Millions of dollars worth of artwork improperly stored in Brodie Hall

Since the early years of SUNY Geneseo’s founding as a college, it has received gifts of works of art given to enhance teaching the arts at Geneseo. The current collection was estimated by a professional appraiser in 2017 to be valued at between $1.8 - 2.5 million dollars and is composed of local and international artists alike. This collection, however, can only be found on limited display; there is a group of works located in the President’s House, while others reside in other buildings and private spaces across the campus.

Since the departure of Cynthia Hawkins in 2021, it has become extremely difficult to locate specific works, as the Office of the Provost lacks a comprehensive inventory of precisely where each work is located; the only inventory that exists is an Appraisal document, which does not list location of individual works, although it does provide information and photographs. 

Geneseo’s permanent art collection was, according to Bosch, stored in Doty Hall until it was moved to the McClellan House on Main Street around 2004 (the historical listings and purchases of this property cannot be found on real estate listing or Geneseo resources). In both locations, the artwork was stored properly, pertaining to the proper conditions of humidity, sunlight, temperature, and more.

“They had shelves built, there was climate control and humidity control…nothing fancy, but pretty basic stuff,” Bosch said. “And then there were shelves built that accommodated all of the works that were in the collection…1,200 works, more or less, of different sizes…So the collection was very well maintained.”

During its time in the McClellan House, former Director of Galleries Cynthia Hawkins managed the collection as part of Geneseo’s Studio Art department activities. When Former College President Christopher Dahl retrenched the studio art department, Hawkins was moved to be supervised by the Office of the Provost, though her responsibilities remained the same. The McClellan House was then sold, and Hawkins transferred the collection to Brodie Hall, where she supervised the construction of a collection’s workroom and storage. When the administration changed the purpose of that room following Hawkins’s departure, the displacement of the collection began. 

Bosch explained, “After she left, that room [equipped to store the collection] was dismantled from being one of the rooms that she used to organize individual works, and everything was emptied out. I don’t know what happened, but my guess is that…almost everything went into that room next to the Lederer Gallery. And then as we [the art history department] never had control over the Lederer Gallery or the collection at any point in its history, I have no idea what’s going on there.”

The current resting place of Geneseo’s art collection is not properly organized or inventoried. Only one storage area has climate control, and the remainder has been seemingly randomly dispersed into three spaces of Brodie Hall, most of which are locked and do not grant student access.

The rooms that can be accessed are a sight to behold—paintings are stacked on top of one another haphazardly, resulting in cracking frames and damage to significantly valued works of art. The works of art themselves are not comprehensively labeled and do not correspond to any organized or easily accessible record. It appears that these rooms have been neglected since Hawkins’ retirement, in the aftermath of her departure.

“It is now impossible to easily figure out what has been lost, what might have been stolen, what has been damaged, [and] the extent of the damage,” Bosch said. “[The collection] is New York State property, even though it belongs to Geneseo and…is managed out of the Provost's Office and out of the Foundation office as Geneseo property. Nonetheless, nobody seems to know anything about what is going on, and there isn’t anybody who can tell you all of these things that one would like to know.” 

Bosch spoke, too, to the impact that this disorganization has had on her courses and students as an art history professor.

“Let’s say I’m teaching your class and I know that we happen to have a couple of things like late 19th-century works. We don’t have, like, a searchable database where I can put in ‘19th-century’ for a list of works. The list of works would say ‘Oh, this particular one is stored here in rooms such and such, on shelves such and such.’ So, because we don’t know where anything is, and because an inventory of matchup has not been done since I don’t know when, we cannot ascertain what is missing…[or] what the potential damage [is].”

Bosch has discussed the situation with Interim Provost Joe Cope and has been informed the administration is considering hiring an external expert to advise them on the permanent collection, though there is not a time frame for this endeavor. In the meantime, the collection is not available for teaching or public display.

The impact of this disregard for Geneseo’s art collection spans further than the experiences of art history students and is a symptom of a much larger problem in Geneseo’s administration—a lack of care for the arts. This article will be part of a series exploring the many factors influencing this disregard and the impact that it has on the Geneseo community. Stay tuned in the coming weeks for more.