One of Seattle’s most popular modern art museums has been forced to apologise for a planned exhibition featuring the work of Amazon and Microsoft employees.
Last week, the Museum of Museums (MoM) advertised the “Amazon v Microsoft” exhibition as a showcase of work that would “highlight and underline” unknown artists working in big tech.
“Collectively, Amazon and Microsoft employ over 1.5 million people,” the arts centre wrote in an Instagram post featuring a drawing of founders Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates wearing boxing gloves.
“Alongside the extreme wealth that often defines these two companies, we believe there is an alternative and equally impressive wealth of artistic talent within their ranks,” continued the MoM.
It said the exhibition – which has since been cancelled, as Geekwire first reported – would also “recalibrate the narrative around what a tech worker is”.
It would also potentially have seen submissions from lower and upper ranks of Amazon and Microsoft, all of whom were invited to submit pieces of artwork before a 20 August deadline.
However, following backlash from Seattle’s arts and creative community, the MoM decided to cancel the exhibition altogether and apologised on Tuesday.
Greg Lundgren, the gallery’s founder and director, said on Instagram that he regretted “not sharing the context, the backstory, or the motivation behind this exhibit – I knew it was a hot button to push and I believed art was the right vehicle for such a conversation. “
“My sincere apologies to anyone I have offended or caused harm,” he continued. “And my sincere apology to the artists we are currently exhibiting – they do not deserve the fallout from my failed attempt to bring two groups together.”
The MoM director also touched on some of the criticism aired on Instagram by social media users, artists and creatives, who pointed out that some of Amazon’s lowest paid employees “aren’t going to have time to apply to your show, let alone the resources to make the art.”
“The rest of us are just barely scraping by here (if we are lucky) and tech is a huge contributor to that,” the same Instagram user added. “I’m so frustrated that a space with such potential to offer voice to real Seattle community has decided to go this route.”
Another wrote: “This is gross and responses are weird, ‘if we give THEM a platform maybe they’ll help US and we can start a dialog’, the dialog already exists and these corporations aren’t interested”.
Mr Lundgren added in his apology: “This is the right time to turn up the volume on the conversation around art, wealth and the future cultural landscape of our city. I believe that. But from the weekend’s reaction to our call for artists, I heard loud and clear that this was not the way to have this conversation and that the big tech should not be viewed as the underwriters of our future health and vibrancy.”
The gallery, which was founded in 2000, says in a message on its website that its mission is “to increase the artist population of Seattle and inspire our local arts ecosystem through exhibition, education, and conversation about the role of the artist, philanthropist and collector.”
Seattle, which is home to Amazon’s ‘Three Spheres’ headquarters and Microsoft’s Redmond campus, has thousands of people employed in big tech. The founders of both companies are meanwhile among the world’s richest people.
