Agnes Gund’s philanthropic innovations

In philanthropy, there’s often a tension between the glamorous causes which rich people support on the urging of their rich friends, on the one hand, and the really important if unglamorous causes which desperately need funding, on the other. For example: the social stratosphere that is the MoMA board, versus the grim nuts and bolts of the people working to reform criminal justice.

Which is why the Art For Justice Fund is so fascinating: it’s a bold attempt to imbue the issue of criminal justice with some of the prestige of the top end of the art world.

Gund has donated more than 250 works to MoMA alone and has helped MoMA to acquire hundreds more; she has also supported and sat on the boards of countless other arts organizations. The way the things normally work in these kind of circles, Gund would hold on to her finest art until her death, at which point one of three things would happen. The art might stay in her family; it might get donated to MoMA; or it might get sold off as part of the estate.

Read the source article at causeandeffect.fm