Meet the Disruptor: Thom Collins

Feb. 10, 2016

In his 1989 book, The Slap-up Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Community Center, Dazzler Parlors, Full general Stores, Confined, Hangouts, and How They Got Through the Solar day , sociologist Ray Oldenburg coined the term "third place."

Oldenburg's thesis is now a social studies tenet: A person's first identify is home; 2nd, work; and third, an escape from the offset ii. Observe the author didn't include "fine art museum" in the championship.

Barnes director Thom Collins would like to modify that.

Afterward less than a year at the helm of i of the world'southward most renowned repositories of fine fine art, Collins is determined to farther transform the once famously cloistered collection into an attainable, meaningful gathering identify.

"Nosotros desire [the Barnes] to be people'south 'other place,' their go-to," says Collins. "We want people to build networks and communities around our feel."

For the previously hard-to-get-into Barnes, such thinking is particularly assuming. For Collins, a Swarthmore grad born and raised in Media, it's a moral imperative.

A few weeks into his directorship in 2015, Collins announced the museum would use a matching grant from an anonymous donor to offer free weekday admission to all currently enrolled college undergrad students. The plan went into upshot this past November. So far, more 3,000 students from across the country and world have visited, as often as they've wished, without ever paying.

"We take a vast and extraordinary collection, and it is impossible for anyone, including yours truly, to assimilate even a small portion of that drove during one visit or even multiple visits. I try to get to the collection every day, and every twenty-four hour period, I come across things I haven't noticed before," Collins says, "The Barnes rewards sustained attention and extended contemplation in a diversity of ways."

The thought is new for Philadelphia, but isn't unheard of amidst similar institutions nationally. The Smithsonian's xix-and-counting locations charge no entry fee. Nor does L.A.'southward Getty Center, or the major art museums in Minneapolis, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Baltimore and Seattle. Many universities and colleges partner with nearby museums—like Penn's Institute of Contemporary Fine art—to requite students discounted or costless admission, too.

Historically, the Barnes has been restrictive—much more restrictive.

While Albert Barnes was live, visitors needed his written approval to see the drove. Starting in 1961,the Chief Line mansion-based galleries and arboretum opened to the public only two days a week. Later on, the Foundation limited visitors to 500 per week. By the aughts, attendance had doubled to 62,400 annually, and during the Barnes' last twelvemonth on the Principal Line, Merion eased restrictions so the museum could permit in xc,000 visitors.

Still, very advanced reservations were always required.

All previous attendance records were shattered post-relocation—postal service controversial relocation, that is—to the Tod Williams & Billie Tsien-designed building on the Ben Franklin Parkway in 2012. In its first eight months, foot traffic past the 59 Matisses, 69 Cézannes and 181 Renoirs more than doubled that of the institution's previous year. In that same corporeality of time, annual membership went from 400 to over 25,000.

It must be said that the good, albeit eccentric, doctor had honorable intentions and a strong philosophy behind his nearly-airtight-door policies. Barnes envisioned his collection as part of an educational mission. He aimed to upturn the idea that art was the provenance of the privileged by granting access to students and the working class showtime, upper-crusty visitors second—or, in some notable cases, like  author James Michener, who eventually posed as a steel worker to go far—not at all.

"[Barnes'] idea was: Let's teach people to meet actively, and to be clear about what they run across, quite apart from whatever advanced educational activity or special knowledge," Collins explains. "That, in his mind, was truly autonomous."

In the Barnes' brave new world on the Parkway, offer free access to college students is another step toward that democracy, says Collins. It is also the key to sustainability. Collins says the Barnes' new strategic plan includes creating a network of academy partners for research, education, sharing of resources and alluring students. Young, interested visitors are more than potential members, Collins says. They're potential partners.

"I of our big goals is engaging younger audiences on a sustained footing," he says. "We can them become hither in one case for an effect or once for a show, but how do we get Millennials hither on a regular basis? The Barnes, like many cultural institutions, is really focused on developing future audiences."

One manner to do that, is by involving the region's more than 450,000 higher-and-beyond students, letting them study at the Barnes, interact in that location, build their ain sense of ownership and community at that place. Doing away with admission is a first step to lowering the bulwark to entry.

The next step: Getting them to come back.

"Nosotros have a vast and boggling drove, and it is incommunicable for anyone, including yours truly, to digest even a minor portion of that collection during ane visit or even multiple visits. I try to go to the collection every solar day, and every 24-hour interval, I see things I haven't noticed before," he says, "The Barnes rewards sustained attention and extended contemplation in a variety of ways."

The free entry for higher pupil programme went into effect this past Nov. So far, more than than 3,000 students from across the country and world take visited, as often as they've wished, without ever paying.

The more you go, the more you know. The more yous know, the more you lot want to share with those around y'all. After all, this is the era of experiential over the material.

Collins was a curator at Cincinnati's Contemporary Arts Center when it deputed an audience engagement study that discovered that more than a demographic profile, more than even than a preference for certain works of art, the museum's frequent visitors shared the desires to exist "challenged past new ideas and experiences,"and to spend time with other people who like new ideas and experiences.

Collins believes the same holds truthful for the Barnes. "Yous come here, aye, because y'all might similar French Impressionism or American Modernism or African material culture," he says. "But it's just as likely that people come hither, and end up engaged with people that care about their interests and concerns."

Interaction, relationships, homo moments: These are what people—peculiarly young people—hold onto, long after art history lessons fade.

So, the Barnes is ramping upwards its special exhibits, doubling down on lectures, movie nights and cocktail parties, and lifting the weight of admission from students for the foreseeable future.

"This is their museum," Collins says, evoking a modern-solar day Albert Barnes. "This is their foundation."

Correction: A previous version of this story said Barnes refused to let poet T.Southward. Eliot to visit the collection. Eliot did visit later on sending a request in 1933.

Header Photo © The Barnes Foundation, 2015. Photo by Michael Perez.

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Source: https://thephiladelphiacitizen.org/meet-the-disruptor-thom-collins-barnes-museum-barnes-foundation/

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