Judith Dobrzynski and Lee Rosenbaum get into it a little bit over Frank Robinson's NYT letter to the editor, and Robinson chimes in to clarify that his "central point" was that it's "important" that "museum people" "understand" and "respond" to the view (held not by him but "some people") that "this is not the time to provide support to museums, especially when it means people might lose part of their pensions, or have basic city services cut." I have to say I didn't come away from it with that as the central point; I read him as posing an "agonizing" question -- namely, how do museums justify choosing art over "basic services"? (Which I assume is why the Times singled his letter out as an "invitation to dialogue.") But I'm happy for the clarification.
UPDATE: Christopher Knight reads Robinson's letter the way Dobrzynski did.
