The Stranger Among Us: Managing the Guest Curator Relationship

By Catherine Zusy

This article was published in Museum News, September/October 1998.

The practice of hiring contract staff to curate shows has been common in American art and history museums for more than a decade. These guest curators have allowed institutions to expand their programmatic offerings. Often, though, the relationships among the contract staff, the institution, and the permanent staff have been marred by conflict over credit, intellectual control, and compensation. This article examines the phenomenon of hiring guest curators and offers insights-from both guest curators and museum administrators-about how to manage outside staff more effectively.

The use of guest curators is not new. The National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., was one of the first museums in the country to hire guest curators, using them for their very first exhibition in 1941,"The Great Fire of London, 1940,"and occasionally since about 1974, with the advent of larger international exhibitions, such as "The Exhibition of Archaeological Finds of the People's Republic of China," "Treasure Houses of Great Britain," and "Circa 1492." According to Chief of Exhibitions Dodge Thompson, typically, gallery administrators decided upon an exhibition topic and then found a subject expert to curate the show. Outside curators were brought in because the topics were beyond the expertise of the permanent curatorial staff (whose expertise reflects the institution's holdings-primarily European and American art). While the permanent staff does organize the vast majority of the institution's exhibitions for example, the recent "Picasso: The Early Years, 1892-1906" and "Thomas Moran"-two of the 14 exhibitions offered by the gallery last year were organized by outside scholars.

Over the past 10 years, the hiring of guest curators has become more common. More than 80 percent of the museum administrators who responded to a recent survey said that their institutions had used guest curators. It appears that the trend will continue, since the demand for ambitious museum programs is only increasing; curatorial departments are regularly understaffed (especially as funding for the arts has become more competitive); and academics are eager for opportunities to prove themselves and gather credentials. Furthermore, guest curators are part of a broader trend-outsourcing in museums.

The subject of guest curators has been of personal interest to me for many years. As chief curator at the New Hampshire Historical Society from 1991through 1995, I worked with several guest curators and, since moving to Massachusetts, I have guest-curated shows at the Bostonian Society and the Museum of Our National Heritage in Lexington. I have spoken with dozens of museum personnel, co-organized a session for a New England Museum Association conference, and in February and September 1997 conducted two surveys on this topic. The first Survey was of guest curators who were members of the Association of Independent Historians of Art (organized in 1982 to provide information and guidelines for independent scholars); 11 of 30 members responded to the survey. The second was of art and history museum administrators; 51 of 106 administrators responded. I was eager to establish:

Who are these guest curators?
Why are they hired, and how do they go about getting hired?
What are they generally responsible for?
What are they paid, and how do institutions establish their pay?
How are guest curators credited? How are the institutional curators credited on the same exhibitions?
What problems are institutions having with guest curators and why?
What advice do institutions and guest curators have about working together more effectively?

(I did not send the survey to directors of university art galleries because they often hire faculty and students-"insiders"- to curate shows and, consequently, do not face the same challenges as institutions that hire "outsiders." Also, smaller university galleries usually lack curatorial staff. I also chose not to poll administrators of science and children's museums because I wanted to focus on collections-oriented institutions with a permanent curatorial staff.)

Guest curators come from a variety of backgrounds. Most are academics, but many are former institutional curators, current museum curators, independent curators, private scholars, collectors, historians, and writers. Usually they are subject experts, although sometimes they bring a strong general background to the project and become subject experts in the process. Occasionally, they are members of a community or of an ethnic group to which the exhibition pertains.

Asked "why are you working as a guest curator?" most members of the Association of Independent Historians of Art (AIHA) gave one of the following answers: because of subject matter expertise, because of the flexibility of the work, or because they had successfully guest curated shows in the past. Others did it because they believed the projects were important, to gain experience between jobs, to enhance their curatorial reputations, or because they wished to avoid the burdens of museum administration. A few have made careers out of guest curating, supplementing their income by lecturing, teaching, appraising, writing, or editing.

According to many guest curators and museum administrators, institutions hire guest curators to augment regular exhibition programs so that the institutions can get someone well known by the field, perspective, expertise, or access to a collection; to contribute to program diversity; or because the institution does not have a curator. The Bratteboro Museum and Art Center in Brattleboro, Vt., falls into the latter category. There, Director Mara Williams hires as many as four guest curators a year. Williams explains: "We are a community-based museum. no one person could curate the range of multidisciplinary topics that we are eager to present." By hiring guest curators, Williams has been able to mount exhibitions on such diverse subjects as contemporary sculpture, historic underwear, and geometry as it relates to nature. Director Michael Conforti of the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Mass., also hires guest curators on occasion. Says Conforti: “When you have a small curatorial staff'-the Clark has a curatorial staff of four- "you can't always do a serious show each year, so you look at guest curator-generated shows. I'd rather have staff work on a show for three to five years to assure that it's a contribution to the field."

Conforti, like many other museum directors, has made hiring guest curators work to the advantage of both the institution and the outside scholar. Last summer the Clark mounted "Uncanny Spectacle: The Public Career of the Young John Singer Sargent." The exhibition was guest-curated by Marc Simpson, a Yale University graduate who had recently completed his dissertation on American painters working in England in the late-19th century (including John Singer Sargent). By hiring an outside scholar, the Clark was able to mount an exhibition with the latest information on Sargent without paying for years of curatorial research. The museum also had the chance to support scholarship through the publication of the associated catalogue, and present this new research and a wonderful collection of paintings (including many significant works from the Clark's own collection) to the public. In turn, the show allowed Simpson the opportunity to focus on an aspect of his research that greatly interested him and interact with the community of Sargent scholars. All benefited from the project.

More than half of the museum administrators who responded to my survey also noted that they saved money by hiring guest curators. Doing so allowed them to "avoid adding a staff position" or to "reduce the burden on a small staff." Although institutions do accept exhibition proposals from guest curators, it is far more common for museums to pursue guest curators to provide expertise in a chosen subject area. While guest curators usually write the exhibition labels and the essays for the associated catalogue and brochure, their Responsibilities vary greatly. As guest curator for "Trophies & Treasures: Two Centuries of Luxury at Shreve, Crump &Low" at the Bostonian Society, I researched the history of the luxury retailer, developed the storyline, located objects and graphics, made initial contacts with lenders, wrote labels, helped draft the press release, and wrote photo captions. I also wrote two related articles and provided the education department with a list of speakers.

It is essential that everyone on staff understand what the guest curator will do and why the institution is hiring him or her. As Rebecca Zurier, assistant professor of the history of art at the University of Michigan and a sometime guest curator, asks, "Does the institution want a fully packaged exhibition? A concept for an exhibition? Some specialized knowledge on a given subject, but with the actualization of the show left to the museum staff? A point of view and interpretation? A voice that might be different from the museum's standard practice, or just information not available to museum staff? Or perhaps simply someone who has the time to do a show that staff could have done themselves if they weren't committed to other projects?" Jane Nylander, executive director of the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, counsels that to avoid conflicts, staff curators should define the role of the guest curator and should help to select the individual.

Administrators should also realize that hiring a guest curator does not necessarily free the staff curator to concentrate on other projects. As project director and institutional liaison, the staff curator must oversee the requesting of objects and coordinate their delivery and return, order graphics, edit labels, oversee the design, and develop associated programs. Staff curators also give guest curators access to the institution's collections and sometimes do research for them. Furthermore, guest-curated exhibitions are often very ambitious. Because everyone expects the show to be bigger and better than one curated by in-house personnel, in the end, these shows rarely save staff time.

While some institutions pay by the hour or day, most pay guest curators by the exhibit. According to my survey of museum administrators, guest curators are typically paid between $1,000 and $10,000 for a show. However, fees as low as zero or as high as $45,000 are not unheard of. One art museum director told me that he had heard of well-established guest curators specializing in popular subject matter (e.g., the work of Monet or van Gogh) being paid more than $100,000. And, depending on the rental fee, guest curators are often paid three or even 10 times more for a traveling show. Unsurprisingly, museum administrators said guest curator fees are usually negotiated. Asked how they established what to offer guest curators, directors said that fees were based on comparable curatorial salaries and benefits, expenses, the magnitude of the exhibit, the amount of work, and what the market could bear. A few administrators noted that they paid more on grant-funded projects.

About half of the administrators polled said they credited guest curators and institutional curators alike in all PR material, credit panels, brochures, and associated catalogues. The other half gave the guest curators the primary credit and the institutional staff some or none. The issue of credit raises hackles, since both staff and guest curators often feel that they do not receive enough. Guest curators are sometimes disappointed to find in-house curators agreeing to interviews with journalists about "their" shows or their names missing from the catalogue cover or exhibition brochure. In turn, staff curators who have devoted hundreds of hours to making the show work (including, on occasion, changing the concept of the show or rewriting the labels) are demoralized when they find their contributions uncredited.

Guest curators and museum staff alike also may feel vulnerable (and ultimately frustrated) about issues of intellectual control. Scholars who have devoted years to a subject may feel they own it, or should at least have the last say on how the material is presented. Museum staff, on the other hand, often find these scholars to be more subject-oriented than audience-oriented. They find it hard to convince scholars to simplify the storyline and labels. Zurier recommends that "Out of mutual respect all parties should be agreed that if the guest curator's contribution is subject to revision, the goal should be to arrive at an end product with which everyone is happy. The guest curator should be allowed to approve the revisions and perhaps negotiate a second round of revisions. A final version shouldn't go forward until he or she has had a chance to approve it."

While more than 40 of the 51 institutions that responded to my survey had used guest curators, administrators' lists of the "disadvantages of using guest curators" were long. In addition to issues of credit, compensation, and control, they alleged that guest curators sometimes:

have a long learning curve on museum practices

are unable to work in teams

lack understanding of workload or needs of staff

promote themselves rather than the institution are not available every day

are disorganized and lack vision and writing ability

are not always available "for the long haul"

are not always available for "grunt work"

live too far from the institution

Administrators also cited the following problems:

personality conflicts

issues of quality control

lack of continuity and in-house knowledge

difficulty in overseeing schedule and enforcing deadlines

not knowing how a guest curator will react under stress

Many of the problems that lead to the above complaints might be avoided if, prior to entering into a working arrangement, museum staff and guest curators discuss and then agree upon their respective responsibilities, expectations, visions, methodologies, deadlines, credits, and review processes. This agreement, along with a payment schedule (with the last payment withheld until the institution is satisfied with the final product), should be recorded in a written contract. (For more about what should be included in a letter of agreement, see "Guidelines for Independent Curators," developed by AIHA. The College Art Association is also developing a set of principles for contractual arrangements between guest curators and museums.) Museums should also conduct a thorough check on the potential guest curator. Gretchen Sullivan Sorin, who guest-curated more than 25 exhibits before becoming director of the Cooperstown Graduate Program in Cooperstown, N.Y., recommends that museum administrators ask the following questions of candidates: "Have they been a guest curator before? Do they work well independently? Do they have specific experience with exhibitions of this type? Will they work and play well with your staff? Do they meet deadlines? Can they write? Do they understand your audience? And can they translate ideas and objects into an exhibition?"

Some tensions, however, are probably inherent to the situation. The guest curator is an outsider and, because of his or her transience, has little authority, says Stephanie L. Woerner, a research associate at the Harvard Business School. Such factors contribute further to the challenge of completing the project.

Museum administrators offered the following bits of wisdom vis-à-vis hiring and working with guest curators:

"Have both parties sign an open letter of agreement."
"Be aware that someone will need to teach the guest curator how the institution works. Appoint a senior staff person to work with the guest curator."
"Have enough help so that [the question of] who is responsible for the work doesn't create conflict."
"Plan work even further ahead than usual in order to leave leeway for unpredictable problems."
"A bail-out clause is essential!"
"Assess the guest curator's abilities and work with someone who can do the job well, whose attitude and approach engender cooperation."
"Be open, friendly, supportive, and enthusiastic; and do your homework to make sure the fit is right."
"Communicate!"

Guest curators advised:

"Make sure that the contract identifies one staff person who is responsible for transmitting all communication from the outside curator to the staff."

Find out whether "the museum considers all of its exhibitions to be 'corporate' presentations or whether it conceives them as individually authored productions, each with its own personality."

"Make it clear who has the final say about every aspect of the exhibition."

"Be prepared to sacrifice intellectual autonomy."

Work out a deal about the use of photographs and slides of objects in the exhibition.

Managing guest curators can be complicated and sometimes difficult. While the end result-the guest-curated show- is often grander than a staff curated production (as more resources are devoted to it), many question the long-term implications of this hiring practice. Museums often contract out design, editing, and development jobs, but is it in the institution's best interest to contract out its intellectual vision or voice on a regular basis? Robert L. Webb, curator at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, argues that "the question of guest curatorship really is the question of who will speak for the museum." Though the Maine Maritime Museum employs guest or consulting curators, Webb prefers "to keep the voice of the museum within the institution." For that reason and others, some historical institutions, including the historical societies of Connecticut and Virginia, have hired subject specialists to co-curate exhibitions with the institutional curator, who also serves as the project director. Other museums, such as the Rhode Island Historical Society, often enlist research consultants (who are credited as such) to assist staff curators in organizing exhibitions.

The key to working well with guest curators is to understand and respect the role of institutional curators. Staff curators and guest curators perform very different functions. Guest curators are paid to develop specific products; they bring subject expertise to a project and take the relationships they develop and much of the information they gather with them. Depending on their abilities and knowledge, they can be extraordinary assets to an institution. Museum curators, on the other hand, generally are knowledgeable about the institution's permanent collections and devote themselves to preserving and interpreting those objects. They also raise funds to further these purposes and develop long-term relationships with collectors, dealers, and other curators. This networking helps them to obtain objects, money, and political support and to develop mental inventories of objects and ideas, ready to be harnessed for the next exhibit.

While they are often able project directors, many staff curators find directing exhibitions-without the prospect of curating them occasionally- to be a bleak existence. The satisfactions of directing a project well do not compare to the intellectual challenge and, yes, the glory-of curating: researching the subject and defining and presenting the story. Staff curators removed from this work can become demoralized and may not remain loyal to their institutions for very long. And that would be a great loss for museums. It is the director's challenge, therefore, to maintain a balance: bringing in outside expertise to supplement the permanent curatorial staff on occasion (publicly acknowledging the contributions of both) and giving that same permanent staff the opportunity to shine by curating their own shows. Only then, when institutional curators have no need to feel overlooked or threatened, will these "outsiders" and "insiders" work harmoniously, committed as a team to producing great exhibitions.

Catherine Zusy is an independent curator based in Cambridge, Mass., and former chief curator of the New Hampshire Historical Society.