Andrea Fraser

2016 in Museums, Moneys, and Politics

The work 2016 in Museums, Money and Politics examines the intersection of electoral politics and private non-profit arts institutions in the US at a critical historical moment. In a huge volume that represents both an institutional critique as well as a reference book, Andrea Fraser documents the donations to election campaigns by the administrative boards of over 125 art museums in every US state during the 2016 electoral cycle. With a campaign characterized by attacks against the most vulnerable in society, defamation of the media and the so-called cultural elite, as well as calls to restrict civil rights and liberties, the 2016 elections transformed the nation’s politics. It was also the most expensive election in American history with $6.4 million dollars being collected for the presidential elections and congress. More than half this money came from just a few hundred people, a number of whom also support cultural institutions and sit on their administrative boards. The year 2016 is organized like a telephone book; the data corresponding to the contributions are classified in alphabetical order by the name of the donor. With this database as well as other types of information, the 900-page book presents a material representation of the scale of the crossover between cultural philanthropy and the financing of political campaigns in America. It also provides an unprecedented resource for discovering the political leaning of the museum sector.