Robert Flynn Johnson on Collecting Edgar Degas, Museum Ethics, and the Art World's Soul

Robert Flynn Johnson spent 32 years building the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts into one of America's great print and drawing collections — all while quietly assembling a world-class private collection of Edgar Degas works on paper on a curator's salary. In this wide-ranging conversation, Johnson reflects on discovering Degas "below the radar" in 1976 for a few thousand dollars, the heartbreak and hustle of acquiring his most prized drawing, and why he's now selling the collection he spent a lifetime building. But Johnson doesn't stop there. He takes sharp aim at museums cannibalizing their own legacies — from the Phillips Collection selling a Seurat masterwork to fund video art, to the Pennsylvania Academy parting with their only great Edward Hopper — arguing that trustees who treat permanent collections as casino chips are violating an unspoken Hippocratic oath. Equal parts memoir, manifesto, and love letter to the human condition in art, this conversation is essential listening for anyone who cares about what museums are for.