To the Editors:
The New Criterion’s misguided ideas about Patrick McCaughey, which appeared in “Notes & Com ments” for December 1989, are based on an inaccurately reported interview that Mr. McCaughey had with William Zimmer of The New York Times and that was published in the Times last October 8.
Mr. Zimmer’s interview contained many mis takes, and one glaring misquote, namely, “After Mr. Austin’s Directorate, the Wadsworth Atheneum fell into a decline.” Mr. McCaughey said no such thing. He has repeatedly and publicly acknowledged Mr. Cunningham’s, Mr. Elliot’s, and Mr. Atkinson’s achievements on many occasions. Before The New Criterion sounded off in such a manner, it might have been wise to call Mr. McCaughey for clarification, for it is well known that the Wadsworth Atheneum has never been “in decline” in the 147 years of its history.
The New Criterion’s attack on Mr. McCaughey’s and his curators’ decision to take the Mapplethorpe show—which was made long before the Corcoran controversy—and its implication that this decision was made for publicity reasons, is totally unfair. What Mr. McCaughey meant when he supposedly exclaimed “Bingo!” was that the publicity that had previously surrounded this show might make the general public more aware of the exhibition; that many of this public might come to the Atheneum to see the exhibition for themselves; and many who came would then remain in the museum and discover what a mar velous place it is. Furthermore, Mr. McCaughey’s judgments about the merits of Mapplethorpe’s work are more in the mainstream than The New Criterion’s. To “raise questions about Mr. McCaughey’s judgments in artistic matters and thus about his competence as the director of a serious art museum” is not the sort of criticism we would have expected to find in this journal. The New Criterion says that Mr. McCaughey has a provincial mind, and yet I wonder if it thinks that Sam Wagstaff [former Curator of Paintings, Prints, and Drawings at the Wadsworth Atheneum and a major collector of photography] had a provincial mind, or that Tom Armstrong, who staged a huge Mapplethorpe exhibition at the Whitney two years ago, has a provincial mind.
We have followed the progress of the Wads worth Atheneum ever since our fathers were directors, and we are well-informed about its activities and staff, including the current director, his extensive and impressive background, his vast knowledge of art history, his past experience as a museum professional, and his personal in tegrity. You don’t get to be Visiting Professor of Art History at Harvard University, found a university art department, or publish two books (one of them at Oxford University Press) and numerous scholarly articles if you are a mere provincial mind.
Naturally one can disagree about the merits of an artist, but making insulting remarks about a person who disagrees with you is not the most professional way for the editors of a critical jour nal to behave. But as in politics and other areas of American life, insults, personal attacks, and inaccurate statements have become the norm. We would have expected more from a journal of The New Criterion’s caliber.
Priscilla Cunningham
Hampton Bays, NY
Sarah G. Austin
New York, NY
The Editors reply:
The New Criterion has checked with the editor of the Sunday Connecticut section of The New York Times and with William Zimmer, who wrote the interview with Mr. McCaughey from which The New Criterion quoted in its December “Notes & Comments” department, and both report the same thing: No complaint was received from either Mr. McCaughey or the Wadsworth Atheneum about alleged inaccuracies in Mr. Zimmer’s article. Indeed, it is Mr. Zimmer’s impression that his article was favorably received at the Atheneum. But even if it wasn’t, both the museum and its director have remained silent about their complaints. We therefore cannot credit the belated claims of Priscilla Cunningham and Sarah G. Austin in this regard.
We can well imagine that it would come as a shock to the writers of this letter to learn that even people who have been invited to Harvard and have had books published by Oxford University Press are not beyond criticism when it comes to judging their quality of mind, the nature of their taste, or their qualifications for directing the affairs of a first-rate museum. It must be wonderful to live in a world where these once magical names—Harvard! Oxford!—evoke achievements beyond dispute, but the bad news is that such a world no longer exists. We regret that we must be the first to break the news of this sad development to Priscilla Cunningham and Sarah G. Austin.
About the late Sam Wagstaff, there is much to be said, but here we shall limit ourselves to two brief comments. Firstly, Mr. Wagstaff was indeed a connoisseur of art and photography who rightly earned the admiration of his peers. Priscilla Cunningham and Sarah G. Austin may be sur prised to learn that Mr. Wagstaff had a high enough opinion of the critical views of Hilton Kramer to invite him to collaborate on a book about his (Mr. Wagstaff’s) photography col lection. That work on the book had to be dis continued had much more to do with Mr. Wagstaff’s well-known drug addiction, which made coherent progress on such a work impos sible, than with any disagreements about artistic matters. Secondly, about Sam Wagstaff’s relation to Robert Mapplethorpe, surely Priscilla Cun ningham and Sarah Austin know that it is not to be explained solely in terms of artistic judgment.
Much could be said, too, about the mind of Tom Armstrong, but we shall forego the pleasure of pursuing the subject on the present occasion.
Finally, there is the matter of “insulting re marks.” Here are Priscilla Cunningham and Sarah G. Austin attempting to malign the work of William Zimmer, The New York Times, The New Criterion and its editor, and all on the basis not of sound information but of a misplaced loyalty to the director of a museum they obviously love. It is our opinion that they are not in a position to hand down lessons in ethics, journalistic or otherwise, to anyone.