Press Releases

About Dr. Hugo Sigman

Media: La Nación
Date: 02/02/08

"We must fight for resources"

Guillermo Alonso says he needs a budget of $15 million and demanded a patronage law.

Early in the conversation, Guillermo Alonso summarized in his own words the main reason why he was put in charge of the National Museum of Art (Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, MNBA) almost two months ago and for the next five years: “We must fight for the resources for cultural activities.” From Alonso’s perspective, that means appealing to the private sector to complete and expand government financing of the most important museum in the country.

Alonso, a 43 year-old lawyer, won the contest organized last year by the Department of Culture, after years of institutional problems at the museum, established by a decree which also re-organized its management. Alonso will have the support of an artistic director and an administrator, positions which he hopes to recruit for in the coming months, as well as a board of consultants of seven members, five of which were proposed as follows: Adriana Rosenberg (director of Fundación Proa), Silvia Fajre (former Minister of Culture for the City of Buenos Aires), Sergio Baur (from the foreign affairs ministry cultural affairs department), Martín Redrado (president of the Argentine Central Bank) and business man Hugo Sigman.

Polite but formal, Alonso, who was the right hand of business woman Amalia Lacroze de Fortabat during her position as manager of the National Arts Fund, explained his immediate plans to La Nación: to expand the museum’s exhibition areas with a building similar to the current one, the construction of which shall be appointed by an international bid; to seek private financing for such building; to re-arrange the staff -"a healthy but badly paid structure"-, and to review security, for which foreign experts will be invited in the coming months.

Perhaps due to his idea that "in a museum, tasks have to be shared", he is not precise about the future curator or works purchase policies, but one objective is clear: “I would love to see the museum turn into an institution."

-What are the museum’s immediate needs?

- I think the urgency is to sort out its development. The museum can only exhibit 7% of its collection. Which explains in itself the development program they are currently setting up. It is a positive crisis. The museum should be able to exhibit a higher percentage of its permanent collection and at the same time, set up a permanent policy for temporary exhibitions.

- How will the construction of the new building be financed?

- My commitment is to generate the project, which will tell us exactly what amount of investment we will require. We are going to call for an international bid for projects, and the whole process until the award is given should not take more than 12 months. We will use the whole of this year to carry out the work required to achieve the financing of the project. As we are dealing with a public institution, the Government should have an important role in its financing, but I also think this is a very appealing project for private sector contributions.

- When your were appointed, your capacity to manage public funds was highlighted, as well as your ability to resort to private support. Is that the role of a museum director?

- I believe so. There's a reality: the needs are unlimited and the resources are few, always. Part of being realistic and mature is understanding that we must fight for resources for cultural activities. When I ask for contributions for the museum, I am giving Buenos Aires an extraordinary opportunity, and business people the possibility, to take part in an extraordinary project. Argentina, with a long history of donations, has to begin a journey along a road that already exists in every country around the world.

- But is there a legal framework to promote this?

- No, there should be a legal framework in place. Unfortunately, Argentina does not have a patronage law. Hopefully, that tool will be achieved soon, but I believe that under the current historical circumstances, on the eve of the Bicentennial, the expansion of the museum is a fact that will, in itself, achieve the generosity of the private sector.

- What is the museum’s budget?

- The museum does not have its own budget, it is part of the Secretariat of Culture, which pays for services and salaries for a total amount of three million pesos. Everything that relates to cultural activities comes from the private sector and the Friends of the Museum, which amounts to one million pesos a year.

How much is needed for the museum to function?

- A budget to cover all of the museum's needs (facilities, security, a program to purchase works, edit and record them) would be around 15 million pesos. In view of the heritage it would preserve, it is a minimum allocation. The only institution equivalent to the museum is the National Library, which has a budget of 25 million pesos.

- Are you thinking about charging an entrance fee?

- The first thing to achieve is the Government’s commitment to the financing of all of the museum's structural needs. In a country as impoverished as Argentina, an entrance fee to the museum cannot be an impediment for someone to enjoy it. At the same time, the museum receives 1,500 visitors a day, both Argentine and foreign, a lot of whom would be delighted to make a voluntary contribution of two, five or ten pesos. That intermediate road could be explored.

- What is the state of the museum's security?

-Last year, a significant investment in technology was made. But we are going to bring in security experts from different parts of the world in the next 60 or 90 days, as consultants. We are going to make decisions and invest whatever is necessary, as this is a key aspect of the museum’s management.

- Up until recently, employees were protesting over salary raises and recategorization.

- The museum has a dreadful organizational structure: highly qualified people and extremely bad categories. It is not an overstaffed structure in which no one knows what their job is, it is a healthy structure, but badly acknowledged and badly paid. Out of just under 100 employees, there is only one person who earns more than 3,000 pesos a month. This reorganization is priority number one, because training someone for an institution such as this is very hard, and people end up leaving.

- Can more be done by the museum to attract visitors?

- Yes. Buenos Aires more than doubles its population with visitors every year. We must set up a strategy to attract those tourists. People do get to the museum, but they do so in a slightly anarchic manner, and that has a cost. We must work on a communications project for the museum, saying that it is a cultural project, where it is located and it must be easy to get to. Without adding anything extra to the museum’s offer, it receives more than a million visitors a year. How many people would come if we had a deliberate policy to attract them?

- How would you like the MNBA to be described in five years? ?

- I very much like the museum as it is today. I have received an extraordinary institution, with an extraordinary collection. But I would love to turn it into an institutionalized working system, with an army of the best people working for the museum.

By Raquel San Martín
From LA NACION