The leasing-out of these 26 great works is especially disturbing when the MFA's current marquee exhibit is the work of a celebrity fashion photographer. As a member, I am alarmed at the poor decision-making that has led to this fallow period. 

Reminds me of the money lust that swept Brandeis into a scheme to sell donated masterpieces back in 2008-09.  

The answer then, and the answer now, for those who have proper regard for museums, is to make your influence felt ... for me that is non renewal of my family MfA annual membership.  The bean counters who have taken over much of our culture only respond to clear messages sent in the currency they understand.    Time for a facebook page 'Drop MfA Boston Membership Until Art Means More than Mo Money for Administrators and Their Shortcomings!'

Tell me again, please, why the MFA is non-profit?

Malcolm Rogers has reached his sell-by date. I wish the MFA's Board would divest him.

So this is why Boston has a museum? So visitors here have to go elsewhere to see its greatest works? One can understand an occasional loan, but this has reached a point where the museum is harmed.

Mr. Smee's front page article on the MFA's aggressive, perhaps even controversial, lending policy is indeed revealing. What it reveals to me, however, is that once again Malcolm Rogers has proven himself to be among the most, if not "the most," creative and dynamic museum directors anywhere and how fortunate the MFA and the greater Boston region is to have him here. There is no doubt that Mr. Smee is correct that visitors to the MFA finding these great works from the museum's collection missing are disappointed. There are, however, literally thousands of great works on display to be seen and wondered at, as well as works from the vast archives that are rarely hung. And it is unfortunate that students studying art don’t get the opportunity to learn from seeing some actual works that would otherwise have been available – though it is also true that the vast majority of the world’s great artworks are still seen and studied by viewing slides. The bottom line here though is the bottom line. We seem to forget the extraordinary accomplishments that Rogers has achieved in growing the MFA, not only in a physical way with the addition of its magnificent new wing, but even more importantly by expanding, indeed redefining the public’s sensibilities of what is “worthy” to be seen within the hallowed halls of Boston’s Museum of Fine Art. Before the 2002 Herb Ritz exhibit, the current showing of Mario Testino’s fashion photographs would have been deemed unworthy as was the extremely popular show in 2005 that brought 16 of fashion designer Ralph Lauren’s magnificent cars to the galleries, and by doing so, he has expanded its audience, grown its attendance, membership, increased its gifts and endowment – while diminishing the institution’s perception as being effete, reserved only for the elite but rather welcoming to all – with a vast array of programs directed at nearly every constituency one can think of – from kids and families to young adults exemplified by its First Friday’s gatherings and acoustic rock and roll sessions. So yes, Malcolm Roger’s (and the MFA’s Board of Directors) can be criticized for temporarily lending and/or (heaven forbid) renting some of its most prized works for money, and it seems a fair criticism to point out that circumstantially too many are “MIA” simultaneously, I would defy Mr. Smee and the varied critics of Mr. Roger’s decision on this issue to look at his many mandates and budget requirements and find a director of any major museum in the world who, as a whole, over an 18 year tenure has done equally well for her/his museum.

Kudos to Sebastian Smee for reporting on this pretty deplorable situation.  Of course, it is not simly Malcolm Rogers who should be focused on, but the MFA's Board of Trustees, who are responsible ultimately for this practice.  In that connection, one thing not emphasized enough in the article in my opinion is the riskiness of what the MFA is doing.  Right now, unless legal authorities respond, this public exposure is unlikely to lead to any change, but come the day (which, alas, seems inevitable in this world we live in) that one of the museum's priceless masterpieces is lost because of a plane crash, a natural disaster, or other circumstance (including theft from a foreign museum), then perhaps at last the Museum's trustees and its director will regret what they have done.   Then they may understand that the drive for revenue was simply not worth risking a painting like the great Gauguin--which, if lost, can never be replaced.  I wonder if the Trustees and Mr. Rogers have thought about what they will say when something like this happens.

This article should have been placed within the context of a bigger-picture article: how desperately the MFA needs funds.  The alternatives are, as the article doesn't point until near the end, either cutting staff or raising admission prices.  Smee's article, instead, could easily be interpreted as the MFA being an uncaring, well-to-do museum trying to get fat off of its holdings.  My take is just the opposite.  Plus Smee seems to side with the local art history professors who whine about certain pieces not always being at the MFA becuase it upsets their courses.  Isn't that just a lot of self interest at play there?  Sure, as someone who visits a few times a year, seeing certain paintings is like running into old friends (always love that).  But at the same time, the museum has a finite space, and unless the MFA empties warehouse (if possible) and displays its collection within its halls and galleries, new pieces can't be displayed unless others are removed.  As interesting and as important as this article was  (certainly not a subject the MFA could be counted on to write about in its newsletter), I wish this article as had seen the glass as half full instead of half empty -- as a shout out to the public and the MFA's well-heeled benefactors to donate more.