I was very pleased to learn that you will be testifying before a Senate committee on behalf of legislation to facilitate the flow of exhibitons of art treasures between foreign countries and the United States. As all of us who have been involved in the planning of such ventures know, the insuring of such works of art has become one of the real roadblocks in the way of bringing them to this country.

Special acts of Congress have been of invaluable help in connection with recent Chinese and Russian exhibits. A more general law would help make possible the increased flow of great art to this country in the years ahead.

The milee v

woperativ Applesenting eleven large midwestern universities, endorses the effort of Congress to find a solution to the problem.

Sincerely yours,

Frederickt Jackson

Frederick H. Jackson

Director

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Senator PELL. Thank you very much indeed.
Now, the final witness would be Mr. Wilder.

Mr. WILDER. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, thank you for permitting me to speak today.

I classify myself as a representative of smaller museums in the United States, and on behalf of the smaller, or let us say, intermediate museums, I wish to speak in support of the act, such as the described in the Senate bill 1800.

While small museums, such as the one I represent, have fewer occasions to require a very large insurance coverage, there is, nonetheless, a real need for aid to our institutions.

Compared to the very large museums we are smaller in physical facilities and budget, but this is compensated for by the numbers.

This intermediate group comprises approximately 19 percent of the art museums of the United States. This figure is somewhat misleading, however, for these museums share a far greater percentage of total museum attendance than the 19 percent would indicate. We receive a larger percentage of public support, and contribute more materially in terms of the art programs available to the American public.

They are responsible for many important exhibitions, both international and domestic, which they develop on their own initiative. However, they do cooperate closely with the larger museums, and for this reason would share any benefits resulting from an indemnity program on an international basis.

Conforming to the usual practice among museums when matters of dollar values arise, it is necessary to accept valuation stated by the owner as the amount of insurance which must be in force. There is no ready process whereby we, as the borrowing agency, can arbitrate the question of value of another museum's object of art. For example, in 1970, when organizing the exhibition of the far north-this is the exhibition referred to by George Seybolt, which was seen here in Washington at the National Gallery of Art, and elsewhere around the United States this exhibition focused upon the native arts of Alaska. The Amon Carter museum borrowed significantly from the classic collections in Leningrad. Insurance values were established by the Institute of Eethnography of the U.S.S.R. and the premium rate was set by Ingosstrakh, the Soviet agency which handles insurance matters involving the capitalist countries. This premium was paid directly to Ingosstrakh, although coverage by American underwriters was available at less than one-tenth of the quoted rate. Such expenses, particularly when accompanied by the request for courier escorts in transit, place a burden on the capabilities of the smaller museums.

However, the same conditions prevail when larger museums initiate projects, but the cost factor is passed on to the smaller institution, and is still to be reckoned with if they are to share in the opportunities provided by traveling exhibitions.

As has been pointed out, the aid of the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities has been vital to the conduct of international exchange at the very highest level. Without this assistance it is difficult to envision a solution to the complex financial problems which have accompanied these major projects.

However, when we appraise the effect which these programs have, then we may truly appreciate the impact of an art exhibition which moves out and beyond the audience in the metropolitan centers.

As an example, I would like to point out the 180,000 people who queued up at the Kimball Art Museum in Fort Worth for the presentation of the impressionist exhibition from the U.S.S.R. that was brought to this country, and was aided by the National Foundation for the Humanities. It prompts us to ask, What happens without Federal aid? Well, major projects do go forward, but not without some sacrifice, especially for smaller institutions.

As an example, the presently planned exhibition, Treasures from the Hermitage and the Russian State Museum, is to be presented in the Houston Museum of Fine Arts during the coming winter, after previous showings in Washington, New York, Detroit, and Los Angeles.

The director of the Houston Museum states that the first change in the Houston museum's free admission policy must be made at that time, due solely to the high insurance premium to which the museum is committed.

Another interesting observation comes from the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts. In 1967 that museum undertook an exhibition jointly with the Fort Worth Art Museum "Picasso Prints, Drawings and Sculpture." The resources of both museums were taxed to the limit at that time by the international insurance costs and the expense of courier escorts. Estimating the cost of such an exhibition today, the administration in the Dallas museum believes that it would be totally impossible to unndertake it without some commitment for financial aid, such as that envisioned by the Indemnity Act.

Unless we have the strong and effective support of an indemnity bill such as we discuss today, I foresee the gradual drying up of these most important exchanges between the museums of this Nation and of the world.

Thank you.

Senator PELL. Thank you very much indeed.

Do you happen to recall what the premium is that has to be paid for the exhibit you mentioned, the one in Houston, where they have to raise the entry fees?

Mr. WILDER. The estimate is $50,000 for the period it is in Houston. Senator PELL. And the insurance companies are going to be American insurance companies?

Mr. WILDER. This I do not know. I have nothing to do with the organization of this particular show.

Senator PELL. Each of you has been very actively involved in international exhibitions.

Would you hazard the thought that the actual cost of an exhibition, let us say, $5 million in value would probably be about $50,000 in premiums, would you have a feeling for it?

Mr. WILDER. It would be very difficult to say, because it would depend entirely on who was doing the underwriting; American, European, or in the case of the U.S.S.R., Iugosstrakn.

Mr. LEE. It depends also on the nature of the material, stone, glass, porcelain, paper, et cetera.

Senator PELL. Incidentally, Mr. Lee, both the points you mention are very valid, and we intend to handle them as we move ahead, if we move ahead with this legislation, and we want to move ahead.

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First, the certificate will be issued to the owner, not to the agent, or anything of that sort. And, second, you are quite right, the word “exhibition" should be put in lieu of "incident" and this is what was intended, and we will follow your counseling in that regard.

Thank you for those suggestions, indeed.

Before we go further, I would ask my colleague if he has any questions.

Represnetative LEHMAN. I would just think in terms of how much international art is already in this country, and I am trying to recall the Miami Art Center getting some Oriental art from the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and even though it came domestically, it was in a sense an international exhibit, and the insurance premiums on that have put a deficit on our art center in Miami, and they are still trying to recover from.

If you limit it to international, and I know it is a problem, that you are not going to get much Asian art from Asia. You are going to get a lot of Asian art from a lot of other museums in this country in my way of thinking.

I am just thinking out loud how you can really help in this kind of legislation without limiting it to just a transfer of art from country to country.

Mr. WILDER. I can speak to that as a smaller institution, certainly, because we are almost totally dependent upon intermuseum loans to maintain our programs, and the cost of domestic loans is a serious challenge to us, as indeed the international problem is to the larger museums who are organizing in the international field.

Representative LEHMAN. I was on the board of directors on the Miami Art Center before I came to Congress, and I remember when the director would come in with the estimate of the insurance costs, you know, the meeting would break up; and it really is a serious factor in bringing good art to outlying sections.

Mr. LEE. May I?

Senator PELL. Please.

Mr. LEE. There is one concrete thing that has been done, and is being done.

That is, through studies, facts and figures on insurance losses, and premiums have been gotten together by Professor Pfeffer, and there has been some lessening of rates on the part of the insurance people.

The second thing that should be done, in my judgment, is a rather massive education of American museum curators and directors in soul searching, so that they will recognize the fact that they cannot replace the work of art by getting its supposed market value back for it and, therefore, adjusting their valuation for insurance purposes accordingly.

Representative LEHMAN. We have more problems than the medical malpractice; do we not?

Thank you.

Senator PELL. In connection with the list of items to be included on the bottom of page 14, the top of page 15, of the bill, did you find that this listing as complete as it should be, do you have any suggestions in connection with it?

Mr. LEE. I wonder, Senator Pell, if it might be wise to have a phrase such as the one used in the arts and humanities legislation, consisting

of, but not limited to, something like that. That would make it a little more flexible.

I think it is very flexible, but if you want to provide for every contingency, that might be a way to do it.

Senator PELL. That is a suggestion which we will consider.

But in addition to that, would there be any other specific suggestion at this time?

Mr. WILDER. Senator Pell, artifacts and objects should be further specified, possibly, archaeological objects, because the archaeological collections are of many categories. They are all artifacts and objects, but it might be well to insert the word archaeological.

Senator PELL. I would think photographs should also be included. Would any of you find the $25,000 deductible figure either too high. or too low?

Miss SHISSLER. That seems sensible to me. I think even a small museum would be able to cope with that.

Senator PELL. In general, do you think they would act as their own insurers in this case?

Mr. LEE. I think they would almost have to act as their own insurers. Senator PELL. What is your thought about the legislation covering for-profit organizations as well?

For instance. I give you the example of Chase Manhattan Bank wanting to bring in some additional paintings from the Soviet Union. Should they be covered?

Mr. WILDER. Like Mr. Dillon, I think I would like to dwell on this a bit. I would like to study this further. I am not sure.

Senator PELL. Or Occidental Petroleum might want to bring over an exhibit. But basically I think we ought to keep this bill as narrow as we can. I would limit it to nonprofit.

How about the idea of placing a limit on the indemnity, top limit? What would be your idea of a horseback figure that we should have, because as of now one of the criticisms of this bill is it is open ended. I would like to ask each of you what the top limit should be. Mr. Dillon said he thought it ought to be somewhere in the $50 million to $100 million range.

Miss SHISSLER. I would certainly support Mr. Dillon's view. After all, he represents one of the largest museums in the country. He will probably be engaged in the largest scale exhibitions of that sort.

Senator PELL. I would like to get the figure down a little bit.

Mr. LEE. The figure has to be calculated against the acceptability of the figure to the Treasury.

The Chinese exhibition, the valuation, I believe, was $51 million. Most loan exhibitions run, that is major ones, run if there are paintings in that, in the area from five to 15 roughly.

But I think the kind of thing that Mr. Dillon was talking about with Metropolitan pictures in Russia is much higher than that.

So I would think $50 million might be a good figure to start with. Mr. WILDER. Senator Pell, I think the $50 million figure is probably reasonable.

In any event, under the terms as spelled out in the bill, I feel that there are ample safeguards here that it could not be abused. There are experts involved in placing these valuations, but bills should carry the maximum in order to carry any contingency.