That's very cool. Last time I remember going through the Cleveland Museum, before it closed for renovation, in an area where they featured new gifts and acquisitions, they had a Kiki Smith that was given to the museum by Agnes Gund and her husband Daniel Shapiro. For those who only know the Gund name as a Foundation, or the former owners of the Cavs and now-Q, Aggie is one of the most knowing experts in art in the world, being President Emerita of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. I've known Aggie since I was a kid and know she has the best eye in art ever in any way associated to Cleveland, and much of the good modern art in the Cleveland Museum was given to us by Aggie, as well as Noguchi's "Portal" before the Justice Center downtown, so I was intrigued by the Kiki Smith - an image from Little Red Riding Hood. From the CMA website: " Kiki Smith is interested in feminist concerns and content, and her most recent work presents myths and fairy tales with subtle feminist revisions. Since 1999 Smith has been preoccupied with “Little Red Riding Hood,” a story which tells of a girl who takes food to her ailing grandmother. In the forest, the girl meets a wolf who, learning her purpose, rushes ahead and devours her grandmother. Little Red Riding Hood meets the same fate when she arrives at her grandmother’s cottage. Born illustrates the episode in which, in some versions of the tale, a hunter saves the girl and her grandmother by cutting open the wolf’s stomach. By representing Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother as standing upright in cloaks, and the wolf as a semicircle, Smith alludes to old master paintings depicting the Virgin Mary on a crescent moon. However, Smith rendered both females as self-portraits; thus, the scene also suggests many feminine apprehensions, from adolescent rites of passage to aging. Although best known as the sculptor whose three-dimensional constructions reintroduced the human figure as an important realm for artistic investigation and discovery, Smith also makes printmaking an integral part of her work."

That Kiki is focused on Little Red Riding Hood as a symbol of feminism fits Aggie Gund's social consciousness quite well... Aggie is one of the most progressive intellects on Earth, and a major supporter of progressive movements like Move On, and was a leader in the efforts to protect America and Ohio from George Bush, spending much time in Ohio campaigning for anyone but Bush during the last, disastrous presidential election Ohio painted red. I believe, in the past, Cleveland leaders' disrespect for this great woman's role in our community has alienated her, like we alienate Peter Lewis today, and that has deprived Clevelanders of great cultural assets and support. MoCA tapped into Aggie's world for help choosing an architect for their new museum, and that is a good sign of respect (so long as it isn't just a hollow gesture to tap into her bank account), but where we will really need Aggie's support in the years ahead is to make certain Ohio swings in the right direction in upcoming elections that will determine if America remains Red or goes True Blue once again, for the future. Ohio will be the key to America's future, and our two most important natives-now-departed, Aggie Gund and Peter Lewis, will be instrumental in funding political activism here against anything Bush, once again, and that is much more important than art and architecture, as important as they are. Thanks, Aggie, for all your efforts to make NEO True Blue, and giving Cleveland more great art, and teaching us about Kiki Smith and raising our social consciousness about feminism and human freedom.

At least a few of the other artwork given or loaned to the CMA by Agnes Gund:

Wrapped Chair | 1996.29 Christo   The City | 1991.30 Agnes Martin   Tour | 1991.28 Philip Guston   Plate Prop Roll | 1991.214 Richard Serra   Wrapped Wool Bales: Project for Keith Murdoch Court, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne | 1971.48 Christo   Man in a Brown Coat Visiting the Sick | 1977.48 Jim Dine   1989. A Portfolio of 11 Images Honoring Artists Lost to AIDS | 2000.161 Nan Goldin   Looking Along Broadway Towards Grace Church | 1991.27 Red Grooms   Giufa e la Statua de Gesso | 1991.29 Frank Stella   The Cleveland Indian (After Eakins) | 1998.179 R. B. Kitaj   Old Church | 1998.11 Hale Aspacio Woodruff   In Blue | 2005.140 Jim Hodges   Çatal Hüyük (level VI B) Shrine VI B.1 | 2001.126 Frank Stella   Born | 2004.34 Kiki Smith   Impala | 1983.68 Alex Katz Caprichos: There is Plenty to Suck | 1972.203 Francisco de Goya Turkeys | 1972.204 James McNeill Whistler Star of Persia I | 1972.92 Frank Stella Untitled | 1969.49 Larry Poons Calligraphic Study IV | 1976.128 Robert Motherwell White Mozart | 1988.26 Dorothea Rockburne Alien Huddle | 2002.65 Martin Puryear The Geldzahler Portfolio | 1998.306 Louise Bourgeois The River (State) | 2004.66 Ellsworth Kelly Cleveland Mural Drawing # 1, November 14, 2003 | 2005.63 Martin Kline

Really lovely and thought provoking... I'm sure our great industrialists and developers think of themselves just like that... big strong gods controlling the world... makes me think of the mansions around town with lions and cannons in their front yards... Hummers in the garages... WalMarts in their portfolios.  And great word of the day - fettering... I had to look it up...

Noun	1.	fetter - a shackle for the ankles or feet hobble hamper, shackle, trammels, trammel, bond - a restraint that confines or restricts freedom (especially something used to tie down or restrain a prisoner)
Verb	1.	fetter - restrain with fetters shackle handcuff, manacle, cuff - confine or restrain with or as if with manacles or handcuffs; "The police handcuffed the suspect at the scene of the crime" restrain, hold, confine - to close within bounds, limit or hold back from movement; "This holds the local until the express passengers change trains"; "About a dozen animals were held inside the stockade"; "The illegal immigrants were held at a detention center"; "The terrorists held the journalists for ransom"