How a Museum Learned to Collect the Future

Of Centennials and Modern Visions: An Unexpected Partnership

Walk through the grand neoclassical facade of the Philadelphia Museum of Art—a building itself conceived as a temple to artistic tradition—and you'll encounter a fish lamp crafted from cardboard and whimsy, a chess set designed by a Surrealist master, and a toilet elevated to artistic statement. This seemingly paradoxical marriage of historical architecture and progressive design forms the central narrative of Kathryn Bloom Hiesinger's seminal work, Collecting Modern: Design at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Since 1876. For over three decades, Hiesinger served as a curator at the museum, spearheading its efforts to document and acquire significant examples of contemporary design ⁶ .

The Philadelphia Museum of Art's neoclassical building provides a striking contrast to its modern design collections.

Modern design pieces like this challenge traditional boundaries between art and functionality.

The Philadelphia Museum of Art itself emerged from the 1876 Centennial Exposition with a practical mission: to improve industrial design through education, modeling itself after London's South Kensington Museum (now the Victoria & Albert Museum) ⁷ . Yet, as Hiesinger meticulously documents, this historically conservative institution would gradually transform into a renowned repository of avant-garde design, building bridges between Philadelphia's rich craft traditions and the cutting edge of modern form. Her book reveals how, starting from its late 19th-century origins, the museum consistently acquired important examples of contemporary design and decorative arts, tracking Philadelphia's gradual embrace of modernism through more than 300 color photographs of its impressive collection ⁶ .

Through Hiesinger's research, we witness how a museum founded to teach craftsmanship to industrial laborers became the home for luminous vases by Louis Comfort Tiffany, organic chairs by Charles and Ray Eames, and a decidedly anti-establishment fish lamp by Frank Gehry ⁶ . This article will explore the key concepts, historical turning points, and methodological innovations that Hiesinger identified in the museum's century-long journey to embrace the modern.

The Radical Idea: Collecting the Contemporary

Perhaps the most telling example of the museum's evolving philosophy is its embrace of Marcel Duchamp's work. The PMA now houses the world's most extensive display of Duchamp's works, including his enigmatic last piece, Étant donnés, permanently installed in 1954 ⁴ . This commitment to an artist who consistently challenged conventional definitions of art demonstrates how profoundly the institution had transformed from its craft-oriented origins.

The Experimental Phase: A Case Study in Provenance Research

Methodology: Tracing Object Histories as Scientific Inquiry

One of the most rigorous methodological frameworks that Hiesinger would have employed—and which the museum continues to practice—is provenance research. This systematic investigation into the ownership history of artworks functions much like a scientific experiment, with clearly defined procedures, hypotheses, and analytical outcomes. Recent years have seen increased attention to this process, particularly regarding works that changed hands during World War II ¹ .

The museum describes provenance research as "an essential component of museum practice" that sheds light on an artwork's "historical, social, and economic context" ¹ . For Hiesinger's study of modern design, this methodology would have been crucial to establishing not just authenticity and legal title, but also the cultural pathways through which modernism entered museum collections.

Equally revealing has been research into works deemed "degenerate" by the Nazi government. The museum discovered that works like Piet Mondrian's Composition with Blue and El Lissitzky's Proun 2 were confiscated from German museums in the 1930s, not because they belonged to persecuted individuals, but because the Nazi government denounced modernist art as "degenerate" ¹ . These works were often sold abroad to raise foreign currency, entering the international art market and eventually reaching American museums like Philadelphia's.

The Scientist's Toolkit: Curatorial Research Methods

Building on the methodological approach to provenance research, Hiesinger's work exemplifies the broader "curatorial toolkit" required for documenting and analyzing modern design. These specialized approaches transform the curator into both detective and scientist, applying rigorous techniques to understand and authenticate collections.

The Evolution of a Collection: A Timeline of Modern Design at PMA

Hiesinger's research documents how the museum's design collection evolved in response to both changing artistic movements and institutional priorities. This chronological development reveals patterns in how the museum gradually expanded its definition of what constituted "collectible" design.

Early Industrial Focus

The museum's initial collections emphasized craftsmanship and industrial design improvement.

Contemporary Conceptual Works

Recent acquisitions demonstrate the museum's embrace of conceptual and boundary-pushing design.

The Enduring Legacy: From Historical Collection to Living Tradition

Kathryn Hiesinger's Collecting Modern ultimately reveals how the Philadelphia Museum of Art transitioned from an institution focused primarily on historical preservation to one that engages with design as a living, evolving discipline. The museum's willingness to acquire and exhibit contemporary design—even when it challenged conventional aesthetics—represents a commitment to the idea that museums should not merely preserve the past but also document the present and help shape future understandings of our material world.

By treating design not as a static category but as a dynamic field of human creativity, the museum has transformed itself from a temple of tradition into a laboratory for understanding how objects shape, and are shaped by, the contemporary world.

Collecting Modern: Design at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Since 1876 stands as both a record of this transformative journey and a contribution to the very tradition it documents—a meta-collection of ideas about how we assign value to the objects that define our times.