Mass MoCA has been pursuing an interesting strategy in the context of today’s much larger, deeper and better funded private collections. Instead of angling for an eventual donation, Mass MoCA is making the most of it’s greatest asset, space, by creating long-term installations. One is a project involving Yale and Sol LeWitt. The other, which we have mentioned repeatedly, is the Hall Foundation’s Anselm Kiefer installation. The North Adams Transcript gives some of the details but click through for a longer description of the strategy by Mass MoCA director Joseph Thompson:

The Kiefer exhibition, which will run seasonally for 15 years, is housed in a galvanized steel warehouse built upon a cement water trough — a remnant of the former five-story Building 15 — and is the latest large-scale show that has found a home at MoCA.

The cavernous building holds three of Kiefer’s works, including “Narrow are the Vessels,” an 82-foot-long wave-like structure of concrete and rebar; “Velimir Chlebnikov,” a steel pavilion containing 30 paintings inspired by the theories of the show’s namesake — a Russian mathematical experimentalist; and “The Women of the Revolution,” a piece made up of 20 lead beds honoring French women who played pivotal roles in the country’s wars.

“The building, the construction, the new road and gate — all of that is 100 percent paid for by the Hall Art Foundation. They are paying 100 percent of the operating costs — the utilities, electricity, security and all the other Things,” Thompson said. “Mass MoCA does the ticket taking, the educational docents and provides all the other museological infrastructure.”

He added, “There is no pretense that this art is going to come to Mass MoCA. It all belongs to the Hall Art Foundation. If, at the end of the 15-year agreement, they choose not to renew it, the art will go back to the foundation and we’ll keep the building and the improvements.”

Mass MoCA Opens Building Dedicated to Anselm Kiefer’s Art (The Transcript)