Portland Museum of Art hangs its future on fate of neighboring building

People walk into the Portland Museum of Art in Portland on Thursday. To the left is the former Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine, which the PMA purchased in 2019 and hopes to tear down and replace with a modern building. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

At the start of 2020, the Portland Museum of Art was looking forward to a good year.

More than 175,000 people came through the doors in 2019. The staff was preparing for a traveling exhibition of works by Winslow Homer and Frederic Remington in partnership with museums in Colorado and Texas. They hoped the museum would surpass 200,000 visitors and set a new attendance record.

We all know what happened next.

“We really have been working since that moment to get back to that new threshold. … We are increasing attendance each year, but nowhere to the level that we’d like to see or what actually is sustainable for our economic plan,” museum director Mark Bessire said this month. “If we’re going to do that, we’ve got to have folks in the building.”

He’s not just talking about the existing buildings.

The Portland Museum of Art has been planning to expand its downtown campus for years. In the wake of COVID-19, that project has become a life raft.

Leaders launched a $100 million capital campaign and unveiled a design for a sweeping addition, made of timber and glass, on Free Street. It would more than double the museum’s footprint with free galleries, performance space, a photography center and a rooftop terrace. They predicted it would not only restore the number of visitors, but also nearly double it by 2027.

That strategy might prove to be flawed, however.

The plan hinges on tearing down the former Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine. The Portland Museum of Art is seeking to remove a historic classification that protects the building from demolition. Two city boards have already said the historic preservation ordinance doesn’t allow such a change. The Portland City Council will have the final say on May 6.

The debate has been divisive.

“We didn’t want to be in this fight with the museum,” said Carol De Tine, board vice president at Greater Portland Landmarks, which has spearheaded the opposition. “We didn’t go looking for it, and no one, including the City Council, wants to deny the Portland Museum of Art their request, but we’ve all been put in this awkward place of having to do so. We have an ordinance they have to follow. They’re asking the council to ignore its own ordinance. They think the rules shouldn’t apply to them.”

The museum argues that the ordinance leaves room for interpretation and should allow the change. Its leaders have been reluctant to publicly discuss their alternatives if they fail. Meanwhile, the museum laid off 13 people this winter, citing financial strain.

“Most other cities would be embracing an opportunity like this,” Bessire said. “There’ll be an opportunity lost. I think that’s what the whole city will have to respond to.”

Portland Museum of Art director Mark Bessire stands in the Payson Wing of the building in 2021. Ben McCanna/Staff Photographer, file

PAYING THE BILLS

On paper, the state’s largest art museum seems to be in a good place.

Tax filings for 2022, the most recent year available, show total revenue of $21.8 million and total expenses of $10.5 million. The net that year was a staggering $11.6 million, more than double the number reported in 2018. Despite a dip during the pandemic, annual revenue increased by nearly $10 million, or 75%, from 2018 to 2022. Expenses also went up, but the increase was not as steep: slightly more than $3 million, or 46%. That growth seems incongruous with the financial pressures cited as the reason for layoffs this February.

Museum leaders say those top-line numbers don’t tell the whole story.

The Portland Museum of Art received $28.6 million in contributions and pledges in 2022. Nearly 91% – $26 million – came with donor restrictions. For example, a major gift of nearly $1 million was earmarked only for future art acquisitions and care for the collection. Another nearly $16 million was dedicated exclusively to the capital campaign. By comparison, unrestricted donations and revenue from membership, admissions and sales totaled $3.7 million. The museum says those restrictions leave less flexibility when balancing the budget.

Chief Financial Officer Andrew Smaha said the museum will also spend the last of the $3.4 million it received from pandemic-related funding this year. That money has paid for new positions and digital technology, among other costs.

“When that money expires, how do you pay the bills?” Smaha said. “How do you present a balanced plan that includes tickets and attendance and fundraising and everything coming in and everything coming out and recognizing that, without that pandemic-era funding, there’s a gap that you have to fill and prepare for?”

Bessire also took a voluntary pay cut of 20% in 2024; his current salary is $353,300.

A concept design that led the Portland Museum of Art to chose Lever Architecture for its expansion. In this rendering, the former children’s museum is replaced with a building made of timber and glass. Image by Lever Architecture, courtesy of Portland Museum of Art and Dovetail Design Strategists

The museum has set an ambitious $100 million goal for its capital campaign under the name “The PMA Blueprint.” About $40 million has been raised so far, mostly in endowment. The museum initially estimated that construction alone would cost $45 million, although that number has not been finalized. Some money from the campaign would be dedicated to operating the new building, which could help avoid the pitfalls that led to this winter’s layoffs. The building would also generate new revenue from rentals of a 255-seat auditorium and a rooftop deck.

“We obviously are going to need a much higher budget just to operate,” Smaha said. “Our goal is for hiring and staffing and programming and utilities and expenses and all of that. By incorporating an endowment target in this $100 million in this fundraising campaign, it allows us to open the doors and be able to operate without needing more money and being in serious debt.”

WOULD IT WORK?

In 2023, 115,411 people visited the Portland Museum of Art. That’s nearly 35% less than the 176,699 people who visited in 2019.

Those numbers are consistent with the national trend. The American Alliance of Museums conducted a survey of more than 300 museums of all types in early 2023 that showed two-thirds were still seeing lower attendance than before the pandemic.

The alliance doesn’t comment on the activities of a specific museum and couldn’t say whether the museum’s projections for visitation are attainable. But spokesperson Natanya Khashan said the museums that have strong relationships in their communities have fared the best since the pandemic.

“We’re also seeing museums who have a deep reach and connection and service to their communities are also recovering well, because they are still impacted but a little bit less so by the fluctuations in things like tourism and downtown changes,” she said.

That mission is the focus of Remuseum, an independent research project that aims to document and support innovation in American art museums. Founding director Stephen Reily, who is based in Kentucky, is studying a shift he has witnessed in the field. Art museums used to see their primary mission as preserving objects, he said, but now say their top priority is to serve the public. (This is also true at the Portland Museum of Art, where the mission statement is “art for all.”)

Reily isn’t involved with the expansion at the Portland Museum of Art, but he’s heard about it. His impression as an observer was that the community had a greater role in the concept design than he had seen in other places.

“The way they’ve approached it in the practice is quite different,” he said. “From the inside, often it’s driven by, ‘Well, we need to grow gallery space so someone will give us a collection,’ or ‘We’ve got donors who are ready to name things and want to see a bigger museum.’ And I say this sometimes, sort of half-jokingly, that in the past, I had never heard of a community that was demanding a larger museum.”

He couldn’t say whether the planned expansion would deliver the results predicted by the Portland Museum of Art.

“I’m bullish on museums in the sense that I believe if they work hard to find ways to be more relevant to more people, they will find the support,” he said. “Institutions that tend to serve and engage big chunks of the public tend to be able to find the support they need to be run.”

Visitors to the Portland Museum of Art in 2021 explore the exhibition “Untitled 2020,” including stained-and-varnished wood sculptures by Steve Bartlett. Ben McCanna/Staff Photographer, file

Museum board President Cyrus Hagge said in an email that the growth projections are consistent with other museums their size opening a new wing.

“We haven’t expanded our campus for 40 years and have more than outgrown our footprint both in visitors and for our world-class art collection,” Hagge wrote. “It’s astounding to have this caliber museum, right here in Maine in the heart of the arts district and on Congress Square. The risk is not expanding and retrenching. It’s time to envision the next great era in PMA history, one sparked through new, world-famous collections and an architecturally innovative campus. This new wing will support the museum for generations to come and will be a new landmark for the future.”

In a recent op-ed in the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, a former director of the Portland Museum of Art challenged the current plan. Daniel O’Leary came to the museum in 1993 and worked there for more than 14 years. In an interview, he said he is concerned the museum will not be able to afford the building it has planned and should focus on renovating the existing one instead.

“The hypothesis that a large expansion, a rooftop café and vague speculations about partnerships with community organizations will lift the PMA out of a pattern of financial underperformance is dubious and untrustworthy,” O’Leary wrote in the op-ed.

DESIGNS TO DEMOLISH

In 2019, the Portland Museum of Art bought the neighboring Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine for $2.1 million. Bessire said the museum knew that 142 Free St. was considered “contributing” to the surrounding Congress Street Historic District and therefore could not be demolished. He said that the Portland Museum of Art talked with city staff about that status before launching the design competition for the new building in June 2022.

“We did go to the city, and we were given advice exactly how to follow this process,” he said. “And we have done exactly what the city told us since the beginning.”

Bessire said he did not want to elaborate on the advice received at that time and that questions should be directed to the city.

Kevin Kraft, deputy director of planning and urban development, said the museum approached the planning department to ask what steps they would need to follow to demolish the “contributing” building at 142 Free St. The staff outlined two paths.

The museum could apply to change the building status from “contributing” to “noncontributing,” a process that is dictated by the city’s historic preservation ordinance. In the past 20 years, Kraft said such a change has only happened twice. In 2012, the City Council found that a vacant house on Brackett Street should be “noncontributing” because it lacked integrity of design and condition; that demolition made way for a mixed-use development. And in 2020, the City Council decided to reclassify a dilapidated house on Spruce Street because the structure lacked integrity and because of the level of alteration to historic features; a new home stands there today.

The museum could also apply for a certificate of economic hardship, which says the building is deteriorated beyond repair. Kraft was not aware of any application for a certificate of economic hardship in the past 20 years.

The museum appeared to proceeded with its design competition as though demolition was not an obstacle.

A rendering of Lever Architecture’s concept for the Portland Museum of Art expansion. Image courtesy of Lever Architecture

It described 142 Free St. as the site for a “new, contemporary, multi-use building.” On a list of features that should be included in the submitted design were administrative offices, a commercial-grade kitchen, a rooftop restaurant and sculpture park, a gift shop, gallery and event space, performance space, and a photography center.

The contest materials only briefly mentioned the former Children’s Museum and Theatre and the surrounding Congress Street Historic District. It did not give any direction as to what should happen to the existing building or say anything about its contributing status. The document included aerial photos of the current campus, as well as a map that identified the “developable site” with a red block over 142 Free St.

None of the four finalists kept the current building in their design; one preserved the façade only. Hagge said in an email that the “contributing” status “was clear to the four finalists of the competition who all visited Portland and toured the building.” De Tine said one finalist contacted Greater Portland Landmarks to ask about the building; that candidate was the one that would have kept the front columns.

RARE OPPORTUNITY OR BAD PRECEDENT?

So far, both the Historic Preservation Board and the Planning Board have recommended against the change to “noncontributing” status.

Museum leaders, city officials, board members and attorneys have debated exactly what criteria should inform the eventual decision on the application. Ultimately, both boards took a narrow view of the historic preservation ordinance. The discussion has been focused not only on those specific criteria but also on the broader implications of this moment.

Opponents have warned the city that approving the application and subsequent demolition would set a negative precedent and weaken the historic preservation ordinance.

“We really don’t know what will come next, but we do know that there will be other people, if this is approved or the museum is allowed to demolish that building, there will be developers and other organizations coming forward and saying, ‘What we want to do here is better than what is here, so you should let us take it down,’ ” said De Tine.

The museum says that fear is unfounded.

“It’s the museum that’s coming forth, which is a nonprofit organization, and it’s a unique opportunity where this building is right next to an existing nonprofit museum,” Bessire said. “It would be unlikely that any other organization would come with this kind of request that is actually a building for the community. … If you look at what we’re asking and the organization that’s asking – we’re stewarding three historic buildings, and we’ve been taking care of the Winslow Homer studio, and this is what we do – and we’re making a request that adds a building that brings all these buildings together facing Congress Square for the future. We are a pretty unique situation.”

The museum has said that it would be willing to put a safeguard in place that says it could not demolish the existing building unless it plans to build the expansion.

“I have faith in the process,” Bessire said.