Museums find their footing post-outbreak 

By: Jon Winkler 

Earlier this month, the Concord Museum announced its reopening to the public in a big way.

The museum welcomed U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan and state Rep. Tami Gouveia on Aug. 5 to tour the “Beyond Midnight: Paul Revere and His Ride” exhibit.

It was also a moment of appreciation after the museum received a $400,000 federal grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities in April.

“The last time I was here, there were some students from my hometown of Lowell who were taking in the exhibits of this beautiful building,” Trahan said at the event. “I don’t think that there is a time in our country’s history where it’s been validated more for the importance of teaching people history. Maybe science is rivaling that right now.”

Trahan had a bit of a chuckle with that last statement, acknowledging the still-prevalent coronavirus pandemic that has shuttered numerous community art institutes.

Museums have not been exempt from that group, as some facilities have had to close down temporarily to follow state measures and others have yet to reopen.

Tom Putnam, executive director of Concord Museum, said his facility had been closed since March 12 and relying on a Paycheck Protection Plan loan and an “extraordinary outpouring of support” from donors to keep the museum running. Thanks to that help, Putnam said the museum hasn’t had to lay off any of its full-time staff in the five months it was closed.

Putnam said that when Gov. Charlie Baker “gave us the green light to reopen, we waited a couple of weeks to see how things were going with other museums.”

“We set up our protocols with timed ticketing, only letting 10 people in per hour and the one-way flow. When I came down here, people had already bought tickets,” he added.

Concord Museum could be considered one of the lucky outlets during the pandemic.

Sara Bogosian, president and executive director of Whistler House Museum of Art, said on Monday that the Lowell location has been closed since March 14 and has yet to reopen.

Bogosian said it would be difficult to reopen at the moment because the museum’s rooms aren’t large enough for visitors to socially distance. She hopes to reopen the museum in the fall, depending on how the state is handling the current state of the pandemic.

“We’ve been doing OK financially, but the pandemic has impacted us,” Bogosian said. “We had to cancel our youth summer arts program, which is a big deal. We recently opened a gift shop on our website and have tried to keep in touch with our artists. A lot of them are really having trouble.”

Some museums had shorter closures than others but still faced trouble.

Kara Fossey, executive director of Fort Devens Museum, said her facility had been closed from mid-March to early July. Despite reopening, the museum is under “strict maximum occupancy guidelines,” which has caused a decrease in attendance, sales and donations during the museum’s typically busy summer season.

Fossey added that it also led to the cancellation of multiple summer events, including its annual Armed Forces Day Open House and its summer Living History Weekend.

“We deeply feel the absence of our visitors, who are the backbone of our organization,” Fossey said. “They are the ones who bring us photographs, artifacts and memories. Without them, the museum doesn’t expand, the Fort Devens story doesn’t grow, and the legacies of the men and women who trained, worked and lived here aren’t celebrated.”

Fitchburg Art Museum also closed in mid-March and reopened to the public on July 22. Susan Roetzer, president of the museum’s board of trustees, said the facility has been “very lucky” to be financially supported by multiple nonprofit organizations, including the Barr-Klarman Massachusetts Arts Initiative, that have supported other art institutes impacted by the pandemic. That assistance has allowed the museum to keep its entire staff employed and cover operating expenses.

“We serve a population that is financially challenged, so we chose to offer online art activities,” Roetzer said. “A lot of this has been done on the fly, and the staff has done a great job making programs. We’re planning on having lectures and allowing free admissions through September. We’ll be using that time to create a social-distancing method and adjust to having shut down our hands-on activities.”

Westford Museum, though it’s only open most Sunday afternoons from 2 to 4 p.m., also had to close its doors in March. Linda Greene, director of the museum, said the facility is expected to reopen on Aug. 30. Of course, reopening comes with changes, including visitors only allowed to preschedule tours through the museum’s website. Still, Greene acknowledged the struggle of losing visitor support.

“We count on donations,” she added. “Visitor donations are a large part of our revenue, and we haven’t gotten that. We’ve still asked for donations and so forth, but we haven’t received anything substantial.”

Fruitlands Museum in Harvard could be considered one of the lucky ones. Michael Busack, director of the museum, said that the facility briefly closed in March and started a phased reopening plan on May 6. Busack said that the plan started with allowing visitors to come on a timed-ticketing basis, then offering pop-up versions of the museum’s cafe and gift shop that could both provide contactless service to visitors. The museum is now planning to reopen its indoor gallery spaces for art exhibitions by this Labor Day.

But even before reopening, Fruitlands offered a means to stay connected with its customers by live-streaming the grounds’ famous sunsets on the museum’s website.

“We saw all of these beautiful experiences from that, like people picnicking in their living rooms with the live-stream on in the background,” Buscak added. “We’re a strong organization and are super nimble. As things are changing, we’re constantly pivoting and switching operations to meet those changes.”

Numerous museums and other cultural institutes are stuck in varying degrees of difficulty from the pandemic. As Fitchurg’s Roetzer added, it’s hard not to feel for the struggling organizations.

“We have a lot of empathy for other members of art cohorts, especially theater groups reliant on annual earnings,” she said.