A tear gas canister manufactured by Safariland, discovered by journalist Patrick Timmons (image courtesy of and by Patrick Timmons/@patrickwtimmons)
On November 25, at the US–Mexico border between Tijuana and San Diego, United States Customs and Border Protection officers released tear gas and smoke grenade on hundreds of Central American asylum seekers hoping to cross the San Ysidro Port of Entry into California. Numerous on-site reporters posted photographs of the chemical weapon canisters branded “Safariland,” a corporation owned by businessman and weapons industry figure, Warren B. Kanders.
On November 27, Hyperallergic reported that Kanders sits on the board of the Whitney as a vice chairman and is a “significant contributor” in the recent Whitney Andy Warhol exhibition, From A to B and Back Again. In the following days, over 100 Whitney staffers signed a letter to museum administration requesting “the development and distribution of a clear policy around Trustee participation” and “a public statement from the Whitney in response to the Hyperallergic article.”
Today, December 3, Adam Weinberg, the Alice Pratt Brown Director of the Whitney Museum of American Art, released a statement addressed to museum staff and trustees, decrying the insidiousness of nationalism, racism, xenophobia, and homophobia, while asserting the museum “cannot right all the ills of an unjust world, nor is that its role.” He closes his letter with an impending promise to meet with staff and trustees in the upcoming days.
Read Weinberg’s statement in full below:
Dear Staff and Trustees,
I write to you now as one community, one family—the Whitney. Together, for the last fifteen years, we have created a place of great promise, hopes and dreams, often against great odds. Our community united in common purpose to reimagine a home for artists in the 21st century where they can envision, experiment, struggle, risk and even protest openly, unencumbered and uncensored. We have fashioned this protected space together through mutual trust, respect, openness and discussion even when opinions differ. We respect the right to dissent as long as we can safeguard the art in our care and the people in our midst. As one director colleague describes the contemporary museum, it is “a safe space for unsafe ideas.” This is the democracy of art.
We truly live in difficult times. People are suffering in our city, the US and around the world: nationalism has risen to unimaginable heights; homelessness is rampant; refugee crises abound; people of color, women and LGBTQ communities feel under attack; and the environment grows more precarious. All these tragedies have understandably led to tremendous sadness and frustration, quick tempers, magnified rhetoric and generational conflict.
Like many contemporary cultural institutions, the Whitney Museum has always been a space for the playing out of disparate and conflicting ideas. Even as we are idealistic and missionary in our belief in artists—as established by our founder Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney—the Whitney is first and foremost a museum. It cannot right all the ills of an unjust world, nor is that its role. Yet, I contend that the Whitney has a critical and urgent part to play in making sure that unheard and unwanted voices are recognized. Through our openness and independence we can foreground often marginalized, unconventional and seemingly unacceptable ideas not presented in other sites in our culture.
I am proud of the work we are doing to present progressive and challenging artists and exhibitions for vast audiences, including this year alone: David Wojnarowicz, an outcast voice silenced much too early; Zoe Leonard, a poet of the unseen and unsung; Pacha, Llaqta, Wasichay, a chance to experience powerful new Latinx voices; Programmed, a radical rethinking of art and technology; Mary Corse, a giant of her generation often overlooked because of her gender; Grant Wood, who worked in other challenging times; Between the Waters, a view of young artists grappling with environmental precariousness; Nick Mauss’s meditation on dance, fashion, design and untold queer histories; and now, Andy Warhol, whose work continues to interrogate and upend how we think of the world today. Beyond that we have presented a compelling array of artist-centric educational and community programs that reach increasingly diverse publics from our neighborhood and afar.
We at the Whitney have created a culture that is unique and vibrant—but also precious and fragile. This “space” is not one I determine as director but something that we fashion by mutual consent and shared commitment on all levels and in many ways. As members of the Whitney community, we each have our critical and complementary roles: trustees do not hire staff, select exhibitions, organize programs or make acquisitions, and staff does not appoint or remove board members. Our truly extraordinary environment, which lends such high expectations, is something we must preserve collectively. Even as we contend with often profound contradictions within our culture, we must live within the laws of society and observe the “rules” of our Museum—mutual respect, fairness, tolerance and freedom of expression and, speaking personally, a commitment to kindness. It is so easy to tear down but so much more difficult to build and sustain.
To those of you, and I trust it is nearly all, who want to move forward despite some significant differences of opinion, I am here as your partner, to lead and to work hard every day to make the Whitney, and possibly the world, a better place. I accept that there may be a few of you who are not inclined to do so, but I would like nothing more than to continue this journey together. We have important work to do. As Flora Miller Biddle, the granddaughter of our founder, said several years ago, “The Whitney Museum is an idea…” This idea, painstakingly built for close to ninety years, has been bequeathed to us. It is a vulnerable idea, now ours to nurture.
I am deeply grateful to our extremely committed, thoughtful and generous board, as well as to our talented and dedicated staff.
I look forward to working and meeting with you in the days ahead.
With respect,
Adam
A Remarkable and thoughtful response by a director who upholds the promise of a truly open museum.
Hmmm – sounds like a letter from someone who does not want to lose big money donors, more than from someone who cares about what might be ethical. Funny how money does that! It’s interesting he mentions David Wojnarowicz as one of his examples of how “progressive” the Whitney is. Who knows, but I’m guessing that if D.W. was alive and his work was up while this news happened, he would take it down. He certainly would not be silent. It’s amazing there is not more uproar on this from artists and Whitney members. They’re all too complacent, I guess. Why isn’t everyone absolutely demanding that Kanders be removed from the Board? It’s the same thing as the Sacklers, just as bad. People should be boycotting the Whitney until Kanders is removed.
It’s about money. It always is.
I would suggest ruining Kanders’ money-making ability, i.e., publicizing a boycott of his products. But I would leave him on the Board; if every Board member of every organization had to be a good person, we’d not have enough Board members to go around. And we’d be spending inordinate energy and time researching each person. Kander’s despicable product just came to light because it’s in the news right now.
Maybe we need to have a little higher standards of Board members??? You’re not going to “ruin” the market for weapons manufacuring anytime soon. He needs to go now. I would like to hope there are others out there with more integrity. If Kanders is the best the Whitney can do, than that’s a sad comment on, well, everything. And it’s what’s wrong with the Art World in general.