A first version of this essay - focused on new museum policies at MACRO, the Contemporary Art Museum of the City of Rome - has been posted to my blog MuseumStudies on Tumblr (5, 6, 7, and 11 July 2011) under the name “Kafka at MACRO, the true inside story - OR - How Not To Run A Museum (Act 1-4)”.

1. KAFKA AT THE M U SE U M , A T R U E I N SI D E ST O R Y
by Alessandro Califano
Launched on 4 July 2011 at MACRO to present to the media the museum’s new director,
Mr. Bartolomeo Pietromarchi, succeeding to Mr. Luca Massimo Barbero, yesterday’s press
conference has been interesting for some of what has been said, as well as for some that
hasn’t - and also, maybe, for the absence of some of the participants being expected: the
Mayor of Rome, Alemanno, and the Manager of the City’s Cultural Heritage Department,
Mr. Broccoli, who were announced, but both did not come.
They sent their greetings, of course – everybody does, why shouldn’t they? – but basically
it’s been a two-men-show: Mr. Pietromarchi himself, and Mr. Dino Gasperini, Deputy
Mayor of Rome, in charge of the city’s cultural heritage, and of its historical downtown
area. Mr. Gasperini introduced the absence of the Head of the Cultural Heritage
Department, assuring that his staff, however, was present au complet – to which half of the
first row uneasily stirred, grinned, and somewhat sheepishly nodded.
Much has been said, described, and promised – as is usual in such settings: to wrap it all
up in brief, cultural programmes are part politics, part funds, but often, there’s lots of blah-
blah involved, as well. Who cares for a sketchy description of the event might be interested
in looking under hash-tag “#MACRO” at my tweets about the conference, yesterday.
Here, however, I’d like to focus not so much on the formal investiture of the new director -
Mr. Gasperini said he felt honoured presenting to the city such a high calibre figure as the
new director, and also a little awed, if he compared the director’s cv to his own (and rightly
so, I daresay: Gasperini’s official CV ON THE City Council’s web site merely mentions that
he has been the Christian Democratic party secretary in the S. Saba rione of Rome as a 19-
years-old lad, and a few other political milestones – really not too much to explain why
he’s been chosen to politically represent and guide the cultural heritage policies of a city
like Rome) – but rather on the funding (mis?)procedures assuring a budget to MACRO.
MACRO’s new Director, Mr. Bartolomeo Pietromarchi, started his opening remarks
mentioning the prestigious new structures recently added to the already existing ones in
Rome, the new MACRO Annex and MAXXI being the top two new entries, and the ticking
swing on Rome’s contemporary art scene. It was the best moment, perhaps – he said – to
catch the (perfect?) wave, picking up the challenge and connecting all stakeholders
involved in this sector.
True, it seems to me that almost everyone else, except those having heavy petrodollars to
back them, is slowly sobering up from the pre-2008 prima-donna architects’ extravaganzas
– but Rome, as an old lady, is perhaps entitled on being a bit slower on catching up trends.

2. Anyway, Pietromarchi explained that MACRO would be certainly up to quickly respond to
signals, blending them on the international scene, opening up to the local community, and
merging with different approaches. Though he didn’t draw a full agenda for the museum,
yet, he mentioned that his idea of cultural policies and the role of the museum was one of
integration, of its being a hub – focusing on comparison, education, and production – to
support the artists’ community.
That’s not a bad idea, at all I’d say. Inclusiveness and networking are something I’m always
ready to strongly approve and support. The problem is – since “the devil is in the details”
as Aby Warburg liked to say – how you do that. Speaking of collective trends and high-
flying goals is quite OK. Mentioning the need to quickly proceed setting up a Foundation
“as an universally well known tool that cannot be renounced, in order to act quickly and
effectively also towards private citizens, even imposing one’s own cultural agenda”, on
the other hand, sounds much less convincing.
Sure, it may be good and proper for a Foundation – especially a private one, marked by
private funds and a (relative) control by a public establishment. But I’m really not sure if a
museum should feel represented by such a mission. For all I know, a museum still is “a
non-profit, permanent institution in the service of society and its development, open to
the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits the tangible
and intangible heritage of humanity and its environment for the purposes of education,
study and enjoyment”, as it has been defined by ICOM at its 21st General Conference in
Vienna, Austria, in 2007…
However, Kafka’s Türhüterlegende (“Before the Law”, 1915) truly came to my mind only
after Mr. Pietromarchi had finished describing the setting where the museum was going to
hatch, and word had been given to the media.
Among the questions asked by journalists – since it was of almost general knowledge that
the previous Director of MACRO, Luca Massimo Barbero, had resigned after months of
financial stand-by and uncertainty – one of the first was about the budget. How come, it
was asked, that the City Board was ready to approve that very night the budget – as Deputy
Mayor Gasperini had just announced – and to draw the museum institution decree, and
the charters of services provided and quality as well, assured to be completed by the end of
the month? How was this sudden change of pace to be explained, since that very same
Board had seemed to have been almost missing in action during the long previous months
that forced Mr. Barbero to resign?
To this, Mr. Gasperini gave basically three answers. First of all, he recalled having stepped
into office only in mid-January this year, so he was not responsible for what had or had not
been previously done by his predecessor. This is only half true, since Rome’s Mayor, and a
vast part of the City Board Mr. Gasperini is part of, remained the same.

3. Second, he stressed that funds had been eventually provided, after all, so Mr. Barbero
should have just waited a little more and he would have got them. This, precisely, was the
point that reminded me of Kafka’s “Before the Law”, and it might be useful to quote here
the plot’s summary (from Wikipedia): “A man from the country seeks the law and wishes
to gain entry to the law through a doorway. The doorkeeper tells the man that he cannot
go through at the present time. The man asks if he can ever go through, and the
doorkeeper says that is possible. The man waits by the door for years, […] until he is
about to die. Right before his death, he asks the doorkeeper why even though everyone
seeks the law, no one else has come in all the years. The doorkeeper answers ‘No one else
could ever be admitted here, since this gate was made only for you. I am now going to
shut it.’ ”. Commenting this, in the context we are talking about, appears superfluous…
As his third answer, Mr. Gasperini, said – with a certain compunction – that the City
Board had to cope with the large overspending the previous Board, lead by Mayor Veltroni,
had left as a burdensome heredity to the present one. I must here admit that I’m not
particularly near to the previous Mayor’s policies. On the contrary, I found him personally
rather “lightweight”, and many policies of his Board frankly fanciful. That said – and
without even taking into account the quite debated truthfulness of that overspending – I
think that using this issue as an alibi, after three years of the present City Board being in
charge (and having been lavishly granted previously unheard of extraordinary funds by the
central government in the meantime), means either to be telling a flat out lie – or to
confess the present Board is utterly inapt as a public manager. Both of which might easily
apply, I guess.
So, in order to “put Lenin back on his feet”, as Rudi Dutschke might have said in this
context – or to put Kafka back on the bookshelf, and out of the museum – let us now here
comment the present setting, how we came to it, and what the future (just maybe, but the
likelihood thereof is quite strong) could keep in stock for the contemporary art-and-
museum scene in Rome. The roots of the Changing of the Guard that brought the City
Board to miss the approval date for the budget (usually set for the 31 December of each
year – but last year’s budget had been approved with months’ long delay as well) sink
indeed deeply into the shaky terrain of Italy’s politics.
When the co-founder of Berlusconi’s governing party – Gianfranco Fini – abandoned the
primary incorporator in early November 2010, the destinies of the depreciated regime of
the old, unfit media-tycoon seemed to be written down in block letters. However, the
decision to wait for a full month before the Parliament could vote for or against the motion
of no confidence, left time enough for tempers to rise, and for the Government to bring on
its side – with tangibly convincing arguments – MPs enough to pass the crisis.
Rome’s Mayor, Alemanno – a “heavy” ally of Berlusconi, though originally belonging to the
same post-Fascist political area as Fini – had now to reassess the City Board’s situation,
since previous allies might now be less reliable as they were considered being before. One

4. of these was certainly his Deputy Mayor Umberto Croppi, in charge of the city’s cultural
heritage, and of communication. A wide-travelled, experienced and bright professional,
Mr. Croppi – who had been in charge of the winning electoral campaign of Alemanno in
2008 – was a rather atypical right-wing representative, and ideally contiguous to
Gianfranco Fini’s political line, whose new party Futuro e Libertà (“Future and Freedom”)
he had joined in November 2010.
A long uncertain moment followed also at City government’s level, and this made the
preparation of following year’s budget (always an occasion for intensive chaffers) a
particularly unfeasible option. The situation changed after Mr. Alemanno went to visit
Berlusconi at his residence in Palazzo Grazioli. Now, why on Earth a Mayor should ask a
Prime Minister for assent (or was it permission?) before reorganizing his staff and Board is
a glorious mystery only to be properly understood in some tribal setting… or among the
Sopranos.
But so far, so good. Early in January this year, the Mayor asked the whole Board to resign,
proceeding afterwards to hand out the delegated charges to a new Board, from which –
Hocus-Pocus! – Mr. Croppi was excluded, while in came Mr. Gasperini, from Berlusconi’s
party area. Resisting, as an earthen pot among iron ones, was probably to be considered
unlikely from start for Luca Massimo Barbero, previously placed at the head of MACRO by
Mr. Croppi himself. After a few months of vain promises and tight purse’s strings, Barbero
was de facto forced to resign.
So, now MACRO has a new director, probably a new budget – though a reduced one:
around 2 M € of the approximately 5 M € of estimated budget needed (but a very late
budget helps out – you only need to cover half a year’s expenses) – and a strong strive
towards the institution of a new ad hoc Foundation to run the museum. As I’ve already
mentioned above, I’m not at all convinced of the last one’s advisability. Foundations have
been proved to be very useful tools for taking care of a certain mission – also a cultural
heritage related one – endowed by individuals, families, or organizations. However, they
are intrinsically very opaque institutions, having pretty few requirements set by existing
Italian laws. There is no duty to present a full budget, for one – explaining where one’s
money comes from, for instance – since this could mean disclosing sensitive data, e.g.
about a sponsor’s ideological preferences.
No wonder Italian parties have been using foundations since at least 1998 to promote their
cultural activities – there’s a rich variety of internal jobs to assign and harvest, and the
freedom of its internal organization is almost uncontrolled. There is nothing to prevent a
foundation to disclose data like who paid for what, of course – but to shift from a public,
relatively transparent institution like a municipal art museum to a semi-private (funds to
run MACRO’s Foundation would be mostly private) and largely opaque one, relying on the
fair play of boards and individuals, doesn’t seem to be a particularly clever idea.
Or is it, just maybe, too clever?