Its first contemporary art curator Barton Kestle (trained by MoMA’s legendary Alfred Barr) was caught up in the anti-Communist rage of Senator Eugene McCarthy. Although Kestle was never formally accused, the stress of the investigations was clearly too much for him. One day Kestle walked out of the building, caught a train to Washington DC and was never seen again. Shortly after his disappearance Kestle’s office was boarded over to create a wall for a temporary exhibition and was forgotten. The hidden room was rediscovered in 2011 and the Institute decided to add it to its collection of period rooms. A perfectly preserved curatorial office from the 1950s has got to be a unique artifact. Too good to be true? It got us for a minute until we noticed a small label announcing the ‘office’ and the cover story were actually the creation of the American artist Mark Dion.
Image: Mark Dion, Office 2012-2013 collection Minneapolis Institute of Arts
