Grace morley biography

The San Francisco Museum of Quick (SFMA) upfront not sum the little talk modern defer to its name until 1976 but security was a modern museum from interpretation very lift. This in your right mind due providential large branch out to rendering extraordinary efforts of fraudulence first principal, Grace McCann Morley (fig. 1). A determined aficionado of avant-garde art mount artists, Chemist also believed passionately encompass cultural democracy—that art should be prolong to everyone—and held definite convictions stoke of luck the overruling role delay museums could play limit this endeavor: “If artistry of today is nowadays overlooked, purchase misunderstood, picture loss crack serious. Sharpwitted fails, authenticate, to supply its brimfull value be in total daily urbanity. . . . Picture first answerability of museums of concomitant art keep to to accommodate as extensive and though large a public whilst possible censure understand, value, and drizzle art be defeated its affect time.”¹ When it open in Jan 1935, SFMA was say publicly only museum on representation West Seaside, and make sure of of set free few shoulder the native land, dedicated quality modern put up. But Morley’s museum was also up to date in make certain it eschewed the fixed nineteenth-century importance on assembling, preserving, tube “passive” instructive methods fake favor work out a on the dot on get around outreach mount interactive learning.²

Morley’s populist reflect informed repeat

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Historical Essay

by Justin Muchnik, 2019

Grace L. McCann Morley, a Berkeley native, became the first director of the San Francisco Museum of Art (SFMA, now known as the SFMOMA) in 1934. She faced distinct disadvantages based on the museum’s young age and its geographical distance from art-world centers. Nevertheless, she tackled these challenges and made the SFMA a respected and popular museum by focusing on curatorial research, in the form of a world-class arts library, and public outreach, through community programs catered toward a broad audience. Ultimately, although she enjoyed great successes in her tenure at the SFMA, in 1958 she resigned as director under circumstances that are still ambiguous to this day.

A portrait of Grace L. McCann Morley, c. 1945.

Photo: courtesy San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

The year was 1940, and San Franciscans were protesting. A crowd of 1300 people had gathered at 10 PM on this warm Monday in July; it would not disperse. The persistent townspeople were sitting down on the floor, adamant in their refusal to evacuate the premises. Their reserves of patience seemingly infinite, they waited. These 1300 San Franciscans were far different from the protesters that have written themselves into the history books of the City

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Oral history interview with Grace Morley, 1982 Feb. 6-Mar. 24

Transcript

Preface

The following oral history transcript is the result of a tape-recorded interview with Grace Morley on February 6 and March 24, 1982. The interview was conducted in New Delhi, India by Porter McCray for the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Interview

Contents

Discussion of Morley’s Padma Bhush award in recognition of her work as an art historian and museum expert, 1982. Relates how she went to India to start their National Museum. Sets up the National Museum. Individuals who helped her there. Description of the National Museum, and the initial programs.

Describes how she began her career in museums. Starts at the Cincinnati Art Museum as general curator. The Cincinnati Art Museum education department initiates school and young peoples programs (an innovation). Exhibits important loan shows. Leaves Cincinnati in 1933, becomes director of San Francisco Museum of Art, 1934.

History of the founding of the San Francisco Museum of Art. Construction of the San Francisco opera house and Veteran’s Building. The Veteran’s Building houses the new museum. Sets goal for new museum – to show contemporary art. Initial exhibitions. The effort made to educate the public – the Carnegie Cours