Anger at Walmart heiress's $1.4bn gallery as art market becomes focus for protests

[Turborama]

Source: The Guardian

When Alice Walton, heiress to the Walmart supermarket fortune and the the 10th richest woman in the United States, opened a spectacular fine art museum in her home town, she might have expected plaudits and gratitude. It hasn't quite worked out that way.

The long-awaited opening of the Crystal Bridges Museum for American Art in Walton's home town of Bentonville, Arkansas, has provoked mixed reactions. Some have celebrated the unveiling of a significant new private art institution, but many have criticised the decision to spend $1.4bn of company and family foundation money as the retail colossus cuts back its workers' benefits.

Protesters at the museum have informally joined forces with the Occupy Wall Street camps across the US and point to growing ties between the Occupy movement and established trade unions.

The museum, which opened last weekend and features a survey of American art from Benjamin West to Georgia O'Keefe, from Norman Rockwell to Andy Warhol, and from Joan Mitchell to Walton Ford, has also come under criticism from within the art establishment for both inflating values and buying masterpieces from impoverished art institutions without giving local institutions a chance to match Walton's offer.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/nov/20/walmart-gallery-crystal-bridges-museum

[Itchinjim]

1. We have truly returned to the Gilded Age.

[trotsky]

2. +1.4 billion n/t

[CTyankee]

6. Yes, but it has been this way throughout history. Even if we don't like it

this is how a lot of art got saved and can be seen and enjoyed today.

I support what OWS is doing, tho. This could be a neat way to show the utter crassness of Walton in doing this. It's obvious she doesn't really care about the art...

My question is: will she run this herself and NOT charge the general public a fee to get in? Will she donate and partner with nonprofit organizations helping struggling young artists? Will she show a true commitment to promoting the arts in this country?

[Telly Savalas]

7. There is no charge to the public. It's free admission.

While the economic elitism that concentrates the wealth to make this possible is offensive, the cultural elitism that insists that Midwesterners not have access to great art is pretty obnoxious too.

The irony is rich. Smug hipster snobs from their enclaves on the coasts decry the uncultured masses here in flyover country, but when somebody tries to improve the cultural landscape by providing an alternative to NASCAR, it's a crime against the art community.

[roguevalley]

11. it is a crime if they did half the shit they are accused of doing and

considering its a walmart boob its true. no one is calling out the midwest here. they are protesting her wealth, her indifference and her family sticking it to employees. honestly, regionalism sucks.

[uncle ray]

13. free admission until that money allocated for admission runs out.

which will only be a few years.

[CTyankee]

18. There are some great museums in what you call "flyover" country.

If you follow art news, which I do fanatically, you find fantastic exhibits occurring in places like Fort Worth, TX with its great Kimbell Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, an incredible museum, and the Rothko Chapel in Houston is another one. Columbus, Indianapolis, Cleveland...the list goes on.

The infusion of art into American culture was brought about by the efforts of some of the worst robber barons and S.O.Bs of the U.S.'s industrial world. Many were horrible union busters. Their motives were mostly pretty crass. However, some did the ultimately good thing, which was to first, make sure that it was cheap for them to bring art treasures (mostly European at this time) into the country by instigating the needed change in customs law, then by bringing the works over and donating them to museums where the American people could experience them. And at the time some of this art from Europe was on sale to them. Much of this was transported to NYC because it was at the time the cultural capital of the country. So the Morgan collection, stored in London, crossed the Atlantic and was eventually donated by Morgan to the Metropolitan Museum. Today I can go to the Met and get in for a nominal fee. So can you. That doesn't make Mr. Morgan a nice guy, because he wasn't. But hey, we get Raphael's Colonna Altarpiece in the deal.

New York's hegemony was further strengthened because of WW2 breaking out. NYC was the beneficiary of getting a lot of Europe's artists who were fleeing Hitler (because he considered modern art decadent and/or because many were Jewish) and eventually the artists of the Soviet Union (if their art did not conform the state "standards"). (Picasso's "Guernica" was smuggled out of Franco's Spain and sent to NY where it hung in MoMA for many years until Franco died (upon Picasso's orders)and it was returned to Spain.) NYC became the art capital of the world, so this was a unforeseen turn of events, but that is exactly what happened.

What we have to remember was that our founders were not big on the art of the societies of Europe of their day. They considered such art decadent and not in keeping with the egalitarian aspirations of our new republic. So it was culturally unpopular with the American people. And being that we Americans were insular and without outside influences, it remained that way in much of the middle of the country for a long time.

I regard Ms. Walton as merely another, modern version of the crass industrialists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. If it gets more art in front of the people of her community and state, I'm fine with it. But if she makes it a museum available only to the rich, I think it would be a huge wrong. Besides, why open up such a museum if it is only to be experienced by a handful of people?

[WildNovember]

25. I think without a gilded ruling class there is no "art," just "craft". I think I'd be ok with that.

[CTyankee]

28. I know what you mean. Art becomes an ornament to display one's wealth, sadly.

The craft works of the people of Arkansas should be more respected and I would guess that there are many such smaller types of galleries around the state. Of course, Ms. Walton is only doing this for the flattery of her own ego. I don't think she really loves art.

[WildNovember]

31. Not only that, though. The very category of "high art" emerges as wealth is aggregated

and particularly in the robber baron era (though there were earlier manifestations of same phenomenon), along with the idea of the special person, the "artist," who supposedly has more refined sensibilities than the ordinary person (in both a positive and negative sense, the negative being the entire mythology of the suffering/self-destructive artist that so many youth buy into to their harm). Along with the idea that art is something we see in galleries (controlled by elites, with contents vetted by elites).

[CTyankee]

32. Art should, and must be, a "lived space" within us. That is my firm belief.

We should be living for art, because it reaches the depths of our souls if it is truly art. Thomas Hoving said:

"I tend to look upon works of art as partly spiritual and mysterious and partly human and fragile. Their lofty nature helps me break free from the mundane. They provide a defense against all the cultural trash that threatens to inundate me. They keep me in balance. I need great works of art for the uplift of my soul. Their exalted character clears my brain...they enable me to fall in love with mankind..."

I am a great lover of museums and galleries. Some of my great moments of joy have taken place in front of a painting or sculpture. I am made almost dizzy in the great museums of the world that I have been lucky enough to visit. So I cannot condemn them out of hand even tho I know much art has been collected by some of the vilest people. At least great art in museums (also in churches!) is available to the people to see, where once they might have hung on the walls of the wealthiest citizens in their palaces and baronial estates...

It is true that art collection didn't only happen in the gilded age in this country. It's an old, old story. The Medicis killed the republic of Florence but made the city glisten with art treasures that ordinary citizens can (and do) see. In Europe young families walk thru museums with their young kids and I notice the kids aren't squealing for a happy meal...it's just what you are expected to do...

As you can tell from my posts, this is a deeply important subject for me...I have made it my life's study...

[WildNovember]

35. I think the public "museum" is basically concurrent with the capitalist/modern age, though

public art (government, church, private estate) is not, and goes back to Rome & even earlier. Capitalist age clearly emerges in the 1600s, and so do public museums.

The "artist" under pre-capitalist conditions was a trained craftsman in a clearly patronage relationship to the powerful. The "artist" (or maybe I should say "artiste") as a special type of personality emerges clearly in the 19th century. Modern "high" artists are still in patronage relationships to the powerful, but the reality of those relationships is obscured by all kinds of myth & the commodification of art as a category.

I don't think we're really saying anything so very different. I'm just saying that the "the artist" as a special type of personality emerged around the time of the robber barons, circa 1850s-1900. And now that I think about it, concurrent with democratization movements.

[CTyankee]

36. I think if we read history we see lots of artists getting into trouble...

or just having difficulty being recognized by the society they live in. How much art is banned, censored, physically attacked, burned, etc throughout history? What a long list...

One of the saddest stories I read recently was about Cezanne, at a time in his life when he couldn't sell his paintings. He used to go into the hills around Paris with his little easel and portable paints and paint what he saw. I guess because he felt he "had" to, because, in his despair, he would simply leave them behind in the field where he had painted them...he knew no one in his society of the time would buy them...

[WildNovember]

37. The "struggling artist" concurrent with the commodification of "art,"

as a market relationship rather than a personal patronage relationship. But Cezanne's father was a banker and he had an inheritance.

Going against the objections of his banker father, he committed himself to pursuing his artistic development and left Aix for Paris in 1861. He was strongly encouraged to make this decision by Zola, who was already living in the capital at the time. Eventually, his father reconciled with Cézanne and supported his choice of career. Cézanne later received an inheritance of 400,000 francs (£218,363.62) from his father, which rid him of all financial worries.<12>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_C%C3%A9zanne

Most of the 19th century artists, I'd be willing to bet, came from the upper middle class or upper classes.

[CTyankee]

39. Cezanne absolutely did have a starting advantage. But my point was that

the vision of his own art was not what was what the public wanted (or the established art critics) wanted at the time. He foresaw what Picasso did. Picasso got the fame. Cezanne died not getting to his goal. It doesn't always work out neatly in the "commodification of art" theory. Cezanne went up against his own best interests in the pursuit of his idea of art and he got close when you look at his Bibemus Quarry work. Picasso took it to the finish line after Cezanne had died.

I don't actually disagree with you about the commodification of art. It's just that art is such a quirky thing in history.

Also, why isn't a "market relationship" really a manifestation of a "personal patronage relationship"?

[WildNovember]

43. I think a market relationship really IS a manifestion of patronage relationships,

but a patronage relationship of a "class as a whole" more than of a specific rich person with a specific artist, as was the case under the Medicis, for example. That relationship is disguised under capitalism, but it's the reason "art scenes" (in art, music, dance, theater) always arise around money, even when they appear to be about "pure art" or even adamantly anti-money. They always end with a few of the participants being lionized and becoming millionaires while the majority drift back to wherever they came from (if they haven't already killed themselves by their participation in supposedly "artistic" pursuits like drinking, drugging, etc.)

I see what you're saying about Cezanne, and I don't know that much about him, actually. But my (bias? prejudice?) is that a lot of artists buy into the myth of the "artiste" and to that extent are disappointed in a PERSONAL way (in terms of their own identity and wellbeing) if they aren't recognized in their lifetime. Don't know if Cezanne did though.

But to my mind there's a difference in that kind of disappointment (which eats at one's core) & the feeling you would get if you were a "failure" in a recognizably market relationship driven by the crassest of motivations and often gamed by big interests, as we all recognize. It may be painful to fail economically, but we can see it for what it is and it doesn't necessarily have to eat at our core being.

Art is nice, but my (again, admitted bias) is that the art/artiste mythology is socially destructive and the modern "art scene" highly manipulated and artificial, controlled by monied interests. And it seems controlled with the outcome of elevating trash to the detriment of actual skill, training and feeling.


Not only in art proper, but the other arts as well, including literature.

As a sidenote I've been reading lately about the Warhol/Factory art scene recently, and it really struck me that Paul Morrissey, the director of Warhol's so-called "films" was/is a reactionary right-winger. I personally think Warhol was a person of moderate talent (basically on the level of drawing fashion illustrations, where he should have stayed) & high creepiness quotient, indirectly responsible for the deaths of many people. Basically a suck-up after money & status and a pervert of death -- and reactionary right-winger himself, despite his associations with what was billed as "free expression". He & Morrissey got rich, most of the others in their "community" did not, or died, and were discarded when they became troublesome or uninteresting or unexploitable.

Not sure if I'm saying clearly what I mean. Maybe I'm just getting old (LOL). I don't think you and I have any essential disagreement though.

[CTyankee]

44. It's good to remember that in early 15th century Florence, the guilds commissioned quite a bit

of art. Donatello comes to mind (even if he did a bit of "product placement" for his patrons, the shield makers guild, in his famous statue of St. George!) While the guilds weren't perfectly democratic, they did represent the people who were busy crafting what they did, not living off of the peasants in some feudal entity!

[WildNovember]

45. Yeah, not saying anything was the rule without exception (though, you know,

the peasants *were* the base of the feudal economy & in a real sense everyone else *did* live off them....even if the relationship wasn't always clear or direct...the peasants created the surplus time for everyone else to pursue art, science, etc)

[CTyankee]

46. then they said "enough!" and went and created their own society in a city!

In Siena, another democratic republic like Florence, there is a fresco in the Palazzo Publico (hey, a public palace!) entitled "Effects of Good Government." Not a church in the scene. I find it interesting!

[WildNovember]

48. It's a very interesting period indeed, and interesting to view its art as a reflection of that.

[CTyankee]

49. The problem with this sort of analysis is that it assumes that the art "market" follows

onkt certain taste, i.e. that of the current moneyed class. This is not always the case!

New styles come up,not always welcome, and then die down. Certainly, that is the case with Van Gogh. There are artists who had terrible times just existing (for whatever reason!) such as Caravaggio.

Why do people create art? We don't know or at least I have not in my reading on the subject found any answer to this question. Me, I think art is endemic to the human being, even as much as drawing breath or sleeping is. We are programmed for art. It nourishes our souls and, as such, saves us from despair and killing ourselves. Art always saves you....

[WildNovember]

52. I don't see how you can say that the art market doesn't follow the tastes of the monied class.

That doesn't mean that class is monolithic in its tastes, or that its tastes never change, but you certainly can't say that art follows mass taste, because most of modern art would never have come into being if the artists had had to get their living by selling to the general public, and certainly wouldn't have become famous a/o wealthy through their "art". Even today, someone like Jackson Pollack is definitely a minority/acquired taste.

Of course there's mutual feedback between mass taste & monied taste, in both directions, but the masses don't have the money or control of the press and the institutions that go to make "success".

It's also understandable that changes in taste would speed up as the world becomes more and more commodified and linked by mass communication and transportation -- just as changes in fashion generally "speed up" under such conditions. But in general the "masters" remain valuable, even if specific values fluctuate.

Also, I don't see how Van Gogh or Carravaggio's lack of general acceptance in their lifetime means that their eventual acceptance didn't mean an acceptance by the "art establishment," a creature of the monied class.

I don't know anything about Carravaggio, but it sounds like he actually *was* accepted in his lifetime, only to be forgotten & rediscovered later (if I can trust wikipedia...)

He burst upon the Rome art scene in 1600 with the success of his first public commissions, the Martyrdom of Saint Matthew and Calling of Saint Matthew. Thereafter he never lacked commissions or patrons, yet he handled his success atrociously... and ultimately had a death warrant issued for him by the Pope.... at the age of 38, he died of a fever... while on his way to Rome to receive a pardon. Infamous while he lived, Caravaggio was forgotten almost immediately after his death, and it was only in the 20th century that his importance to the development of Western art was rediscovered.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caravaggio


Van Gogh is one of the sources of the "suffering artist" mythos, but he was from an upper-middle class family and had lots of connections to the art establishment of his time. His first job was with a leading international art dealer, gotten through an uncle who worked at the same house; another uncle owned a gallery, his brother was a dealer, his cousin was a well-known and successful artist, etc.. Van Gogh's fame and importance began to grow almost immediately after his death -- not so surprising considering his family connections and the growing acceptance of modern art generally.

The part of the art world the Van Goghs were aligned with was actively promoting newer stuff -- I think Vincent's problems breaking into the art market initially had to do with weak technique and his social/personal problems and religiousity -- he wasn't comfortable with "society", it seems.

Also I should say I don't think that direct comparisons can be made between Caravaggio's time and Van Gogh's, or ours. The "art world" is ever a creation of the monied class, but the specific ways that happens are different. You know, in Rome artists constructed public buildings and monuments and decor for private estates, under Catholicism they constructed monumental churches and their decor, etc....all for the monied classes of their times, but under varying economic arrangements and varying personal "identities" that grew out of those economic arrangements.

I actually don't think you have any fundamental disagreement with me, just more love and reverence for art, maybe...I would personally be ok with a world without "high art" if it were a world of more equality.

[CTyankee]

57. Thank you for your thoughtful response.

I did an Independent Study of Caravaggio in grad school and was fascinated by his genius and by his self destructive nature. His genius was in foreseeing the sheer magnitude of what we now refer to as Baroque art is a force to be reckoned with. Where did that vision come from? I doubt that he knew. His creative force and his self destructive force were always at war in him. So in a real way he was "anti-establishment" in that he refused to conform to any one rule that the church had laid down in the Counter Reformation (see the Council of Trent for the art guidelines the church dictated...and then see how often he broke the establishment rules!)

As I've pointed out in another post, NYC became the art capital of the world due to the number of artists coming there from Europe, fleeing Hitler and Stalin. That was a phenomenon of other forces at work in the world at the time, but it had a disproportionate effect on modern art as well. 1940 marked a turning point. Who knows what would have happened if there were no Hitler or Stalin? Perhaps the modern school would never have really gotten off the ground. Perhaps American artists such as Pollack would never have become big in art. I don't really know the answer to that, but I doubt you can say that the moneyed interests planned the whole thing ,altho if you wanted to, you could argue that Peggy Guggenheim was a "ringleader" of sorts and certainly of that class. I think she was pretty gutsy myself, going to Paris as the bombs were falling the suburbs of that city, whisking away Bird in Space from a weeping Brancusi and getting on a ship from Marseille to bring her collected items back to New York! I don't think it's all bad...

I do believe that I can be a progressive and also love what is referred to as "high art." We can love the art itself if not the system that midwifed that art into being. I don't impugn bad motives to artists because within each category we see variations and great leaps of genius. That came from the artist, not the system that he/she worked in. But that's my view...

[WildEyedLiberal]

62. The Nelson Atkins museum in Kansas City is wonderful too

And like you, I am reserving my judgments on the Walmart art museum. While I find the Waltons extraordinarily distasteful, I - like the previous poster - can't help but applaud any sort of "high culture" enclave being opened and made available to people who previously lived 3 or 4 hours, at least, from the closest museum. As long as the admission remains free and the museum remains open to the general public, it will be a very nice thing for the people of Bentonville and Arkansas in general.

[hedgehog]

27. I live in a rural region myself, and it makes sense to me to put these

items where they are most accessible to the most people.

[roguevalley]

10. this gang of pirates had a daughter who paid someone to attend

cornell university for her and showed up in a cap and gown to claim 'her' diploma. pix and everything. Ended up in the papers and then it was revealed. they are inbred, stupid and incapable of anything other than their own narciscism. I love art but mercy.

[CTyankee]

14. was that Alice?

[roguevalley]

41. I'm not sure. I just read she was a daughter of one of them.

[roguevalley]

42. I'm not sure. I just read she was a daughter of one of them.

[tammywammy]

47. Do you have a link for that?

I Googled Waltons & Cornell and I can't find anything. Thanks.

[Blue_Tires]

63. I do remember the infamous Paige Laurie case:

http://www.columbiaheartbeat.com/2011/06/remember-paige-laurie-new-controversy.html

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=264646&page=2

[CBHagman]

3. "...without giving local institutions a chance..."

"...to match Walton's offer."

That speaks volumes.

[CTyankee]

17. I've done research on what happened during the Gilded Age in terms of art.

The art that we have in these wonderful museums is largely due to the bidding wars between industrialists and other very rich people during that time. I hate to tell you this, but it is how we have so much this fabulous European art in our finest museums. There was a convergence of newly impoverished dukes and earls in England having to sell off masterpieces that had hung in their country estates for several hundred years in order to pay the heavy taxes levied on them by their government. Thus, these great works went to the highest bidder, usually American business tycoons. J.P. Morgan had a friendly Senator and NY state congressman put together legislation that allowed works of art to be brought into the U.S. customs free. Morgan's entire collection was promptly shipped from London, where it had languished in splendor, to New York. Eventually, it was donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art where Morgan had been a trustee. Morgan wasn't alone: there were the Carnegies, the Fricks and Mrs. Gardner in Boston (who complained bitterly that the men were always outbidding her).

[sarcasmo]

4. More out of touch billionaire bullshit. Tax them on their profits.

Wrecking the art community the same way they wrecked the retail business.

[Initech]

16. I think it's time to start taxing these outrageous profits the way we tax lotto winnings.

[sarcasmo]

58. Right on, 40%.

[edhopper]

5. Let's buy great art from

major metropolitan areas and stick them in Bumfuck Arkansas.

Thanks Wallmart for fucking up this country even more.

[kiva]

61. Yes, because great art should only be in major cities...

:eyes:

[edhopper]

64. Yes, that is what I am saying

Thank you for agreeing.

I wasn't talking about great art that is ALREADY in cities where millions of people a year see it and moving it to some out of the way museum where it will be seen by a few.

[BlueToTheBone]

8. they cut the workers pay and benefits and Alice is so cheap

she won't hire a driver and endangers the lives of others while she drives drunk around the country. What an arrogant human.
http://www.katv.com/story/15688273/alice-walton-arrested-for-dui-in-texas

[Safetykitten]

9. Amusing selection of art, considering the donor. Let them eat art.

[Hestia]

12. You can thank the Walton heirs for coming up with the meme 'death taxes'

because they didn't want to pay Ark. 7% of their inheritance. I'll never set foot in her 'apology' to Arkansans.

[Initech]

15. If their employees were actually paid, that museum wouldn't exist.

[CTyankee]

19. There may be some Arkansan art majors who would love a job in a

fine arts museum so they can get skilled in curating and museum management. If I were a starting out art major I would probably welcome such an opportunity...I don't think there's an art major out there that thinks they'll make big bucks in their profession...

[Initech]

23. I've taken a lot of art classes, no way in hell would I work for the Waltons.

I wouldn't care how desperate I was... knowing where and how they get their money from, I stand by my principles.

[CTyankee]

24. I hear you. And there may be art majors who believe the same thing.

for some, tho, it would be tough to turn the opportunity down.

[Ikonoklast]

30. But there is now, $7.65 an hour, only twenty-one to thirty hours a week, no benefits.

Must be able to work work any hour posted, any day of the week, holidays included.

Of course, the Waltons will help the new curator of their mausoleum, uh, museum, apply for food stamps and government subsidies for health care.

Must have advanced degrees in Art History, ten years experience in Fine Art Restoration, and be able to lick boots.

[CTyankee]

33. Unfortunately, to work at what they love, plenty of art majors would be interested.

To get any kind of money at all they would have to be employed at a renowned, well endowed museum, probably in New York, Boston, Philadelphia etc. But I'm guessing that those young art majors who live in Arkansas and want to stay close to home figure that they will learn on the job and move up. It's nuts, I know...

[Liberal_in_LA]

20. +1000

**thanks to whoever gave me the star! **

[Starry Messenger]

21. +1000

[Tom Ripley]

22. That's why I enjoy art frauds and forgeries

The majority of "victims" can well afford the loss

[CTyankee]

26. It's a big business! There are some great stories about such frauds and

forgeries...

[woo me with science]

29. Did anybody watch "The Rape of Europa" on PBS?

Timely, apparently.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/24/arts/television/24euro-webonly.html

http://www.pbs.org/therapeofeuropa/

[CTyankee]

34. Unfortunately, it is not airing on my local PBS stations...nor out of NYC either here.

Damnit!

I read the book, of course, and it was wonderful. If you liked it I also recommend "Rescuing DaVinci" which is about the Monument Men in WW2 and "The Venus Fixers" about the monument men in Italy. They are superb accounts about the mostly American and British/Australia/Canadian efforts to find or rescue the art of Europe. Actually thrilling accounts...

But "The Rape of Europa" is a real masterpiece and absolutely riviting. I started to cry when I read how the German army blew up all of the bridges in Florence, except for the Ponte Vecchio, including the Santa Trinita, which had been designed by Michelangelo. That bridge was so sturdily built the German army had to detonate it 3 times before bringing it, and its beauty, down...

[woo me with science]

54. I thought they did a beautiful job, especially given the time constraints.

I never even knew of the existence of the Monument Men before this book and documentary.

That story was very moving in the documentary, too...especially coming after the account of the young Allied flyers who tried so hard and succeeded in bombing just the narrow strip of rail lines in Florence without harming any of the nearby art. They interviewed a woman who recalled the city bursting into tears when the bridges were lost.

Thank you for the recommendation. I have been looking for a next book. :)

[madinmaryland]

38. What pisses me off is that the $1.4billion would have gone a long way

towards paying the health insurance of many of their employees. Sorry, but the art museum is a waste of fucking money.

[CTyankee]

40. On balance I think the money should go to the employees.

But I don't agree that an art museum is necessarily a waste of money...art has its place and should have its place in the lives of ALL of the people, not just the few that can afford to buy stuff to put on the walls of their estates...

[sarcasmo]

60. +1

[freshwest]

50. Sick.

[rucky]

51. I saw Crystal Bridges dance at Cheetah's a few years back.

She was alright, but nothing to name a museum after.

[countryjake]

53. K&R! n/t

.

[melm00se]

55. Patron of the arts

People are bitching up a storm over this but I don't/haven't seem complaints about:

Guggenheim Museum (formed by the Guggenheim family)
Getty Museum (Getty family)
Hirshhorn Museum (he was a "bankster" - he made $168K as a stock broker in 1916)
de Young Museum (he was rich)
Albright Knox art gallery (had to throw this in as its in my home town)

as well as many others.

It's just because she is a Walton.

Grow up - - for centuries art patronage has always been something the wealthy do

[Logical]

56. Whining about this shit gives dems a bad image, it is a FREE PUBLIC Attraction!

[Marrah_G]

59. How many families could she have lifted out of poverty if she had instead opened a business

With living wage, or better then living wage jobs?

If the Billionaires want to "help" they can bring back all the good paying jobs.