Every museum — with its own collection and, more important, its own style and curatorial vision for bringing art to the community — is like another dollar bill in your pocket. Some metropolitan regions are rich and some are poor.
The museum started out as the steward of paintings by late Colorado artist Vance Kirkland, and it still has about 600 of them. But, thanks to backing by the Merle Chambers Fund, it grew to be a museum for decorative arts, with a collection that ballooned through the sheer will of Hugh Grant, who was married to Chambers from 1989 until 2017, and who retired recently as the Kirkland’s executive director.
For all of its panache, the Kirkland remains a small institution. It reported expenses of $1.6 million in 2022, according to Internal Revenue Service filings. DAM, by comparison, reported $71.6 million in expenses that year.The Kirkland’s relatively small size kept its profile minimal on the local cultural scene. It cared for its collection, but lacked the curatorial firepower to make the most of its holdings or to promote itself into a national player despite the fact that it has the goods.
But with its curatorial firepower, it should be able to showcase these treasures in a more professional and diverse manner, with better packaging and better signage. DAM already has an architecture and design department with 18,000 objects, plus design pieces across the board in its textile, Indigenous and modern and contemporary art collections. The addition of the Kirkland material will allow for shows with much greater depth and interest.