I agree with you that business rules do not apply to museums. I am not suggesting that a museum sell critical pieces of their collections to make a profit this

I agree with you that business rules do not apply to museums. I am not suggesting that a museum sell critical pieces of their collections to make a profit this quarter. I’m suggesting they sell or take out loans against the pieces of their collections that have never been on display and will likely never be put on display, so that they can continue to curate and display the pieces for the public to enjoy. I’m suggesting that it’s hypocritical for a museum to claim that it exists in service to the public (as opposed to private collections), but to close its doors or gouge prices, as an alternative to selling or taking out loans on assets that have never been and never will be displayed to the public. From my perspective, a museum with closed doors and good storage is not a museum, it is a private collection with windows and a board of directors. I realize this does not work for small museums. I specifically have the Metropolitan Museum of Art (and its cousin museums in other large American cities, which are run with similarly hyper-acquisitional). It doesn’t make sense to me that these museums can continue to acquire art (a big expense), and lay people off. It’s putting art above people, which does not sound like a public institution to me, regardless of my beliefs about the commercialization of art.