This documentary, while reasonably well-made and engaging, is essentially a piece of agitprop. It was produced and directed by, and stars, the loose connection of former Barnes teachers and other Friends of the Barnes who opposed the reorganization and relocation of the Barnes Museum of early modern masterpieces to downtown Philadelphia. Sure, politics was played and facts may have been concealed, but the counterargument for not moving the museum and opening it more broadly to the public never really surfaces in this film.
The Barnes was undercapitalized, the last of the original trustees had passed, the trust beneficiary, a struggling state college, did not want manage it actively, the residential neighbors in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania were crying "NIMBY" over the arrival of busloads of out-of-state visitors, and there were no living lineal descendants of the trustor, a quirky pharma pioneer described in the film as a "misanthrope," who died in a 1951 automobile accident at the wheel of his old Packard convertible. The art collection was literally and figuratively orphaned. No wonder the case was brought in Orphans Court.
The film convinced me, but it convinced me only to visit Philadelphia and take in the art collection in its new downtown home.
The Barnes was undercapitalized, the last of the original trustees had passed, the trust beneficiary, a struggling state college, did not want manage it actively, the residential neighbors in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania were crying "NIMBY" over the arrival of busloads of out-of-state visitors, and there were no living lineal descendants of the trustor, a quirky pharma pioneer described in the film as a "misanthrope," who died in a 1951 automobile accident at the wheel of his old Packard convertible. The art collection was literally and figuratively orphaned. No wonder the case was brought in Orphans Court.
The film convinced me, but it convinced me only to visit Philadelphia and take in the art collection in its new downtown home.