New Englanders are jumping ship

Uconn is following the Rose Art Museum bandwagon.... this is a joke!
I guess art is a unnecessary luxury... hell we should just get it over with and burn all the Art Museums down. I'm going to be irate if he follows through with this.

UConn President Considers Closing Campus Museums

By GRACE E. MERRITT | The Hartford Courant
February 23, 2009

STORRS — - University of Connecticut President Michael Hogan is considering closing the Benton Museum of Art and the state's natural history museum, both located on the Storrs campus, to help close an expected $35 million gap in state funding in 2009-10.

Hogan estimates that the university would save $1.25 million a year by closing both museums.

"This economic crisis is forcing us to take a much closer look and ask more fundamental questions, like should we be in the museum business at all," Hogan said.

He noted that he is not considering selling any of the Benton's extensive art collection, unlike Brandeis University. The president of Brandeis sparked a furor last month when he announced that the school would close its museum and sell its art collection to help offset its shrinking endowment. He later reversed himself.

"I really don't have anything to say about it," he said.

Hogan said he would have to check with lawyers to see whether there would be any problems getting permission to close the museums, particularly because both are state museums. But he said budget constraints have forced him to consider a range of cuts.

"When you are looking at the rescissions we're facing, you've got to look pretty hard at the things that are not at the center of the academic mission," Hogan said.

In addition to possibly closing the museums, Hogan said, he is exploring consolidating them.

Both museums have been renovated or expanded in recent years. UConn built a $3.2 million, 7,000-square-foot addition onto the Benton in 2004. The museum, which officially opened in 1967 in what was originally the university's dining hall, called the Beanery, has more than 5,500 works, including paintings, drawings, watercolors, prints, photographs and sculpture.

Hogan said the university has been concerned about art storage at the Benton because of leaks and humidity in the building. UConn has explored storing some of the museum's most precious pieces in other museums, but storage has been limited at those sites, as well.

"The drainage all around the exterior of the building needs pretty substantial repairs," Hogan said. "Most of the art is stored in the basement. Only one of the rooms has up-to-date moisture and air control."

Meanwhile, the Connecticut State Museum of Natural History opened its first permanent programming and exhibit space two years ago in the old Apple Sales Room Building on North Hillside Road. The museum, which is actually 20 years old, is now the headquarters for the Connecticut Archaeology Center, which has the single largest repository of Connecticut Native American, Colonial and industrial artifacts.

Officials at the natural history museum could not be reached for comment.

Brandeis University caused a commotion last month when the board of trustees voted to close the Rose Art Museum and sell its art collection. Brandeis President Jehuda Reinharz subsequently said the decision was misunderstood. He said the museum would remain open, with a focus on serving the college's educational needs, and that some pieces of the collection might be sold.

UConn has no plans to sell its collection, Hogan said. In fact, regulations stipulate that any art that UConn sells must be reinvested in artwork, he said.