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Keeping an eye on the prize

Posted on | November 4, 2009 | 245 views |

Wexner Center symposium to explore the art and science of protecting works of art

By Julia Harris

In a locked closet in his narrow cinder-block office, Doug McGrew keeps a jar full of pale green pebbles of glass. On first inspection they look like crushed pieces of auto windows; a closer look, however, reveals a distinctly rose-tinged streak running through the glass.

Since McGrew’s office is tucked deep into the twisty bowels of the Wexner Center for the Arts, it makes sense to assume the jar of glass is some kind of art piece.

The assumption would only be partially right.

“When the ‘Groundswell’ exhibit was first installed, someone put some kind of white powder into it without anyone knowing,” McGrew explained, referring to the hilly heaped glass sculpture on permanent display outside the Wex.

“And then with the first rain, it turned red and stained the whole piece. It had to be scrubbed clean.”

McGrew, who has been the manager of security at the Wex since 2005, was not on staff at the time of the vandalism but says the story has become legend — and the piece continues to provide security challenges.

“We have people who have jumped in it and faked swimming motions, people who have made snow angels in it,” he said, smiling a bit faintly. “And then there’s the white grid work around the center, which people like to climb on to have their picture taken.”

The task of safeguarding these and other aesthetic objects — referred to by McGrew and his colleagues as cultural property — is a constantly evolving and complex challenge.

So far, McGrew says — while playfully knocking on his wood desk — the Wexner Center has not had major security problems with any of its exhibits, which means other institutions have been more than happy to lend their own art holdings for inclusion in shows, such as last year’s international Warhol exhibit.

Part of his successful track record comes from a refusal to become complacent with the policies and procedures he’s put in place.
“I have friends and colleagues in the field who come in and test something for me and let me know if it was effective or not,” he said. “In 20 years we’ve never had a systemic failure, but we know our emergency manuals and procedures are living and breathing documents that need to be constantly evaluated.”

Given the need to stay ahead of the curve, McGrew — a founding member of the Heartland Chapter of the International Foundation for Cultural Property Protection — is spearheading a symposium titled “Cultural Heritage at Risk: Art and Book Theft — Past, Present, Future” Nov. 10 at the Wexner Center, geared for people involved in the arts and law enforcement.

When planning this all-day conference, the first of its kind to be held at the Wex, McGrew cast a deliberately wide net when sending out invitations. Librarians, curators, registrars, private collectors, security professionals and police departments were all included on the guest list, in the hope that participants would begin to expand their traditional networks in how they approach cultural property protection.

“I want to get our experts together and look at this problem from all levels — local, regional and international — and share our experiences and how we can maybe change our strategies,” McGrew said.

“What we want to do with this conference is bring a different mindset and change what people think of as cultural property. With universities and colleges, there’s a lot of historical architecture and cultural property that I think can get overlooked, things we walk past 100 times a day and never even think about until it comes up missing.”

To help create and shape that broader mindset, McGrew invited a diverse roster of both arts experts and private collectors to the conference. The day’s events will include presentations on the history and extent of thefts in fine art and library resources, roundtable discussions and book signings featuring authors such as Travis McDade (The Book Thief: The True Crimes of Daniel Spiegelman) and Noah Charney (The Art Thief) and a screening of The Rape of Europa, a documentary about art theft in World War II.

Another one of the invited roundtable participants is Ohio State’s own Paul Denton, who has served as chief of the university’s police force for three years and was a Columbus police officer for almost 30 years before that. Denton is one of the Wex’s most faithful attenders of exhibit openings and shows — and it’s not just because he’s on the lookout for potential security problems.

“I like going to exhibits because I get to network with people I don’t normally have a chance to interact with, and it helps me understand what’s important to them so I can then communicate that to officers who respond to incidents,” Denton said.

“It’s a pretty awesome responsibility to think about guarding the university’s cultural legacy.”

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