• January 8, 2026 | 11:00 AM - 1:00 PM
• Continental 6, Ballroom Level

2I: Museums. Collecting Histories and Collecting Futures: How and Why Museums Collect Art Today (Workshop)

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Sponsored by:
AIA Museums and Exhibitions Committee

Organizers:
Sarah Lepinski, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Lisa Anderson-Zhu, The Walters Art Museum

Panelists:
Seth Pevnick, Cleveland Museum of Art, Jessica Powers, San Antonio Museum of Art, Lynley McAlpine, San Antonio Museum of Art, Carolyn M. Laferrière, Princeton University Art Museum, MaryKate Cleary, Princeton University Art Museum, Jens Daehner, J. Paul Getty Museum, and Maya Muratov, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Overview Statement:
For museums, acquiring art today involves numerous steps of evaluation and necessitates significant investment of resources to conduct research and verify provenance and to consider broader issues surrounding fund raising, conservation, storage, programming, and the presentation of the work in the galleries for a variety of audiences. With the significant investment of time and effort involved, and the challenges to acquiring objects from the ancient Mediterranean region in a legal and ethical manner, how and why do museums continue to collect ancient art?

In many respects, institutions collect because they seek to diversify collections and the stories they can tell, to fill narrative and thematic gaps in collections, or to target acquisitions that either connect directly to objects already in the institution or are exceptional objects in their own right. Diversifying collections to include objects made for daily life, were made by or for women, or that depict underrepresented groups, offers curators opportunities to change the kinds of narratives presented in gallery displays, making them more inclusive and accessible.

Acquisition opportunities arise when well-provenanced objects appear on the art market or are offered as gifts or bequests to an institution. Antiquities have been featured on the art market for centuries, and it is possible for curators, collectors, and auction houses to trade in objects whose histories extend not only beyond 1970 but can even be traced back centuries. Through increased engagement with international partners and careful research to verify the provenance of objects, museums legally and ethically expand their collections today.

This workshop features brief presentations by museum professionals highlighting recent acquisitions of antiquities in the last four years (2022–present). As a group, the presentations address museum acquisition practices and procedures, as they pertain to specific institutions, and examine the goals and rationales behind decisions to acquire works of ancient art today. The presentations will be followed by moderated discussion with the workshop presenters and participants.

The topic of museum acquisitions is timely, as communities and professionals working across institutional structures (e.g., universities, museums, research centers, and government agencies) are actively engaged in assessing policies and principles surrounding the stewardship of cultural heritage. The session provides the opportunity to explore the complex issues surrounding museum acquisitions among the wide range of the AIA professional membership.