Although this discussion has veered off into the direction of loans, I want
to say a few things about the original topic--how to deal with requests for the
return of donations.

First, I want to say that I have little patience with donors' heirs and
descendants who want to contravene gift decisions made by the donor during his or
her lifetime.  I think that takes a lot of crust.  Would they also think they
have a right to demand the return of a wedding or birthday gift their parent
(or ancestor) gave to a private individual just because they lust after it?  If
they can prove that the donor didn't have full ownership of some family
heirloom and had no right to donate it to the museum in the first place, of course
that's a different matter.  But merely wanting to have an object, now in a
museum collection, because it allegedly has family heirloom value would cut no ice
with me.  Repressing the urge to tell them to take a hike, I'd try to
convince them that preserving the object in the museum's collection is an appropriate
way to honor the family.

I have always felt that it's a great mistake when curators and registrars do
not state up front (and in the deed of gift or gift agreement) that the museum
cannot guarantee exhibition of a gift.  As far as I can tell, this omission
occurs most of the time in many museums.  Donors do need to be educated by the
museum about this, during the acquisition process.  It is a fact of museum
life that a rock-solid guarantee of public display of a gift, whether permanent,
occasional, or temporary, is rarely possible, and we should have the guts to
say so.  I think it's a shame (practically a scandal) that museums can't agree
to make such disclaimers the norm.  Since it isn't yet the norm, I suppose
everyone is afraid to go out on a limb and be the first to tell the truth,
fearing that such candor will scare donors off and lead them to seek out another
museum that isn't so frank.

I've seen situations in which even artifacts collected for a specific
exhibition didn't make the final cut and couldn't be included, leading to great
disappointment for donors who had been led to believe that their gifts definitely
would be displayed--all because the museum didn't explain that there are no
guarantees.  Donors need to understand that the production of an exhibition
involves negotiations over issues of space, design, theme, logistics, narrative
flow, etc., and that some objects--including some that the curator fully intended
to show--may be eliminated for one reason or another.  Of course, the other
side of the coin is that some objects which were collected primarily for study
purposes may end up being selected for display years later, however
un-exhibitable they may have seemed at first blush.

A donor who is specifically courted and solicited for a gift in an
exhibition-driven transaction may well feel frustrated if the gift ultimately is
rejected from the exhibition.  In situations in which the donor's desire and
expectation of display in a specific exhibition is intense, a curator might be wise to
make the transaction a loan to be considered for display, then converting it
to a gift when and if it actually goes on exhibit.

While we're telling donors we can't guarantee exhibition of their gifts, it
seems to me that it would be nice if we routinely informed them when their
gifts actually do go on display.  One recent donor of mine, who understood why we
couldn't promise display, asked for a stipulation in the deed that she or her
heirs be notified if we ever DID display it publicly.  I was not permitted to
add such a stipulation, however, on the grounds that it would be too difficult
to enforce, unfairly committing my unwitting successors to honor such an
agreement.   But I think this would not be a problem if such practices were more
frequent and normal.  I was told that such a notification requirement would
produce a hardship for future staff due to possible changes of address and
difficulting in locating a donor or heirs, but my answer to that is to further
stipulate that it is the responsibility of the donor or heirs to provide updated
contact information to the museum to facilitate exhibition notifications.  After
all, what is so difficult about sending a donor a form letter stating that a
donation is scheduled either for temporary or indefinite display?  I think
such procedures, if standardized, would alleviate much confusion and many hard
feelings.

Potential donors who dream of seeing their donations on display in a museum
setting, of course, have every right to shop around in order to locate the
institution which seems the most likely to display them.  But I think museums need
to be much more careful about being honest and above board in negotiations
with donors, telling them--and stipulating in gift agreements--that they cannot
guarantee exhibition of a donation because of the vicissitudes of the museum
business.  Even if a donated object truly is a central artifact in a planned
exhibition, and you're in a position to say so to the donor, occasionally an
exhibition gets cancelled due to lack of funding or other factors over which the
curator has no control.

While I'm complaining about greedy or demanding donors, I nevertheless want
to add that too many museums don't, in my opinion, treat their donors right
when their objects do go on display.  I repeat my statement that I think donors
or their heirs should be notified about plans to place their donation on
display, whenever possible.  And they should receive label credit in the exhibition,
whether in a separate object label or in a general donor list (unless of
course they prefer anonymity, which is something else that ought to be established
in a gift agreement).  I've been troubled by the notion, which seems to be
increasing in the museum world, that donor credits in exhibitions are
unnecessary.  There was a time, I think, when donor credit lines in exhibits were taken
for granted.

I sympathize with museum staff who are afflicted with sloppy record-keeping
of the past--missing gift and loan agreements, vague agreements, inadequate
identification of provenance, etc.  The problems which arise from bad practices
should amply demonstrate how important good gift and loan agreements are.  We
have a responsibility to our collections and our donors to make sure that new
transactions are properly documented and that all the bases are covered.

David Haberstich

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