Louis Brandeis’s ex-niece has sent out an open letter to Jehuda and the administration. She quotes Louis Brandeis to show that in his work building the University of Louisville, he absolutely considered an art museum essential.
Second. The beginning of an art collection. Living among things of beauty is a help toward culture and the life worthwhile. But the function of a university in respect to the fine arts is not limited to promoting understanding and appreciation. It should strive to awaken the slumbering creative instinct, to encourage its exercise and development, to stimulate production. …
Here’s Michael Rush reading out the whole of her letter:
The conclusion:
I hope the above makes apparent, by assessing the art collection as merely a disposable financial asset rather than as the culturally and intellectually valuable ensemble that it is, your university’s trustees and your administration have proposed to act not only without full appreciation of core objectives of any university, but against those that Justice Brandeis himself most actively fostered. I therefore urge you to abandon any plans of selling any portion whatsoever of the art collection of the Rose Museum, or of diminishing its role.
Louis Brandeis would be ashamed of any University selling art in his name. What a sad sight.