently headed by a Dominican scholar and covers all the Caribbean equally. Personally, I get tired of spending a lot of time fighting about the names of things and prefer to fight over the content and vision. It’s been a long time since El Museo only displayed local work or Puerto Rican work, if there ever really was this mythical moment. And some of the direction that it has moved in of late I thought was
healthy.
To me the question is deeper — how do El Museo and other Latino organizations make their programming and administration true to its original and evolving mission and vision? How do these organizations appeal to a Latino public (and guess what? A lot of us don’t patronize these institutions as much as we could or should) and also appeal to other constituencies? I’m not Chinese but always get a lot out of exhibits at the Museum of the Chinese in the Americas (which changed its name when it started work on Chinese emigration to Latin America), and the Bronx Museum
of the Arts has also done a great job in representing its local constituency but finding ways to raise its profile with other audiences (see the recent show where you could have pieces in the Museum’s permanent collection manicured onto a set of nails — cheeky and smart).
Sorry for the long post, but I do think about the present and future of Latino organizations a lot, and think it’s important for NALIP, which I think is a very promising organization, and its members, to understand the larger issues and trends. It can only make us stronger as Latino artists and institution builders.
Thanks for yr patience, Carolina Gonzalez
RE: The idealism and courage of the founders
I am in agreance with Judith in that little is known of the history of institution such as El Museo Del Barrio, El Taller Boricua, “Realidades (which was produced by recently pardonned nacionista, Dylcia Pagan), and other organization that now provide the services previously denied to people of color & foreign languages.
It would be too easy to jump on the generation bandwagon and talk about “silver spoons” but, I am not. What I will re-iterate is the ease with which many are willing to join in the ethnic explosion bandwagon and buy into the trend of gentrification and globalization without fully understanding or researching the ramifications of what is lost and who gains the short & long term benefits. If organizations like The Studio Museum in Harlem were to follow suit, many artists will , again, be excluded, as they were during the civil rights era from exhibition & performance spaces.
The demand for INclusion has historically been that of who Judith has written of Latinos, Asians, Natives, and the Africans diaspora into the mainstream institutions. We deserve to be patronized by the mainstream as much as we have patronized their system, institutions, and society. It should be nothing else than equity and civil respect to ask that the mainstream that has ignored and disregarded ethnic communities qualified themselves to be inclusive & supportive as we have been.
Today, we (Latinos) have leverage, $500 billion. We would also be playing “los pendejo” if we believe or think that there are other incentives and motivations, or interests. If it were not for the national consumer power and/or vote, there would be no explosion and the question of whether or not the Director of El Museo continues to be a Puerto RIcan would not be an issue.
A Museum for the People
A Museum for the People
By Aurora Flores
9 July, 2002
The revolution is back and this time… it’s cultural. The search for a new director for El Museo del Barrio has begun behind closed doors excluding the community that gave it birth. Notwithstanding, educators, activists and professionals in harmony with Community Board 11 are clamoring for representation in the selection process that has locked them out since the new board took over in 1986.
Sprung from the pain of heretofore voiceless Puertorican artists, activists and educators struggling for identity, history and expression 33 years ago, El Museo del Barrio today enjoys increased funding, personnel, prestige and professionalism over any other Latino arts organization. Yet, there are no Puerto Rican curators or educators employed at El Museo. A rehabbed firehouse at 104th between Lexington and Third, founded in 1979 as a community art
school once run by local El Museo artists, stands abandoned. The Three Kings Day parade, initiated as an East Harlem tradition since 1978, has not grown in funding, stature or pageantry since El Museo=92s new board took over. This is even more telling when not one board member was present for this historically and racially diverse parade into East Harlem even while newly elected
[multibillionaire] Mayor Michael Bloomberg made this event his first public appearance.
The bigger issue then becomes how to reconcile the needs of a still marginalized community with the demands of the fine arts world? Without people of color and community artists on this elite and powerful board, that issue will remain unresolved. El Museo del Barrio will eventually follow the lead of The Museum
of the City of New York to an “improved location” (code word white) unless the City and politicians intervene to revamp this board.
Yet, El Barrio is growing so fast culturally that the “nubohemian” movement of the cultural corridor will pick up where El Museo leaves off. El Taller Boricua, ironically enough instituted in response to the elitist exclusion of Nuyorican artists by another now defunct institution (Friends of Puerto Rico that also placed more value on Eurocentric Latino artists than the
urban up and coming Latinos), is leading the new movement of community arts organizations committed to establishing a social consciousness for identity. The collective mission of these organizations mirror El Museo’s nascent calling to educate, communicate and demonstrate a bond of solidarity that is Puerto Rican in focus and Latin American in scope. Here in the cultural corridor,
art doesn’t necessarily need to be in galleries as much as it needs to be directly connected with the everyday reality of its people.
On the longest day of the year, June 21st, an “open door” art and cultural showcase took place on 106th and Lexington that recalled the bohemian Village days of the 70s. Led by young artists and poets of Mixta Gallery, artistic doors were flung open to the streets where El Taller brought the gallery outdoors while individual artists opened their studios to the public.
Musicians and performers danced and played on the pavements from 105th to 107th while community folks stopped, stared, inquired and participated in the mirth. The Graffiti Hall of Fame sported a brand new tag for the evening. La Fonda and La Cantina restaurants displayed art and artists on their menus while James de la Vega’s chalk scribblings lined the pavements to his shop. Every Thursday,
Taller Boricua hosts “Julia=92s Jam” a cultural smorgasbord of art, music, dance, poetry and literature at a formerly abandoned elementary school rescued from “shelter status” and salvaged as the Julia de Burgos Cultural Center, sporting art galleries, a theater in the round, and artists residencies.
The mission East of Fifth Avenue is clear for these arts organizations
that truly are the “souls of the cultural community.” As for El Museo del Barrio, well… “let them eat their cake.” Once inside the lofty gates of the fine arts world, they’ll soon discover they are neither equal in status or funding to the mainstream institutions that have kept us out for so long.
Aurora Flores is a journalist, educator and cultural activist living in El Barrio.
Rambling discourse on el Museo and class struggle
El Museo del Barrio embodies Latino class struggle in the United States. Within the context of the U.S., el Museo stands perfectly poised, if not teetering on a tightwire, of class struggle, between los hacendados and los campesinos, los patrones y los trabajadores, the white and the brown, the cosmopolitan and the communal. It is currently one of the most fascinating American institutions to watch as it reinvents itself again: From a community organization to a city institution, representing Puerto Rican artists and other Latinos and Latin Americans, to a city institution, representing Latino and Latin American artists.
It is comparable to the situation occurring within the Latino Studies departments in the university, although, here it is an internal matter.
Part of the eternally nagging problem is that Art is by its very nature elitist and class bound. Ergo, the art appreciator, the connoisseur, the art consumer is historically and presently the rich or the upper-middle-class.
Of course, there are always exceptions–and markets are invented, where none exist.
With art, when markets are invented or where there is an attempt to market more widely–as is the trend in museums today–without the concommitant education or actually, cultivation–what happens is basically a kind of “dumbing down.” The commercialization of art is by no means to be mistaken for truly creating an art of and for the people.
Elite images are appropriated and placed on T-shirts, posters, fingernails, tatoos. This may be fun and great but it is not accessing art for the people or the masses. It is the kind of appropriation Latinos and other Third World people have always been accustomed to brought home to roost. That is, a tearing down or pulling asunder of what a society considers of value, sacred, etc., to serve the purposes of capital.
Within the context of el Museo and its own struggle with the institutional establishment of art museums of NYC, where it must face off against the likes of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, etc., it has “stayed in the ring,” to use a boxing metaphor. But joining Museum Mile has meant moving further away from its original community El Barrio. Thus, rather than, affirming its heritage and community roots while professionalizing itself and attracting greater funding while clearly maintaining its roots and demarcating its turf, as in the case of the Studio Museum of Harlem, el Museo del Barrio has sought to join Museum Mile and has wanted to drop the “del Barrio” part of its name to add something to the effect of “el Museo Nacional de Latinoamericanos” or the “National Museum of Latin Americans,” not unlike the National Museum of Native Americans, clearly demarcating a national turf that has no connection to its original founding community.
Arguably, foundations and African Americans see Harlem as the center of black cultural life in the U.S. which is not the case with El Barrio. Most importantly, private foundations, public or government funders and private corporate donors, pressure at least Puerto Rican organizations to generalize their names to justify their spending by extending “the market.”
This is to say, that partly for survival and partly because the museum envisioned itself as a Fifth Avenue institution and, therefore, I think rightfully, identified itself as comparable to the Met or MOMA, in order to say we are indeed of the dominant culture’s caliber, these reasons would necessarily, move el Museo away from its historically, non-elitist roots in the artistic community that existed in El Barrio.
El Barrio itself, however, has also changed and is currently undergoing a tremendous transformation that may in fact cause it to lose its Puerto Rican identity altogether and, potentially, its Latino identity. Ironically, el Museo reflects this community in transition and nearly mirrors it except for–perhaps–the loss of Latino identity in its entirety. Although, there is no reason to believe that the board or the administration has to be Puerto Rican, Latino or Latin American in order for it to be a museum of Latin American Art.
Within this context of trends in American museums, pressures from funders, and vision issues, el Museo embodies the class struggle of Latinos carried forward to the U.S. The artists who founded el Museo were not from the upper classes of Puerto Rico, they were the sons and daughters of the jibaros, los campesinos de Puerto Rico.
This is very important to understanding el Museo’s class struggle in relation to el Barrio, its community of origin.
El Museo is inherently an elite institution that was founded by non-elite artists and community activists who may even have had socialist leanings as the youth and intelligentsia of the period did. This has implications for today and is at the heart of the conflict today between the community and el Museo. More later.
Search for New Director
I want to express my concern over the search process for the new director of El Museo del Barrio. As a cultural warrior of color who has seen numerous cultural institutions of color lose their identity and alter their mission in order to fit into the latest “national initiative”, it concerns me that the search committee for this prestigious and important cultural institution does not represent the very people it was founded to serve. The mission of this museum is clear and should remain unaltered, regardless of the “latest cultural trends”. All too often the fate of our history and the cultural memory of our people rests in the hands of people who are not us. Our stories, whether told visually, literally, or musically, must be told by us. The vision of El Museo del Barrio must remain clear and focused on the people for which this institution was founded, Puerto Ricans! It is not as though we have a plethora of such institutions and can afford to lose one to the multicultural craze (translation: anything but the original group an institution was designed to serve!) I urge you to recompose the search committee to represent the constituency and artistic community El Museo del Barrio was intended to serve.
A Luta Continua,
Vicki Meek, artist, curator, cultural critic
Colonized and cannibalized
Picture this: A colonized people, who to this day, remain so, for better or for worse, half a century ago, sends half of its sons and daughters to its colonizer’s land in search of a better life.
Picture this: Among those who settled in New York City were artists and artesans. They came to El Barrio too — but in order to paint, sculpt, write, direct, act, photograph. Finding no place to exhibit, they agitated, demonstrated, and eventually created spaces of their own, El Museo del Barrio among them. Other Latinos too were invited to exhibit, but the museo’s heart and head remained Puerto Rican–reflecting its historical legacy and its surrounding community.
Picture this: Thirty years later the community around el museo has altered. While predominantly Puerto Rican, or Nuyorican, there is a substantial presence of African Americans, Mexicans, Dominicans and other Latinos. The board changes, Puerto Ricans are nolonger a majority. The leadership eventually changes, and will Torruellas-Leval be the last Puerto Rican Director, presiding over its most radical transformation? She has not groomed anyone to replace her and, thereby, has left el museo vulnerable to being cannibalized by Latinos who do not reflect the community–whether the Puerto Ricans, Nuyoricans, Mexicans, etc. These are rich Latin Americans, of varying ethnicities, not even necessarily Latin-based, who are ignorant of the struggles of the Latinos stateside, let alone, Puerto Ricans, and have more in common with the residents of the Upper East Side–and I don’t mean the Northern part–I mean all the streets between the East 80’s and East 50’s.
There is a mission here to cannibalize El Museo and it seems, somewhat inevitable unless there is a clear trajectory that involves some members of the board of trustees and staff of the museo who might feel the current changes are undesirable.
Message to El Museo Del Barrio
“We Are Watching You!”
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Please join concerned community residents, merchants, artists and cultural activist regarding the practices of EL Museo Del Barrio. Born in School District #4, the Museo Del Barrio educational program was created in response to the growing concerns of East Harlem Puerto Rican parents and community activist for the need to celebrate and respect the richness of the Puerto Rican community. Incorporated by Marta Moreno Vega, as Los Amigos del Museo del Barrio it created the transitional process and evolution of the program into a cultural advocacy institution that had never existed before. Though their tireless and selfless efforts they created a voice and opportunities for the Puerto Rican artist community to be valued and respected. Thirty years later the Museo the mission has changed, the Board of Directors has no community representation, and local artist access is limited.
We ask for:
-Community participation in search for a new director
-Board Policies for the community distribution of unwanted catalogues instead of throwing them away
-Policies to promote local Puerto Rican artist, history, culture and preservation efforts for Puerto Rican art and artifacts
A ‘Museo’ Moves Away From Its Barrio Identity
A ‘Museo’ Moves Away From Its Barrio Identity
July 21, 2002
By DENNY LEE
The neighborhood north of East 96th Street is sometimes
called East Harlem or Spanish Harlem, but local Puerto
Ricans affectionately call it El Barrio. So in 1969, when
local artists and activists created a scrappy museum in a
city classroom, the museum virtually named itself: El Museo
del Barrio.
But now, as the 33-year-old institution searches for a new
director, some are wondering if the museum has symbolically
dropped the words “El Barrio” from its name in pursuit of
broader goals.
“There is too much focus on Eurocentric Latin American
artists,” said Aurora Flores, a Puerto Rican activist and
former public relations consultant for the museum. “The
board wants to eliminate its Nuyorican identity, which to
them means lower class.”
At issue are matters of both substance and style. Critics
contend that recent exhibitions have strayed too far from
the museum’s ghetto origins, focusing on artists from
Mexico, Brazil and other Latin American countries. Its
officials, they say, are more comfortable in boardrooms
than bodegas. The neighborly sense of belonging, they
lament, is no longer.
“People don’t see themselves on the wall anymore,” said
Juan Flores, a professor of black and Puerto Rican studies
at Hunter College. “It’s not their museum, but someone
else’s.”
The controversy dates to 1994, when the museum amended its mission statement to expand the focus to “all Latin
Americans,” not just Puerto Ricans. The departure last
month of its dynamic director, Susana Torruella Leval, who
had held the post for nine years, has given critics a focal
point.
“We want to be a part of the selection process,” said Debby
QuiÃ’ones, a member of Community Board 11, which has
embarked on a campaign called, “We Are Watching You,” to
influence the hiring of Ms. Torruella Leval’s successor.
But museum trustees say they have a moral duty to transcend El Museo’s humble beginnings. The city’s Latino population, they note, now includes immigrants from many Caribbean and Latin American countries.
“If the criticism is that we’re not an ethnocentric gallery, then that’s fair,” said Tony Bechara, the chairman of El Museo’s board. “But our ambition and our mission demand that we become a world-class museum, open to all people.”
Mr. Bechara also rejects the notion that El Museo, which
has an annual budget of $3 million, has grown apart from El
Barrio. In keeping with its classroom origins, the museum
teaches students throughout the local school district about
art and Latino culture. Moreover, he argues, works by him
and other Puerto Rican artists represent 60 percent of the
museum’s every-other-year survey of Latino art and other
shows.
Still, tensions are expected to rise as the choice of a
successor to Ms. Torruella Leval draws near. “It’s a natural part of a museum’s growing pains,” said Anne Ackerson, director of the Museum Association of New York. “When you’re singled out as the representative of an entire community, you carry a lot on your shoulders.”
Some talking points re: El Museo del Barrio
These talking points were went from Yasmin RAmirez. It’s important that we become as informed as possible so they don’t continue to dismiss our arguments when we go to the press. We’re writing a response to NYTimes piece. but if any of you has opportunity to be heard, here’s more ammunition.
Some talking points re: El Museo del Barrio
A short article entitled A Museo Moves Away from its Barrio Identity was published in Sunday’s New York Times City Section on July 21 regarding El Museo del Barrio’s search for a new director (and new direction). Written by Denny Lee, the article suggests that the point of contention between El Museo del Barrio‚s board and the Puerto Rican community is rooted in issues of class-that the board’s elite composition has steered the museum away from its “ghetto” or better said community based working class origins. However, because Tony Bechara is quoted at the end of the article, the average reader is left with the impression that the Puerto Ricans artists, activists and scholars who express discontent with the museum‚s Latin American focus are “ethnocentric” and that the museum is simply trying to fulfill its “moral” duty to represent the cultural heritage new immigrants to the city. Of course, we know there is much more to the story than this but how can we get our broader concerns across?
Reviewing at the articles that have been written about El Museo’s conflicts with the community we come across the some myths and sound bytes being repeated over and over that need some “deconstructing.” The following is my response to two claims that mythologize the history El Museo del Barrio.
Myth number 1. El Museo del Barrio was founded by local artists, educators and community activists in a city classroom.” El Museo del Barrio’s origins are “humble.”
Problem – this summary account of el museo’s origins, which el museo del barrio publicizes in one form or another in all its promotional material, eliminates the radical objectives that lay behind the founding of El Museo, namely to form a community based museum run for and by working class people and artists of Puerto Rican/Latino descent. Moreover, this account of El Museo del Barrio eliminates the name of the world renown vanguard Nuyorican artist who founded the institution-Rafael Montanez Ortiz thus participating in the erasure of a Latino artist from cannon of art history in the United States. Of all things, a museum that reputedly wants to protect and preserve the history art and culture of the Latin Americans in the United States must be reproached for what is by now a deliberate omission of this valued artist’s name.
Some background info
El Museo del Barrio was the outgrowth of a city-wide effort on the part of Puerto Rican and African American artists, educators and community activists to gain community control over education and social services. Because El Museo would not have been funded by the City without agitation on the part of these activists, it is right that we should think of the origins of El Museo as a community based working class institution . However, we should also recognize that it was founded and directed by a sole individual in 1969, the vanguard artist Rafael aka Ralph Montanez Ortiz, a first generation new york born Puerto Rican or Nuyorican. Ortiz was by no means a humble individual but rather a very well respected and established artist who pioneered the genre of performance and video art in the United States and indeed the world. Although Ortiz was already in the collections of the Musuem of Modern Art in 1962, he did not want to be part of the conservative white identified art market. Instead, he was part of the art workers coaliation and other radical organizations that protested the elitism and racism of New York museums and galleries. Ortiz promoted the idea that cultural institutions that garnered public monies must take the public into account in their programs and policies-thus, from the beginning El Museo del Barrio was conceived as a community based institution that would offer an alternative to institutions that were run by upper class elites. Although El Museo has had different directors since Ortiz, it is safe to say that Marta Moreno Vega, Jack Augueros, and Petra Barreras shared this fundamental belief that El Museo del Barrio should be accountable and open to the Puerto Rican/Latino community. Ironically since the “expansion” of El Museo’s mission in 1994 under the direction of Susanna Leval and current Chair Tony Bechara we have seen the constriction of community participation by Latinos in El Museo. At present there is no active community advisory board and no artist in residence program for Latino artists. Indeed, The last artist in residence at El Museo del Barrio was Pepon Osorio back in 1991. He credits his work at El Museo with contributing to immense success today as an artist and McArthur Fellow-Imagine how many other artists of Pepon’s caliber El Museo could have been nurturing all these years-the lost opportunities are disheartening. El Museo has also failed in its outreach to Latino scholars. It does not sustain collegial relationships with other Latino Cultural/Educational institutions. And, recent attempts by certain centers to collaborate with El Museo have fallen on death ears. Lastly, the Dominican community, which rivals the Puerto Rican community in size and influence in New York has no representative on the board and Dominican artists have not had much exposure in El Museo’s exhibitions. African Americans and Afro-Latinos are also conspicuously absent from the board, staff and exhibitions in El Museo del Barrio save the occasional show on Afro-Caribbean religions like Santeria. On the other hand, non-Spanish speaking white North Americans have become commonplace in El Museo’s executive staff and board while Latino scholars and professionals are relegated to temporary “consulting” positions.
Myth no. 2 – “El Museo has to transcend its Puerto Rican roots.” Puerto Ricans who criticize the expansion of El Museo‚s mission are ethnocentric and/or anti-latin American
Problem: These statements assume that El Museo was once Puerto Rican and now it is not. The facts are much more nuanced. Firstly, Latinos from other groups participated in Museo exhibitions even when it was reputedly a Puerto Rican museum; (2) El Museo del Barrio continues to be Puerto Rican Institution despite all attempts to eliminate the presence of Puerto Ricans on the staff and board because its permanent collection is largely made up of ancient and contemporary Puerto Rican art and artifacts- (3) Critics of El Museo are not ethnocentric. Practically all the Puerto Rican artists, activists and scholars that I have spoken to about El Museo do no subscribe to the idea that El Museo del Barrio should be exclusively Puerto Rican.
info
A cursory look at El Museo del Barrio’s exhibition history over the past 30 years will prove that Latin American artists have been participating in exhibitions even when it was a “Puerto Rican” museum. The Puerto Rican centered-mission never precluded other Latinos from being part of El Museo del Barrio if they so choose just as Puerto Ricans and now more Dominicans have been welcome at the African American based Studio Museum. The expansion in the mission has been more a case of a fiduciary duty on the part of the board than anything to do with morality or transcendence. It is clear that these elite board members would not give to largely working class Puerto Rican institution unless some modifications were made to its mission and staff. And, of course insulting to suggest that we must transcend being Puerto Rican as though originating from Latin American was a higher stage of evolution.
El Museo may try to transcend its Puerto Rican origins but its permanent collection remains about 75 percent Puerto Rican, a factor which makes it a Puerto Rican institution regardless of what the board now desires it to be. El Museo does not have a sizable Latin American collection at present and there is no acquisition plan or donation in the wings that I am aware of. The board will have to pony up a lot of money to buy enough pieces of Latin American art to make El Museo a “Latin American Museum” and so far the board is doing nothing but fronting a Latin American façade via temporary exhibitions.
We can and must insist that there be some Puerto Ricans or latinos/even Spanish speaking north americans with demonstrable knowledge of Puerto Rican art and culture on the curatorial, education and public relations staff of El Museo del Barrio because the history and permanent collection of this institution demand people with such a background. If you have a collection from a certain region or ethnic group or artistic movement then you must hire curators and educators that are conversant with the subject matter. This is not ethnocentricity at work but just good museum practice and plain old common sense.
At the same time, I have not met one person who has said El Museo should be exclusively Puerto Rican. Rather, the greater concern is that El Museo remain “community” based which in this case means that it be responsive and relevant to “working class NY Latinos” and their culture and lifestyle, .that there be more programs for artists, community involvement and exhibitions that seriously deal with issues that affect Puerto Ricans/ latinos. This can and is being done at other institutions.
The fact is that mainstream museums like MOMA/PS 1 and the Americas Society are putting on much more radical exhibitions dealing with Latin American and Latino culture than El Museo. Take a look at the Mexico City show at PS 1. It will blow you away with its display of artists who examine the way class affects how bodies (people) are valued and evaluated in contemporary Mexico. Meanwhile the Americas Society is sponsoring a vanguard gallery of artists that formed a space called La Panaderia in Mexico City. If El Museo were putting on shows like that I would have no problem with it going “Latin American” because it would be bringing artists and art to El Barrio that that are relative to El Museo’s socially conscious roots.
I wish I had the ability to write a pithy sound-byte which conveys that critics of El Museo del Barrio’s current policies are not opposed to Latin Americans per se. Rather what people are reacting to is that El Museo’s new “expanded” board is bringing to our table old unwanted baggage related to nexus between race, class and privilege in Latin America that is absolutely contrary to the progressive values of this community based institution. There is good reason to protest the whitewashed composition of its board and staff and the condescending and sometimes outright false statements that the board has issued about the origins of the institution and the objectives of the Puerto Rican community. Lastly, it is justifiable under the circumstances to insist on community involvement in choosing a new director since it is clear that the board of directors is steering the institution in the wrong direction.
Rally to save El Museo del Barrio
Rally to save El Museo del Barrio
There will be a community rally on Thursday, August 15, 2002 7p.m. — 8:30 p.m. @ 104th Street and fifth Avenue at the garden gate.
Call Debbie Quiñones for more information: 212.831.8929.
We have also attached an articles written last Tuesday in El Diario by José “Chegüi” Torres which puts his finger directly on the “Culture Vultures” running El Museo today.
Penchi, por favor de usar esta version y incluir mi email.
A Museum for the People
By Aurora Flores
© July, 2002
The revolution is back and this time it’s cultural. The search for a new director for El Museo del Barrio has begun behind closed doors excluding the community that gave it birth. Notwithstanding, educators, activists and professionals in harmony with Community Board 11 are clamoring for representation in the selection process that has locked them out since the new board took over in 1986.
Sprung from the pain and struggle of heretofore voiceless Puerto Rican artists, activists and educators struggling for identity, history and expression 33 years ago, El Museo del Barrio today enjoys increased funding, personnel, prestige and professionalism over any other Latino arts organization. Yet, there are no Puerto Rican curators or educators
employed at El Museo which is housed in a city-owned building. A rehabbed firehouse at 104th between Lexington and Third, founded in 1979 as a community art school once run by local El Museo artists, stands abandoned. The Three Kings Day parade, initiated as an East Harlem tradition since 1978, has not grown in funding, stature or pageantry
since El Museo’s new board took over. This is even more telling when not one board member was present for this historically and racially diverse parade into East Harlem even while newly elected Mayor Michael Bloomberg made this his first public appearance.
The bigger issue then becomes how to reconcile the needs of a still marginalized community with the demands of the fine arts world? Without people of color and community artists on this elite and powerful board of “culture vultures” who have excluded the community that created their positions, that issue will remain unresolved. El Museo del Barrio will
eventually follow the lead of The Museum of the City of New York to an “improved location” (code word white) unless the City and politicians intervene to revamp this board who doesn’t know anything about our cultural struggle for social identification and whose only concern is their own prestige and power.
Yet, El Barrio is growing so fast culturally that the “NuBohemian” movement of the cultural corridor will pick up where El Museo leaves off. El Taller Boricua (the Puerto Rican Workshop, Inc.) for example was, ironically enough, instituted in 1969 in response to the elitist exclusion of Nuyorican artists by another, now defunct institution,
Friends of Puerto Rico that also placed more value on Eurocentric Latino artists over the urban up and coming Latinos of New York. Today, El Taller Boricua is leading the new movement of community arts organizations committed to establishing a social consciousness for identity. The collective mission of these organizations mirror El Museo’s nascent calling to educate, communicate and demonstrate a bond of solidarity that is Puerto Rican in focus and Latin American in scope. Here in the cultural corridor, art doesn‚t necessarily need to be in galleries as much as it needs to be directly connected to the everyday reality of its people.
On the longest day of the year, June 21st, an „open door‰ art and cultural showcase took place on 106th and Lexington that recalled the bohemian Village days of the 70s. Led by young artists and poets of Mixta Gallery, artistic doors were flung open to the streets where El Taller brought the gallery outdoors while individual artists opened their studios to the public. Musicians and performers danced and played
on the pavements from 104th to 107th while community folks stopped, stared, inquired and participated in the mirth. The Graffiti Hall of Fame sported a brand new tag for the evening. La Fonda and La Cantina restaurants displayed art and artists on their menus while James de la Vega’s chalk scribblings lined the pavements to his shop. Every Thursday, Taller Boricua hosts “Julia’s Jam” a cultural smorgasbord of
art, music, dance, poetry and literature at a formerly abandoned elementary school rescued from “shelter status” and salvaged as the Julia de Burgos Cultural Center, sporting art galleries, a theater in the round, and artists residencies.
The mission East of Fifth Avenue is clear for these arts organizations that truly are the “souls of the cultural community.” As for El Museo del Barrio, well “let them eat their cake.” Once inside the lofty gates of the fine arts world, they’ll soon discover they are neither equal in
status or funding to the mainstream institutions they so covet that have kept us out for so long.
Aurora Flores
El Museo: Its ours, so let’s go into our pockets!
I sincerely support and believe that the new Executive Director for El Museo del Barrio should be Puerto Rican and one that can enhance & create a Puerto Rican agenda & perspective relating to our Puerto Rican contributions; however, the whole Puerto Rican community in New York City (and in the state and nation with proper marketing and promotion to reach them), must increase the level of participation and attandence as well as provide financial support. The fact is that we are very bad at supporting our own institutions. That’s why we have very few.
Meeting to discuss el Museo
Dear colleagues: On August 15th there will be another protest at El museo and another round of articles is sure to come out. I am hoping that you can make a meeting on ****Wednesday, August 7 at 6:00 ****at the Center for Puerto Rican Studies Solarium. The idea is to talk over ideas on how best to put pressure on el museo for some community involvement and to respond to the board’s unfair characterizations of the protesters and, most importantly, to consider how we can be more effective critics and advocates for Puerto Rican issues in the Latinized and neoliberal City, all in the spirit of inclusivity. These issues will likely continue to be pressing and important in the future. Please come, RSVP and most important, spread the word to others you think can contribute to discussion.
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Message to El Museo Del Barrio
“We Are Watching You!”
Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Please join concerned community residents, merchants, artists and cultural activist regarding the practices of EL Museo Del Barrio.
Born in School District #4, the Museo Del Barrio educational program was created in response to the growing concerns of East Harlem Puerto Rican parents and community activist for the need to celebrate and respect the richness of the Puerto Rican community. Incorporated by Marta Moreno Vega, as Los Amigos del Museo del Barrio it created the transitional process and evolution of the program into a cultural advocacy institution that had never existed before. Though their tireless and selfless efforts they created a voice and opportunities for the Puerto Rican artist community to be valued and respected. Thirty years later the Museo the mission has changed, the Board of Directors has no community representation, and local artist access is limited.
We ask for:
–Community participation in search for a new director
–Board Policies for the community distribution of unwanted catalogues instead of throwing them away
–Policies to promote local Puerto Rican artist, history, culture and preservation efforts for Puerto Rican art and artifacts
RE: Community Board #11 – Community Petition
Debbie, please scroll down & see my coments. Are you going to post on online petition.
Information flyer for demo
As some of you know there is another demonstration by community board 11. Some of us, including people from El Barrio, students and artists, met to draft an info flyer. While there are obviously a lot of different views about this issue, we wanted to be as informative as possible, in order to avoid being misconstrued by our ëfriendlyà press (see below). Please note that it is important to be positive at the demo because of the September 11 function that is also taking place then (it would be easy to look bad by attacking el Museo when it is extending a gesture of support to the Latino community that suffered from the WTC disaster). Please forward to others.
Community Board # 11’s
Cultural Affairs Committee
Invites You To:
Send A Message to
El Museo del Barrio
“In The Search For A New Director,
We Are Watching You!”
The Community Must Be Involved In The Process
Community Rally
August 15, 2002 **From 7-8:30 p.m.**
104th Street & Fifth Avenue
At The Garden Gate
Information Flyer:
As Puerto Rican and Latino/a Artists, community members, scholars, writers, and members of the Puerto Rican and Latino community at large we express discontent that El Museo del BarrioÃs expanded mission to represent all Caribbean and Latin American cultures has resulted in a constriction of community participation.Â
Why We Care:
-The Museum’s collection houses the largest collection of Puerto Rican art in the United States, comprising at least 75% of its collection. The collective culture and visual evidence of Puerto Rican art, and a history against elitism in the art establishment are housed in this institution.
– El Museo was created by a group of Puerto Rican artists and community activists to exhibit the works of U.S. Latino artists and provide arts education to the Latino community. It provided an innovative and groundbreaking alternative to the elitist art museums and galleries of New York.
-Puerto Ricans, Latino and U.S. born Latin American artists are still marginalized in mainstream art museums and galleries. There is as much need for El Museo’s founding mission to represent the Puerto Rican and Latino artistic community and provide creative exhibitions for the Latino constituency today.
-The board and staff raised nearly a half million dollars for the present exhibition of Frida Khalo and Diego Rivera (the Gelman Collection) while exhibitions of U.S. Latino and Puerto Rican artists are woefully underfunded.
What we Want:
-Adherence to El Museo’s current mission which is “to represent the arts and culture of Puerto Ricans and Latin Americans in the United States,” in a balanced and equitable basis.Â
-A comprehensive exhibition policy that is consistent with the nature of the collection and with the make up of the U.S. Latino community which is primarily Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban and Mexican-American.
-Puerto Ricans and Latinos in Upper Management positions.
-An Artist-In-Residence Program and an acquisition policy for the work of U.S. Latino artists.
-That at least 25% of El Museo’s Board of Trustees be made up of Latino/a artists, scholars and community members.
-A permanent exhibition space for the Puerto Rican works that were contributed to establish the museum.
-Fiscal accountability of public and private sector monies.
-Community involvement in the selection of the new director.
meeting on 21St and Townhall meeting on *9/26*
The room at the Centro is not available on the 22, but we are booked for *Wednesday 21 from 6-8.* Make a note of the change. As some of you know, the demonstration was a success! And there is a ****Townhall meeting (organized by the Cultural Affairs Committee of Community Board 11) for September 26 at La Guardia House (307 116Street, between 1 and 2 avenue), @ 6:00 PM, ***** We had said that Wednesdays meeting is to strategize re: a possible meeting and for this important event.
letter Yasmin sent to El Museo
Below is a letter Yasmin sent to El Museo. Please remember that we agreed to meet at the Centro on Thursday, August 22 at 6:00 to discuss how to proceed from here. See you all tomorrow! a.d.
From: RAMIREZ, YASMIN
To: ‘sdelvalle@elmuseo.org’; ‘stlpnl@aol.com’
Sent: 8/13/2002 5:48 PM
Dear Susan R. Delvalle, external affairs coordinator and Susana Leval, director emeritus:
I am writing to give you an update on last wednesday’s meeting at the Center for Puerto Rican Studie where artists,
scholars and community activists gathered to discuss their concerns about El Museo del Barrio and plan for the August 15th rally. Firstly, I am happy to inform you that is was a postive and productive meeting. We were able to reach consensus on several key issues that we would like
the board to consider. They are outlined below in the “information sheet” that is being circulated over the internet by the Puerto Rican Studies Association and will be handed out at the demonstration on Thursday. The group decided that they want to meet a week after Thursday’s rally to discuss how best to pursue meetings with the board ,
>set down some possible times and dates, etc. In the meantime, I will be glad to forward your comments and concerns to the group at the next meeting. Since I am temporarily acting as a conduit between the community at large and El Museo it would be good to set some groundrules
so that there are no misunderstandings.
Firstly, you should be aware that I am sending a blind copy of this email to several members of the group in order to keep this process transparent.
Secondly, please send any correspondence you want circulated at the next meeting to my email yramirez@gc.cuny.edu and/or to my home XXXXXXXXX but address the letter in a way that it can be shared with others i.e. to: “Supporters of Community Board 11 Cultural Affairs Committe”.” Also, please bear in mind that I am primarly serving as a conduit between the scholars and artists in the group and El Museo. Ms. Debbie Quinones, who is spearheading the We Are Watching YOu campaign in district 11 should continue to be contacted individually. My role at this time is to lift the burden of passing information from Ms. Quinones’s staff to artists and scholars that live outside District 11.
Thanks again for offering to keep the lines of communication open…yasmin ramirez
El Museo
You ask “why do we need to share” the institution, why not keep it “our own”? The answer is fairly simple: because from Day 1, el Museo had exhibitions about other cultures! Look up the list (of the last 32 years) of all the exhibitions mounted on the walls. It was, is, and will remain a Puertorican museum OPEN to others, to show them about us, but also to show how much we have in common with others….
The founders of el Museo, most if not all were Puertorican, had a compelling vision back then and it continues to this day. Practically the entire board of trustees IS Puertorican. In Manhattan the perception is that it is a “Puertorican museum”.
That, for example, wooden scultptures from Puerto Rico–“santos de palo” which were and still remain in the permanent collection were a cultural phenomenom of Puerto Rico were ALSO found in other countries–therefore they would show the santos from Puerto Rico but also explain and illustrate that that tradition was SHARED by other countries. That it had come from Spain and the Catholic church; That by making sure that children could see these connections to many other cultures they were not alone. That our culture, specifically from PR and its diaspora, was part of a bigger world beyond: it is rich and huge.
Another example is that the famous “Vegigante” masks from Ponce, which el Museo has in its collection to this day were ALSO linked and related to the mask-making traditions of Mexico and other Caribbean cultures. These exhibitions were in place decades ago inside el Museo!
Your children and our children and all children of Puertorican heritage will ALWAYS have access to that permanent collection, they are taking care of it for generations to come.
I think that instead of worrying about “which direction” el Museo is going, we need to support it by going to visit it as often as we can, becoming members (and therefore we become part of el Museo’s community), and make constructive suggestions and recommendations. We need to show el Museo that we are willing to roll up our sleeves to work with them to make it even better: MORE gallery space so that MORE art & culture can be exhibited. This will require MORE $$$$.
I think we can be and do BOTH. el Museo is our premier cultural institution–lets not “tear it down” by having a petty family squabble in public. That only damages the institution.
If you remember there were dark days for el Museo some time ago: its doors were shut down and its director escorted out the door by Marshalls. Do any of you remember THAT? How soon we forget. He was accused of missapropriation of funds–this was a media spectacle from which el Museo had to spend YEARS and YEARS to recover from. No funder wants to give $$$ to controversies, nor does the city of New York.
I think el Museo has done a great job!
UNNECESSARY HYSTERIA
I am very surprised to read some of the claims put out by some people who wish to “re-claim” el Museo del Barrio.
Perhaps settting the record straight might be helpful on some issues:
FACT: El Museo del Barrio WAS founded in a classroom in East Harlem/El Barrio by a group of parents, educators, artists and community leaders. Among them, there WAS Ralph Montanez Ortiz–who WAS Director of el Museo at one point.
From the material put out by el Museo, and the material that is available to those who bother to ask for it in el Museo’s archives, the above FACTS have never been denied, changed, hidden, or distorted. This is a FACT not a “MYTH”.
As to the claim that the importance of the artistic legacy of Ralph Montanez Ortiz, who now teaches at Rutgers University, is being “denied” by el Museo seems to me to be overblown rethoric. The artistic legacy, importance, of any artist (Latino, Puertorican or any descent for that matter)is rarely if never in the hands of a single institution, on the one hand–it requires the building of a consensus by scholars, critics, artists, etc., etc. over a long period of time– and if the artist is alive (which here it is the case) then the artist himself/herself can be looked at for further support and evidence of that vision (does the artist continue in a similar,seminal, trajectory? does the artist vision reach a critical mass? and so on). As far as I know Mr. Montanez Ortiz is very satisfied with his teaching role and the work he produces and has not made any accusation, himself, against el Museo. El museo in fact assisted in the exhibition of his work in other venues and lent its pieces from its own collection to broaden the knowledge base of his work over the last 30 years.
FACT: The current board of trustees did not “take over” el Museo in 1986.
Any museum board of trustess advises, and sets overall policy and has fiduciary responsibility to its institution. The day-to-day management of any institution is delegated to its Executive Director. The board is also heavily responsible for fund raising. Members of any board do not come and “take over” anything….members are added over long periods of time usually 1-2 at a time. By nature a board is very conservative body–they tend to be cautious, not prone to making speedy, “knee-jerk” decisions. Board meetings throughout the world are behind closed doors…it can get boring in there! This applies to universities, museums, not-for-profit institutions, etc. I do not know of any museum board of trustees that holds “open meetings” with anyone outside. It is its own prerogative to conduct its business in the manner they see fit–if you want open doors you can go to el Museo itself every day it is open to the public its doors are always OPEN. That is what a museum does.
As far as I know, Taller Boricua’s board meetings are also behind closed doors. The selection of its executive director is not done by a process of consensus with the community nor in an “open town hall” type meeting, nor is the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Bronx Museum, or any other comparable institution, culturally specific institution.
So the questions comes up why complain about something which follows standard practice? If the gripe allegedly has been there since 1986, why raise it now? Did the complainer(s) register this with the Executive Director, Susana Torruella Leval? Are they also “Watching” the other non-for-profit groups when they select a director? Did they do this with the search for an Executive Director at the Museum of the City of New York? At Mt. Sinai Hospital? at Taller Boricua?
FACT: Aurora Flores runs Aurora Communications a public relations and advertising agency in el Barrio. She has worked for el Museo in the past and has received contracts for promoting exhibitions at el Museo over many years. She did not get the contract for public relations for the Frida Kahlo/Diego Rivera exhibition.
Ms. Flores has been quoted as saying that el Museo promotes “eurocentric Latin American artists” (whatever that means) which I assume is referring to Kahlo and Rivera. But I am puzzled by that claim. Neither artist would never have considered themselves “eurocentric” in their lifetimes nor have I come across ANY written material by bona fide art critics, art history scholars, other artists which deal with this issue of their alleged “eurocentrism”….. so the jury is still out on that one.
FACT: El Museo has presented CONSISTENTLY (go to http://www.elmuseo.org) and SYSTEMATICALLY the art and culture of Puertoricans AND Nuyoricans for 32 years. El Museo has about 7,500 square feet of exhibition space.
Ironically the fact remains that others–non Puertorican and Nuyoricans–perceive and consider el Museo a PUERTORICAN museum and institution to this day. Some artists, who shall remain nameless, including some from el Barrio have refused to be shown at el Museo when invited because they believe that el Museo is too “narrow” for them and those same artists believe it would be detrimental to their careers to be shown there. This is as recent as 6 months ago.
FACT: The overwhelming majority of board members of el Museo ARE Puertorican (100%). There IS an African American board member. Until recently there WAS a Dominican American–she submitted a letter of resignation because she wanted to raise her children. Nominations to the board are open to anyone and there is a process involved.
There is more, much more, of course but my recommendation to the community leaders is that the gripe they have brought before the community at large ought to be re-directed to: the mass media for ignoring us (everyone from the New York Times to ABC News); the wealthy Puertoricans and Latinos (those that are NYC based) who decline to support financially el Museo or visit it; the new Bloomberg adminsitration for for taking away the Tweed Courthouse from the Museum of the City of New York thus preventing el Museo from making a quantum leap–into a much bigger building–by moving next door when MCNY was scheduled to move downtown.
It may well be a case of complaining at the wrong window.
Positions to be presented at town hall meeting
Both sides will be able to present at the town hall meeting scheduled this coming week, on Thursday. I saw the event posted in Corrientes. Will you be there?
reminder of townhall
Don’t forget that ***Community Board Eleven’s Town Hall Meeting on El Museo del Barrio*** will be held at La Guardia Community Center this Thursday, September 26 from 6:00-8:00PM. The Center is located at 307 East 116th Street, between 1 and 2nd Avenue in El Barrio.
If you want to speak you MUST register before tomorrow, Tuesday September 23 by calling District Manager at 212-831-8930. Otherwise, just come and spread the word! **Que circule la palabra!**
BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
This is a ridiculous idea promoted by a small, disgruntled, hysterical, and non-residents of East Harlem.
Whatever petty complaints can be filed directly with the staff of the institution.
I am not going to waste my time nor my neighbors’ to go see (or hear) a monologue.
Get a life girls!
What Positions?
Clara: What positions? This is a meeting called by one side only–while it appears to be an opportunity for both sides to “present” their positions it does not have any consent from anybody else.
Its like Olga Mendez saying she is going to call for a “debate” but does not ask anybody else if the other side will agree to one. She “debates” herself and then claims the other side did not show up?
I live in East Harlem and this so-called “town hall meeting” is of no interest whatsoever to many residents.
Debbie Quinones should get a real job and stop harrassing others. That’s why I would never vote for her–too petty and narrow in her views.
BOYCOTT “Town Hall Meeting”
Mi Gente: There are emerging voices and more people rallying and supporting el Museo del Barrio.
You can help by becoming members, attending shows, and taking your kids there as we East Harlemites are doing.
3-4 hysterical women do not a movement make: the town hall meeting is a hoax and a waste of people’s time.
We vote with our feet by going to lots of activities & programs at el Museo, we submit constructive ideas to the people who are in a position to implement positive change, volunteer with our time and encourage others to go there as well, etc.
Therefore, stay home on the nite of 9/24: why waste your time?
el Museo is poised
El Museo is poised to be a great institution going forward.
The foundation has been well laid.
RE: el Museo is poised
As a “puertorriqueno”I feel very proud of the Museo’s accomplishments throughout these years. I believe that its time to accept that we don’t live alone in this world, that we are participants in a much larger scheme. I believe that we must integrate ourselves into the bigger space of the arts, in
conjunction with our Latin American brothers and sisters. Le’s put aside those sterile “nacionalismos” and let’s work for the benefits of all Latinos regardles where they come from. La unidad mas que la division es la clave del exito.
VENUE VENUE VENUE
Dear EGG,
I do not agree with your comment about not being from the community.
I certainly do not agree that [the girls] should get a life.
I do not agree that anything should be boycotted.
However, I do agree that that particular forum didnt need to take place at Town Hall…if you wouldnt mind my approaching the question in the inverse.
The issues around the leadership of El Museo are sound & significant. The theme of ethnocentricity or multiculturalism, as it applies to inclusion, as opposed to exclusion (or apartheid or “seprate but equalism”) is worth as much intellection as we can get into the airways; but Im not sure that Town Hall was a venue for this particular activity. The Hecksher auditorium would have been, for sure. The auditorium or gymnasium of a local school, of course…St Cecilias.
Anyone who can relate to the issues relating to the future of El Museo would easily have been willing to make it to El Barrio.
RE: VENUE VENUE VENUE
You may have been misinformed:
The venue itself was NOT the well-known Town Hall theatre near Times Square.
The “town hall meeting” style meeting already took place: it was at the basement of La Guardia, a local community center in East Harlem.
Of course the 4 amigas could have made it at el Teatro Hecksher giving the proceedings a more logical & thought out presence.
In their hysteria they missed the boat.
RE: BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
The townhall meeting which was organized by community board #11 was quite successful. Quite successful because the follow-up is really critical. The board members who were part of the panel, Tony Bechara and John Caro, as well as Susana Toruella Leval were responsive–sincerely responsive and moved, I believe, by the outpouring of the community, over 150 people, residents, artists, activists, as well as academics and others from “outside” El Barrio. The fact is, that the Museo del Barrio is important to the Puerto Rican community and the Barrio is a much bigger concept than simply the area comprising Manhattan’s East Harlem area. You should know better than posting such a disgruntled comment.
RE: BOYCOTT “Town Hall Meeting”
El Museo was founded in 1969 not only as an alternative exhibition space for Puerto Rican artists whose art would not be shown by mainstream or canonical museums, but also to fulfill a social role within the Puerto Rican community of New York. This social function consisted in establishing an institution that supported and diffused the richness and complexity of Puerto Rican arts and history. For many years El Museo served as a landmark of the Puerto Rican presence in NY, and presented–to the Puerto Ricans and to international art consummers– the potential and talent of a population that had been historically marginalized and underestimated in the United States both culturally and socially. In addition, the close relationship between El Museo and the community of El Barrio was significant in presenting an art deeply shaped by the living experience of this marginalized population and which consequently was very loaded with social and political meaning–a characteristic that also fits in other Latino art expressions in the US, such as Chicano art. It would be therefore very irresponsible to deprive the Puerto Rican community of any participation or direct representation in El Museo, since it will decontextualize the work of many Puerto Rican and Latino artists whose art has so much to do with their urban experience as underpriviledge citizens. At the same time, it will mean a total erasing of the original mission of El Museo which was meant to be a socially aware institution that took account of the needs and concerns of the Puerto Ricans in New York.
Mr. Garcia Gutierrez, with all the respect that you deserve for been an important Puerto Rican art historian and critic, I have to admit that I am deeply offended by your very misogynist and reductive comment on the “3 or 4 hysterical women” who were advocating for more participation of the community in El Museo. Having been at the Town Hall meeting on a stormy thursday night, having listened to many long-time members of the Puerto Rican community in NY, including hard working Puerto Ricans, internationally known artists like Diogenes Ballester, Jose Morales, and Juan Sanchez (among others), and new important intellectuals like Arlene Davila and Yazmin Ramirez, having seen the presence of our major scholar of the Puerto Rican diaspora, Juan Flores, I can tell you that the movement is big, strong, well articulated and above all non-hysterical. If such would have been the case, the results of the Town Hall meeting would not have been so productive, as to get Chairman of el Museo, Mr. Tony Bechara, and former executive director, Mrs. Susana Torruella Leval compromise on instituting community representation on the board of El Museo.
el museo del barrio
CUANDO LA PAPA
ESTA CALIENTE NO
LA DEJES ENFRIAR
I CAME OUT OF THE MEETING
WITH THE FEELING OF PRO CESO
THE TEMPERAMENT OF ESPERAR
PALABRAS COMO NEXT WEEK
EL PROXIMO MEZ DE TEN FE
SI PERO LA VIDA ES ASI
M’IJO/A
PERO QUE SE PUEDE HACER
CON MI MENTE DE BASTA YA
SO I ATE THE PAPA CALIENTE
WITH CON AJO DE BREA
AND DURING THE MASTICATION
PRO CESO BORINCANO
WITH LLUVIAS OF PROGRESO
I THOUGHT OF A CONSTITUIONAL
CONVENTION DURING PUERTO
RICAN HERITAGE MONTH
AT THE HECKSCHER THEATRE
WHERE THE ENTIRE BOARD
OF EL MUSEO DEL BARRIO
WILL BE ON STAGE CON LA COMUNIDAD
TO CLARIFY LA MISION
I THOUGHT THAT TOMAS YBARRA
FROM THE ROCKEFELLER FOUNDATION
SHOULD HOST A LUNCHEON ON
OCTOBER BETWEEN THE EXECUTIVE
BOARD OF EL MUSEO AND SIX
COMMUNITY NOTABLES TO SET THE
NOVEMBER ENCOUNTER
NOW I FELT INTELIGENCIA
AN AMICABLE SOLUTION
BUT I REALLY FELT LIKE
CANDLELIGHT DEMONSTRATIONS
AND THAT EVERY PUERTO RICAN
SHOULD RESIGN FROM THE BOARD
UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
I WALKED TO EL MUSEO DEL
BARRIO WITH GOTAS OF THE
RAIN MILITARY COMPANIONS
AND WHAT I REALLY
FELT WAS THAT EL MUSEO
DEL BARRIO IS ON FIRE
CON LOS BORICUAS
HAY QUE APAGARLE LA LUZ
BUT I WILL RESIGN MYSELF
TO WAIT UNTIL THE PUERTO
RICAN HERITAGE MONTH
CONVENTIONAL ENCOUNTER
NO HAY MAS NA
The Puerto Rican Legacy
Most people were neither there nor know of the long and difficult struggle to bring this wonderful institution to New York City by Puerto Ricans. It is only fitting that its leader be Puerto Rican and the Board of Directors have significant Puerto Rican representation. This, in and of itself, does not make the institution exclusionary nor “nationalistic”. The record speaks for itself on that subject as the Museum has always exhibited and promoted the arts from ALL Latino cultures. It does help establish the Puerto Rican legacy and their contribution to our society in general. We should and must pay homage to those who have blazed this trail for ALL Latinos. A “Puerto Rican Museum of Latino Arts and Culture” would be a worthy tribute to those who built the Museum lest we forget who we are in our collective memory and lose our heritage in the process.
RE: RE: BOYCOTT “townhall meeting”
Thanks for your defense and lucidity, Clara. As artist Juan Sanchez said in one of the meetings of the “We are watching you” campaing, “el barrio” is not only East Harlem, but a metaphore of every Puerto Rican community in NY, from Harlem to Staten Island, passing by Brooklyn and Queens. El Museo just happens to be in 104th St and 5th Ave, so the residents of East Harlem should have something to say regarding its functionment. However, residents from other parts of NY or from PR who are sincerely concerned about the preservation and diffusion of Puerto Rican culture are welcome to contribute.
Yesterday’s historical meeting went on for two hours with a good, constructive and RESPECTFUL debate between the community and El Museo. I don’t see the reason why we should be disrespectful to each other in order to expose your concerns in this forum. Even when you don’t agree with someone, be respectful, please, and avoid comments such as “get a life, girls!” or “hysterical women” when you want to refer to any community member or any member of the new generation of serious intellectuals who are making significant contributions to Puerto Rican scholarship.
RE: UNNECESSARY HYSTERIA Response
You claim a fact about me that is NOT A FACT but misinformation. First of all, I DID have the contract for the Frida Kahlo show and it was breached by the Executive Director and the board. In fact, not only was it breached but the Director lied about not having money to hire any public relations firm and that the work for that show would be done “pro bono” by a board member. Not only was this a bold faced lie, they received an unrestricted grant and hired a top ten P.R. Madison Avenue firm that has a relationship with one of the Board members. They were so guilty about doing this behind my back while they were claiming poverty that the Director wrote me a glowing letter attesting to the wonderful work done by my firm. I realized she was lying to me when she called me a month later to get copies of all my previous reports to her as well as my contact lists so that she could share this with Fuder – Finn, the firm that was hired to promote an event that needed no promotion. Wasn’t that wonderful of her?
Prior to that I witnessed first hand how the Director and the Board totally ignored, disrespected and patronized the supposed Community Advisory Board that was to have worked alongside El Museo for the Three Kings Day Parade. As a matter of fact, El Muso wanted me to directly intervene and negotiate with this board after they had ignored them for more than six months. I refused to do this since I was hired directly by the Executive Director to do P.R. not to lie on their behalf. Some of us do have ethics, morals and scruples. In any event, it became very obvious to me that the Director and the Board have absolutely no regard or respect for the community and the Puerto Rican founders of the museum. They also have no respect for the surrounding Mexican community as I also witnessed the total rudeness and lack of any “class” or “courtesy” when el Museo’s former education director quite brutally disrupted the Mexican Aztec Fire Dancers from their Dia de Muertos ritual dance because they were making too much noise and were disrupting the talk that El Museo had simultaneously scheduled with Isabel Allende.
Anyone that has worked for this cadre of “Culture Vultures” will attest to these truths. The result of the Three Kings Day Parade was the appearance of the newly elected Mayor in El Barrio for his first public appearance, and the absence of ANY board member accompanying the Mayor — or anyone else — into the East Harlem Community.
I don’t know who you are Mr. Enrique Gutierrez but you should learn some basic manners first and journalistic principles later that before you go off quoting or talking about someone — you should get your FACTS directly from that person. I have no problem meeting you FACE to FACE if you should want to see any of the REAL FACTS I am quoting to you now. This is also not the first time I have worked with EL Museo. I have had a long history with the institution since its inception — as a member and as a businesswoman. And the fact that you went off “half cocked” without checking with me first taints any credibility to the rest of your fabricated and totally inarticulate story.
As for myself, I am a long standing community member, cultural activist, entrepreneur, writer and the great grandneice of Eugenio Maria de Hostos.
And I will DEMAND respect from you or any other self-hating, provincial thinking, psudeo intellectual colonialist slave that pretends to speak on my behalf. I do not need you or anyone else for that matter to define who I am.
Aurora Flores
Town Meeting Here or There
GPena…thanks for the clarification. Somehow, I recall the notice i received saying Town Hall — but it makes sense that you are right.
Now about The Hystericals. Interestingly, Hecksher would have fired them up but in a contextual way ‘eh…& appropriately.
My question to you is, why are The Hystericals in a position to determine these things: Agenda, When, Where, &c. Did a vacuum make room for The Hystericals to take the lead (Life Abhors a Vacuum — in fact there can never be a vacuum, if you think about it. The moment there is an opening, it is filled by the last best choice. But then again, that is another conversation.)
Can you appreciate the Symetry: a Vacuum of Leadership at El Museo = a Vacuum of Leadership in the Loyal Opposition.
Are all the Good Effective Leaders ‘comprao’ or what. Are they in Academia (that has always been my suspicion; their literati aspects notwithstanding.
The issue is Puertorican Pride and respect”
Puertorican pride and respect has been turned into a mockery in this country. The streets of New York City are paved with the blood of great Puertorican Artist who never made it because of racial bigotry and racism. We have now, and have had, many great leaders who have struggled to build our image as hard working creative,caring, sensitive and loving people. I’m from the Lower East Side where we have struggled for over 50 years to establish a piece of the rock for ourselves. When no one wanted to visited LES, or Loisaida as we call it, we were the ones saving the buildings,cleaning the streets, and chasing the drug dealers out. We saved an abandoned school building, created a magazine,”The Quality Of Life In Loisaida” and began a housing cultural artistic movement that blossomed into what we see today, total gentrification. El Museo del Barrio would not exist if it were not for groups like Charas/El Bohio. I feel we need a PuertoRican Executive director in El Museo Del Barrio because Charas was evicted from their building after twenty years of hard work by the Guliani administration. We longer have affordable rehearsal space for the Latino and struggling artist. El Museo Del Barrio should be dedicated to continue the work we have given our lives to establish PuertoRican Pride and Respect. It should not be allowed to turn into another gentrified institution that is solely dedicated to serving the status quo. How much do we have to lose before we realize, no one is going to do anything for us, except ourselves. Must we lose El Museo too…Haven’t we lost enough…Can’t we we get it together to save our hard earned effort. Divided we fall, united we stand.
The issue is Puertorican Pride and respect”
Puertorican pride and respect has been turned into a mockery in this country. The streets of New York City are paved with the blood of great Puertorican Artist who never made it because of racial bigotry and racism. Julia De burgos, one of our most illustrious famous artist was almost buried in Poters field. We have now, and have had, many great leaders who have struggled to build our image as hard working creative caring, sensitive and loving people. I’m from the Lower East Side where we have struggled for over 50 years to establish a piece of the rock for ourselves. In the early 70’s when no one wanted to visit LES, or Loisaida as we call it today, we were the ones saving the buildings, cleaning the streets, and chasing the drug dealers out. We saved a City abandoned school building 605 East 9th street, created a magazine,”The Quality Of Life In Loisaida” and began a housing cultural artistic movement that blossomed into what we see today, total gentrification. El Museo del Barrio would not exist if it were not for groups like Charas/El Bohio, Loisaida and the Nuyorican Poets Cafe. I feel we need a PuertoRican Executive director in El Museo Del Barrio because Charas was evicted from their building after twenty years of hard work by the Guliani administration. We no longer have affordable rehearsal space for the Latinos and struggling artist in the City. Charas was the only affordable space. El Museo Del Barrio should be dedicated to continue the work we have given our lives to establish PuertoRican Pride and Respect. It should not be allowed to turn into another gentrified institution that is solely dedicated to serving the status quo. How much more do we have to lose before we realize, no one is going to do anything for us, except ourselves. Must we lose El Museo too!..Haven’t we lost enough!..Can’t we we get it together to save our hard earned effort. Must our history be wiped out to make way for gentrification. Gentrification is a form of bombing like the bombs falling in Vieques. When our people are being displaced because of skyrocketing rents, over twenty thousand families in Loisaida in the past 20 years, were is the justice for our hard earned contribution. If we don’t stand up and fight for what is ours one day our neighborhoods will be like Soho, Noho and Moho.
“Town Meeting: NOT Here NOR There
Very good questions indeed….let me share some of my thoughts re: Las 4 Amigas [aka: Las Histericas, Las Lloronas]:
Yes, it appears that the minute it became known that the Executive Director of el Museo was retiring [for compelling health reasons], this group of opportunistic parisites/viruses infected the situation.
The timing is CLEAR. Now, what do they choose to do? How they chose to proceed?
They chose to do a damaging, vociferous, and antagonistic campaign ON THE STREETS, and ON THE PRESS without bothering to go directly to the source and communicating directly with the principal players.
In other words, it is like calling for a meeting, orchestrating a demonstration against the mayor (or any public institution) without bothering to write/speak/engage/file the complaint with the mayor’s office (or public institution’s CEO).
Indeed they went ahead and scheduled their own meeting, unilaterally, with ALL “their” people and THEN announced it to the world and el Museo that they were holding a so-called “town hall meeting.”
This was (and became) a charade. The meeting was interesting for ALL THE PEOPLE WHO DID NOT SHOW UP!!!!!
RE: The Puerto Rican Legacy
Beautiful words and deeply meaningful.
I too believe that that is the greatest legacy of el Museo, a living and growing institution.
However, the above does not require a Puertorican executive director. Instutions live on, directors do not.
“Town Hall Meeting”
Another large group of Puertorican leaders, artists, scholars, community activists, and other stakeholders stayed home.
After seeing the true motives and misguided attempts to polarize our community, many decided that they would rather attend the shows, become members, support with their sweat and dough this magnificent institution.
If you are “offended” that others have a different point of view from yours, including “our own kind” and people of our own flesh and blood, then this argument is not about one institution but rather about something much bigger: race, class, education, power, etc.
It appears, from your description that you have some nostalgic sense of what it was like to struggle to sustain such a mission. Ity appears that during these entire 3 decades you have not once gotten involved.
Where were you during th last 10 years? Where were you when Jack Agueros was escorted out the door by Marshals? Where were you when el Museo was shut down, under investigation for misappropriation of funds?
It is a miracle it is still there.