About 50 members of Axios gained privileged access to the Des Moines Art Center's collection last night, including a peek into its 'voluminous vault' of hoarded cultural capital. Senior curator Laura Burkhalter fielded questions from this select group, offering details typically reserved for those with institutional connections.
This private viewing for Axios members stands in stark contrast to the public's general access. The Des Moines Art Center, while offering free admission to all, reserves deeper engagement and behind-the-scenes insights for its membership. This event underscored how cultural institutions, even those with open doors, often operate with an internal hierarchy of access, concentrating knowledge and experience among a privileged few.
Hoarding Cultural Capital
Burkhalter spotlighted some of the museum's most valuable assets during the exclusive session. These included Francis Bacon's "Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X" and Edward Hopper's "Automat." These works represent significant concentrations of cultural capital, their value accumulated through historical processes of artistic canonization and market speculation. The curator's role involved managing and interpreting these assets for the members present, reinforcing their exclusive claim to such knowledge.
The "voluminous vault" itself suggests a repository of wealth, kept from general view. It holds items deemed too precious or numerous for constant public display, embodying the museum's function as a custodian of concentrated artistic value. Access to information about this vault, and the ability to question its manager directly, represents a form of social capital granted to the Axios members. This isn't merely viewing art; it's access to the mechanisms of its preservation and valuation.
The Illusion of Public Access
The Des Moines Art Center maintains public hours from 10am-4pm on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 10am-7pm on Thursdays and Fridays, and 10am-5pm on Saturdays and Sundays. Admission is free for everyone during these times. However, the private event for Axios members reveals the limits of this "free access." While the doors are open, the deeper, more intimate understanding of the collection, and the direct dialogue with its custodians, remains a commodity exchanged for membership or status.
This dual system ensures that while the general public can observe the displayed works, the mechanisms of their preservation, acquisition, and the full scope of the institution's holdings are primarily shared with a more exclusive audience. The event highlights how cultural institutions, even when publicly accessible, often reinforce existing class distinctions through tiered access to knowledge and influence. The free admission serves as a public relations gesture, masking the deeper structural inequalities in cultural engagement and the distribution of cultural capital.