Q&A with Agustín Arteaga, new CEO and director of the Crocker Art Museum

Photo by Nick Glover, courtesy of the Crocker Art Museum

As we’re talking right now in early June, you’re preparing to move to Sacramento. Have you found a home here yet? 

Yes! For the first time ever, my husband and I found a home before  we moved. I’ve been a director in probably six museums now in different places over the last 35 years. And every time my husband and I move, we just rent a furnished apartment, try to learn about the city, take time to figure out where we want to live, and then we move in somewhere. But this time, when we were in Sacramento for four days [in April], we were on a mission to find a home, and we found it. We’re very happy.

What part of town are you moving to?

West Sacramento. And our location just kind of fulfills everything. It’s surrounded by trees, which is something that we always need to have—to look out the window and see green.

You know, we just watched The Truman Show  a few days ago because, after we got the house, we felt like, “Come on, there’s got to be something wrong with Sacramento. Is it real?” Our house is less than a 10-minute drive [to the Crocker] and 15 minutes if I’m cycling, which I love to do, and we have a pool where I can swim laps and a beautiful park that is just outside our house. So it’s just perfect. It’s everything we need. I hope it’s not The Truman Show. Tell me it’s all true. 

It’s all true! Can you talk about why the Crocker position appealed to you? You have decades of experience at much larger museums.

Well, I felt that there were two ways for me to go—one was to try to go for bigger, more complicated. And then there was this  opportunity, with an extraordinary collection, the most beautiful facilities, and all the programming for the community. I wanted to be able to focus on these things and not on managing a huge staff or dealing with a very large [expansion] project as is happening in Dallas at this moment. 

You’ve been involved in a few of those large construction projects previously.

Yes, I’ve done those, so it’s “been there, done that.” I built MALBA, the Museum of Latin American Art in Buenos Aires. It’s an extraordinary museum where I had the privilege of being the founding director and working there throughout the design and construction process and opening the museum. Years later, in Puerto Rico, I built an [annex at the Museo de Arte de Ponce] that was as large as the original museum, and did a full renovation of the original design by Edward Durell Stone. But I felt that I really wanted to dedicate my time to where my passion is, which is dealing with art and artists. And I’m a curator at heart—that’s how I started my career, and I want to be more engaged in that.

The Crocker is, as you know, a bit unusual architecturally. The original galleries were built in the 19th century, and Charles Gwathmey [the late architect best known for his addition to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim in New York] designed the Crocker’s expansion that opened in 2010. You started your career as an architect. Do you have any impressions of the museum’s architecture?

I’m very impressed with the architecture. I love the 19th-century buildings. I think that they’re so beautiful. They’re so well preserved; it’s amazing. And the Gwathmey structure is just fantastic. I think that the job that the architects and Lial [Jones, the Crocker’s longtime director and CEO who is retiring after 26 years at the museum] did was just extraordinary. You have these extraordinary heights in the galleries that are so hard to get, and they help produce really fantastic installations. And the way that the light comes into the spaces and provides this soft play, but at the same time, the vibrant glare that helps you appreciate art. And they work so well together. I think that it’s very difficult when you have already a landmark to build a new one next to it—to connect them while being respectful about height and somehow neutral in form and color. It’s really well-thought-out.

Speaking of architecture, one of my favorite exhibits was a show I saw of Frank Gehry’s work at the Guggenheim in New York. I don’t know if you saw that exhibit…

I did, yeah. Architectural shows are great. When Charles Gwathmey died [in 2009, a year before the Crocker expansion that he designed opened], I’m not sure that people were aware of his talents and his contributions to the field, and that’s an interesting subject to explore. I think the museum could think about helping acknowledge him as he deserved [with an exhibit].

Are there any specific works of art or collections at the Crocker that caught your eye while you were visiting?

The collection is so diverse and so rich and covers such a huge span in history and geography that there’s a lot that I need to learn about. You know, I’m very familiar with European masters, but I’m not as good with German 19th-century landscape.

I am very impressed with the ceramic collection. You mentioned that I’m an architect, and I have a very specific connection with sculpture as well. So looking at those exquisite works of art from so many different times and geographies is exciting. The collection of works on paper is, from what I know, absolutely fantastic. And the new exhibit on [Anthony] van Dyck shows the strength and the power of the Crocker collection. [The presentation, which features 59 portrait prints and one drawing by the Flemish Baroque master, is on view through Oct. 12.] I think that it’s sort of a hidden treasure that we can showcase and share with the world.

The California art collection also covers a full history of artists in just one collection that is very, very impressive. I’m still more familiar with the 20th century than with the late 18th and early 19th century, but that’s exciting. It’s a good opportunity to learn about something new. But I truly love the contemporary art collection and I’m glad to see how it’s so actively growing right now. I’m hoping that I can contribute to that myself. I’m always looking to see what is happening and how artists represent a moment in time. That’s what is so important about art. It’s like having a sectional cut on the history of humanity, and when you put that under the microscope, you can see how things were happening and interacting. 

Do you have any early thoughts on what some of your goals with the museum might be?

I hope to see if the things that the museum does so well locally can resonate nationally or internationally. I think we can probably raise the museum’s profile, which would be important because the profile of the city is also changing. And I think the Crocker has been an intrinsical part of that transformation, being the cultural anchor of Sacramento. And being one of the fastest-growing cities in California, I feel that many other places in the world are going to start looking more closely at Sacramento.

I read recently that California’s economy [is now] the fourth largest in the world [behind the United States, China and Germany] and I think that’s going to be very important for the museum because we have a big opportunity to find ways to be part of a cultural diplomacy and exchange where people from other countries learn about us, and we can also bring great art and present it to our community. I feel that there are a lot of opportunities to make the museum move toward a new epoch, a new period. Lial’s was a period of foundation and transformation, and she really made a great institution. I just hope that I can build on that.

I can tell you that having your collection being viewed abroad is as important as making good use of it locally. When I was the director of the Ponce art museum in Puerto Rico for nine years [2004-2013], people were wondering what I was doing there since I had been running larger institutions. Years later, I felt very proud that its collection had traveled to major institutions in Europe and on this continent. The collection was presented in Madrid, London and Vienna, to name some. But what was important was not only raising and elevating the profile of the museum, but also helping people understand the importance and value of your collection. It also helps in exchanging and bringing works from other places that are significant. 

You have curated a lot of blockbuster exhibitions—is that another way to raise the national and international profile of the museum?

I think that it’s a good way to do it. I have some ideas which I’m not going to share at this moment. It’s way too early. What is important at this moment is to connect at all levels with supporters—with the community at large, with the membership of the museum, city authorities, schools and community organizations, and see what is important to them.

I think museums all share a common DNA, but in the end, we’re very specific to our communities, and if you don’t really understand what is relevant for that community, then you’re probably not putting your energy in the right place. I think my first three months will have to be a very serious listening tour with my staff and all the stakeholders, and then from there, move into creating a strategic plan that reflects what I have heard, and then, of course, what we will collectively agree to do.

You mentioned that you’re a curator at heart. In 2016, you curated an exhibit called Mexico: 1900 to 1950—with works by Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera and other seminal Mexican artists—that was on display at the Grand Palais in Paris. It opened only weeks after you started your tenure at the Dallas Museum of Art. And then you moved mountains to fundraise and extend the loans of many of the pieces in order to bring that show to Dallas after Paris.

Yes, that happened exactly as you described. It was a very big endeavor, and it turned out to be perhaps one of the most significant things I’ve done. In Dallas—with 42% of the population being of Mexican and Latino origin—the museum had very little connection with that community. You need to engage with the communities and you need to facilitate the dialogue, and make it accessible so they know that they belong and that they can engage.

I read that it was one of the highest-attended exhibits in the museum’s history, drawing over 125,000 visitors. 

Yes, it was a very unique opportunity. We had a very famous double portrait by Frida Kahlo known as The Two Fridas  that is actually banned from traveling anywhere in the world [outside of Mexico]. I had to work very hard to get a special permit from the minister of culture and approval by the president [of Mexico] at the time so that painting could leave the country. It went to Paris and then I was lucky enough to extend that permit to Dallas. When it came into the [Dallas] museum, we filmed it being uncrated and placed on the wall and, believe it or not, in less than a week, it had over a million views on social media. So that was significant to have the name of the museum seen in many places.

One of the last shows you co-curated in Dallas was Frida: Beyond the Myth, which was hugely successful and extended by several months. I noticed that the exhibit is currently in Virginia. I don’t suppose you can pull off another miracle and bring that to the Crocker, can you?

If there wasn’t another Frida Kahlo show right on the tails of this one, I would probably have thought about doing it. [The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston is organizing a Kahlo retrospective, which will be on display there from January to May before moving on to the Tate Modern in London.] I could have dreamed about it, but you have to be always conscious of what is feasible. Trying to do a Frida Kahlo show is really hard, if not impossible nowadays. In Virginia, it really has become a blockbuster. 

But you may be surprised—maybe we can get some other Fridas on view at the [Crocker] and people can see something special. You never know. 

It’s very unusual for directors at large museums to also curate exhibits, but you’ve been one of the rare directors who has curated shows around the world. Do you hope to curate some shows in Sacramento?

Yes, yes, I do. I hope to do that. You know, this is the thing: Curating a show doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to take on everything. I’m very used to working with curatorial teams. I’ve been a curator since my first show opening, probably in ’85, if I recall. So that’s a long time curating exhibitions. But I also love mentoring, and working with young people. That helps me keep up with the world. It’s a two-way street to sort of educate each other, and that’s something I really treasure—that opportunity to learn from young scholars who have a new vision and are more up to date on what’s happening with the times.

That is one of the reasons why I wanted to come to the Crocker—to have that opportunity to be more closely engaged with the curatorial team and with artists and the community so I can be engaged and not just an administrator on a very high strategic level. I’m very excited about that.

You mentioned your connection to sculpture. As you probably know, the Crocker has long explored the idea of creating a sculpture garden of some type in Crocker Park across the street from the museum. Are there any updates on that or do you have your own vision for that space? 

I know that soon, sidewalks are going to start being built, which is great. I know there are conversations that we have to restart with the city, and that it’s a project that the museum and the city would like to see accomplished in the near future. And I’m very excited about that because I think that would give the museum an opportunity to expand without really having to grow its footprint in terms of brick and mortar. But I think that could really become a very transformative space, not only for the museum but for the city.

I don’t see that just as a sculpture park. I would think that it would be much more of a creative space where you can see works of art that children and people can interact with, and that are designed to be used and enjoyed, not just admired. 

One of the areas that’s been a hallmark in your career is a focus on diversity and inclusion. Can you speak to your passion for that and your thoughts on how that might manifest itself in your new role here?

Yes. I mean, everybody knows I have a husband. Everybody knows I come from Mexico. I’m a U.S. citizen, but I was born and raised in Mexico. I know how it feels to be on one end of the spectrum, and I just feel that the opportunity for all of us to be together in one place and enjoy each other’s company and the exchange of ideas is something that the museum can easily facilitate—to learn about the otherness, to learn about somebody else’s culture, or even [the parts of] our own culture that we lost track of.

So I am very keen about making sure that the museum provides an opportunity and a welcoming space for everybody. And I mean everybody, whether you’re white or Black or brown or whatever. It’s a space for all of us to coexist and to learn from each other. I love to see how the museum has programming celebrating Black History Month and Gay Pride and, through its collection, Asian Americans. So, I’m just excited to be part of continuing that role and expanding it.

This is all really exciting, and why I’m telling you that I think that the Crocker has so many things that are so compelling for any museum director, and to me personally. It became a very attractive opportunity, and I’m the lucky guy who got it.