Have you ever wandered aimlessly through the halls and the rooms of a museum...

...and asked yourself why that Picasso is standing right in front of that Gaugin?

Why Mirò next to Bosch?

Why an ancient statue of the Virgin Mary and a rare copy of the Koran?

Sometimes the association is driven by same style.
Other times by same period, or same author, same iconography or provenance.

Whatever the case, together they seem to make perfectly sense. All these individual pieces arranged to create harmony.
Just like a collage.

So, in a sense, those big collectors of pieces of art we call museums are, in turn, pieces of art themselves.

The layered surfaces of collages can be torn to reveal parts of the image laying just below their surface...
With often marvelous results.

Same can happen to museums: you can study them upclose, peal off each of their levels and learn more about them to eventually discover what's hiding underneath.

Let's do it.
Let's pick two you may already heard about, or even visited.
The Museum of Modern Art/MoMa (New York, USA) and the Tate Modern (London, UK).

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) – founded in 1929 – is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.

It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art and is often identified as one of the largest and most influential museums of modern art in the world.

In a network of four art galleries, Tate is an institution that houses the UK's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art.

Since its foundation in 1897, the complex has kept growing into one of the largest and most visited galleries in the world.

0. INTRODUCTION

In 2021, their annual visitors count was:

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0

0. INTRODUCTION

ARTWORKS

In the last century, the Moma's evolving collection has included an ever-expanding range of visual expression,
for a total of

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artworks

When Tate first opened its doors to the public it had just one site, displaying a small collection of British artworks,
for a total of

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artworks

1. ARTWORKS

When do artworks date back?

1. ARTWORKS

...And when were they acquired?

*2013 is the last year available about data acquisitions' information.

1. ARTWORKS

Which historical time periods are represented at the Museums?

1. ARTWORKS

What about the artists?
How many are they?

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2. ARTISTS

GENDER REPRESENTATION

2. ARTISTS

Focus:
the most represented female artists

2. ARTISTS

Where do artists come from?

2. ARTISTS

Now that we have a general overview of what is inside our useums' collections,
we can delve into acquisition criteria over time.

3. COMBIINE

In which years are artists' works mostly acquired?

Tate acquired 37,984 in 1856, by far the most they have ever acquired in any single year — 37,711 of these works comprise a massive donation of J.M.W. Turner artworks.

In the 60s, we assist to a jump in the acquisitions number: from less than one thousands in the previous decade, to nearly six thousands and a half.

3.1 ACQUISITION CRITERIA

As for the MoMA, the 60s witness a boost in the acquisitions’ number: from little more than 6 thousand artworks in the 50s, to nearly 40 thousands.

1964 is indeed the year with the greates number of acquisitions: 12828 in only one year.

3.1 ACQUISITION CRITERIA

We have already accounted for the total number of male and female artists. Let us now anlyse the gender of acquired artists in time. In this way, we will try to investigate in which ways the the gender gap changes, if it does.

For both museums, the gender composition is heavily unbalance towards male presence: the average percentage of male artists is of around 86% for both Museums (MoMA: 86%, Tate: 85.5%), with female contribution only reaching the 14%.

3.2 GENDER GAP

Throughout the timespan under examination, the lowest and highest percentage of female presence are 7% (1930s) and 23% (1990s) respectively for MoMA, and 8% (1960s) and 27% (2010s) for Tate.

The average percent growth is of 1,71% for MoMA and of 1,14% for Tate. The trend is positive, thus, but still only weakly positive.

3.2 GENDER GAP

For both museums, the female artists' presence fluctuates throughout last century’s years, showing a mild and inconstant increase in its last decades.

However, the new millennium seems to bring slight improvements when it comes to representing women in arts.

3.2 GENDER GAP

We now considers artists’ nationalities throughout the years: in which proportion is each continent represented?

Does acquisition campaigns show different tendencies and patterns throughout the years, when it comes to the artists' nationality?

3.3 NATIONALITIES

In the 30s, when the MoMa opened to the public, its collection included almost evenly European and North American artworks. Although their presence remains predominant all over the years, slowly but steadily other continents make their appearance in the collection.

The inter-continental openness at MoMA keeps steady up untill the 90s: in the 2010s, the museum’s acquisitions include an unprecedented proportion of African artworks, until then almost excluded.

3.3 NATIONALITIES

Originally, the Tate documented mainly modern British art, from the Victorian age. Later, the collection was expanded to include foreign and contemporary art.

As we can see, since the mid-1900s, the museum's acquisition policy widened, opening to asian, african and south american contribution: still, Europe and the U.S. occupy the dominant position by far.

It is only with the 2010s that other continents decidedly mark their presence in the collection.

3.3 NATIONALITIES

Although MoMA’s collection shows an overall greater international openness when it comes to artworks’ acquisition, the trend is similar in both museums: ever since the mid-1900s, inter-continental art presence grows and keeps steady.

The beginning of the new millennium marks a step forward when it comes to worldwide inclusiveness, with African art finally attaining a more significant place in the museums’ artworks acquisitions.

3.3 NATIONALITIES

What historical periods are included in the collections?

Do different decades show different interests, when it comes to artworks’ dating?

3.4 CENTURIES

MoMa's collection embraces works from the 18th to the 21st century. Nonetheless, the museum’s undisputed protagonist is the 20th century, which dominates aquisition all throughout the decades, while, the 18th century is poorly represented.

The contemporary vocation of the museum is confirmed by the growing presence of the new millennium at its very beginning.

3.4 CENTURIES

Tate shows more variety in the artistic periods featured in the collection: 16th century artworks are steadily acquired in nearly every decade, while the 17th century art presence grows in the 50s and 60s.

Differently from the MoMA, early 1900s acquisitions mainly concern 19th century works. Subsequently, thanks to the progressive openness of the museum towards contemporary art, we witness a gradual growth of interest towards the 20th century.

3.4 CENTURIES

To conclude, both museums obviously show in the new millennium a step towards the inclusion of 21th century artworks.

3.4 CENTURIES

It is said that "life imitates art".

And art, life.

Art institutions, too.

No wonder, then, that female representativeness our museums’ collection does not even reach the 30%.

Or that African contemporary art only shyly makes it appearance among the wide and extablished tradition of European and North American artists, in our millennium.

A closer look at the acquisition trends over the years, though, opens up a more in depth perspective on what is actually happening in the inscrutable world of art.

The new millennium paves new ways.

Unprecedently does it unlock museums’ doors to the categories which have traditionally been excluded from the world of Western art.

Slowly (too slowly) women and racialized groups come in, find a representation, share their capability to express and communicate.

Art give us back the picture of our time and society, mirroring their beauty and horrors, their recursive patterns and languishing nostalgia.

But also their hopes for the future, a better one, their struggles and changes towards it.