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Wednesday, February 13, 2002

By Caroline Abels and Mary Thomas, Post-Gazette Staff Writers

The Pittsburgh Center for the Arts has laid off its curator of exhibitions and suspended its exhibition program indefinitely.

Vicky A. Clark, who has curated contemporary art exhibits at the center since 1996, was let go Monday as part of a cost-cutting strategy designed to stave off a significant cash shortfall faced by the center. Another member of the three-person exhibitions department also was laid off, and a third resigned recently for personal reasons.

The center has canceled the curated exhibitions it had planned for May and beyond, including the 2002 Pittsburgh Biennial. However, exhibitions by the center's artist guilds will continue, and the Artist of the Year show is expected to take place around Christmas.

"This is a sad day for Pittsburgh art and artists, and for me personally," Clark said yesterday, declining to discuss the issues behind her departure. "It's been a great six-year run."

According to PCA executive director Laura Willumsen, the center experienced a drop in donations last fall and a shortfall in revenue from fall class registration. Willumsen attributed the disappointing numbers to the economic fallout from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks: The PCA's primary fund-raising campaign was to kick off on Sept. 11, and that week also was the final week of fall class registration.

To date, the center has raised only a third of what it expected to raise during the fall portion of its fund-raising campaign.

"I don't think it's that the donors or students no longer cared about the organization, but that lots of circumstances got in the way," Willumsen said.

The closing of the exhibitions department will save the PCA $350,000, Willumsen said. She declined to disclose the amount of the projected cash shortfall but said some of it has already been made up by staff cuts in the marketing department and the gift shop that were made in the fall and that totaled $100,000.

Willumsen said she regretted also having to eliminate the exhibitions staff. Volunteers will be recruited to help mount the guild shows.

"We've cut everywhere we can, and there aren't a lot of places left," she said. "I needed to act now because we were making exhibition commitments for next year, and we needed some time to get our financial situation in order."

Ian James, president of the PCA board, said Clark's departure "shouldn't be construed as any criticism of her."

"The sad fact is, as exhibitions have become more high-profile and more expensive, our ability to support them has declined. ... We had to make a decision between choosing to support programs with broad appeal that give back to the community or preserving something that very few people are really going to enjoy or get the benefit of."

James said that curated exhibitions will return in the future if there is enough money for them.

Robert Raczka, an associate professor of art at Allegheny College, was co-curating the 2002 Pittsburgh Biennial with Clark before it was canceled. He said yesterday that Clark's departure came as a surprise to him, and that it's a "terrible shame" that Pittsburgh is losing her curatorial influence.

"Many of the finest Pittsburgh artists were presented in important, meaningful exhibitions that included national and international artists," Raczka said.

Caroline Abels can be reached at cabels@post-gazette.com.