UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

Interview #742
PANCZENKO, RUSSELL

PANCZENKO, Russell (1947- )
Director, Chazen Museum of Art
At UW: 1984-

Interviewed: 2006	
Interviewer: Robert Lange
Length: 6 hours, 4 minuets 

Family history; Ukrainian culture; Early education; Fairfield University; Teaching Latin; University of Florence; Dissertation; Williams College Museum of Art; Directorship of the Elvehjem [now Chazen] Museum of Art; Acquisitions; Departments of art and art history; Hollaender Collection; Relationships with collectors and donors; Fund-raising; Arts Consortium; Arts Institute; Changing museum name. 

NOTE: THIS INTERVIEW WAS RESTRICTED UNTIL 2015.

First Interview Session (January 9, 2006): Tapes 1-2

Tape 1/Side 1

00:00:40	Russell Panczenko was born in Germany in 1947.  His father, a Russian soldier, had been a prisoner of war.  His parents met at a displaced persons camp in Frille, Germany.

00:03:00	His father died a year after RP was born.  An uncle sponsored his mother’s application for immigration status from the US.  They moved to Pennsylvania in 1949.

00:06:15	His mother remarried and they moved to Connecticut in the early 1950s.

00:08:00	RP talks about the origins of his name.

00:12:25	He discusses being steeped in Ukrainian culture during his childhood and beyond.

00:17:25	His parents were uneducated.  He didn’t have any particular early interest in art.

00:21:10	RP describes his early education.  He attended a Catholic high school.  He read widely in ancient and medieval history and studied Latin.  In college he majored in classics.

00:25:35	He took his first art history course in his junior year at Fairfield University.

00:26:35	Passion for fencing.

00:29:10	He traveled to Europe with a group led by his art history professor.  He was fascinated by this professor’s cosmopolitan style.  RP took independent courses in art history.

00:31:15	End of side.

Tape 1/Side 2

00:31:25	Russell Panczenko relates taking a job as a high school Latin teacher after he graduated from college in 1969.  He also taught Greco-Roman mythology.  This job allowed him to get a deferment for the military draft.

00:35:30	He wanted to go back to Italy and applied to the University of Florence to pursue an Italian doctorate degree.  He describes this graduate education.

00:47:05	He graduated from the University of Florence in 1979.  RP describes his dissertation.

00:50:00	He talks about living in Florence.

00:51:55	RP returned to the US in 1979 and taught Latin at a private high school in Waterbury, Connecticut, while he searched for jobs in art history.  

00:54:40	He found a position as assistant director at the Williams College Museum of Art.  He talks about the director, Thomas Krens.

01:00:54	End of side.  End of tape.

Tape 2/Side 1

01:01:15	Russell Panczenko left the Williams College Museum of Art in 1983 to travel in Europe on an NEA professional development grant.

01:02:00	RP describes some colleagues he met at Williams, including Charles Parkhurst.  He talks about Williams being a major center of the arts community and the prominence of its alums, known as the “Williams mafia.”

01:07:35	He wanted to pursue a museum directorship elsewhere and came to the Elvehjem Museum at the University of Wisconsin in 1984.

01:09:25	RP describes his interview at UW.  He was called back for a second interview with Dean E. David Cronon of the College of Letters & Science and Chancellor Irving Shain. 

01:14:35	He talks about his knowledge of the Elvehjem before he came to Madison.

01:17:00	First impressions of Madison.

01:18:40	He married his wife, Paula, in 1981.  She started a non-profit arts exchange and was assistant director of the Wisconsin Arts Board.

01:21:15	RP describes his first year at the Elvehjem.  One of his first acts was to take carpets off the walls and make greater use of the building space.  Jim Watrous did not interfere.

01:28:20	He wanted to give greater order to the artwork in the Elvehjem collections.

01:29:15	Strengths of the collection when he arrived included the Japanese prints.  He thought the museum’s main weakness was in twentieth-century modernist works.

01:32:00	He wanted a new assistant director.

01:32:20	End of side.  

Tape 2/Side 2

01:32:25	Russell Panczenko continues to discuss his reorganization of personnel at the Elvehjem Museuem during his first year as director.

01:42:40	Dean E. David Cronon was very supportive of RP.  More generally, the support he has received from university administrators has been a key factor in his staying at the Elvehjem.

01:45:40	RP wanted to augment the museum’s twentieth-century collection.

01:47:35	He met with Alexander Hollaender, an art collector who donated works to the Elvehjem.

01:49:45	RP talks about the weakness of the art history department at UW when he arrived.  He describes some of the art faculty and their professional credibility.

01:54:10	He was appointed as an adjunct professor for five years.

01:54:40	He talks about the refashioning of the art history department.

01:59:10	RP describes colleagues in the art department.  Relationship with the art history department.
02:03:30	End of side.  End of tape.

Second Interview Session (January 12, 2006): Tapes 3-4

Tape 3/Side 1

00:00:35	Russell Panczenko discusses the difficulty of directing the Elvehjem Museum in a small and only moderately wealthy city such as Madison; there are few collectors in the city.  

00:03:10	He talks about Alexander Hollaender and the Hollaender Collection. 

00:9:55	RP reorganized the different museum galleries in order to accommodate the Hollaender Collection.  He brought a more philosophically ordered approach to the museum’s collections and galleries.

00:15:50	Consultation with art history faculty on acquisitions.

00:18:25	He talks about Arthur Frank, a collector of Greco-Roman coins, and another coin collector from Beaver Dam.

00:23:10	RP describes some other collectors.

00:31:10	End of side.

Tape 3/Side 2

00:31:15	Russell Panczenko continues to discuss his relationship with collectors.

00:36:15	The Fishmans collected German expressionist works.

00:40:20	He talks about managing acquisitions.

00:43:20	RP relates a story about dissident art from Russia.

00:49:00	Cleaning and preservation of the Davies Collection.

00:55:00	RP again discusses the issue of quality in acquisitions.

00:57:20	He describes his relationship with the collector Alvin Lane.

00:58:20	End of side.  End of tape.

Tape 4/Side 1

00:58:35	Russell Panczenko continues to describe meeting collector Alvin Lane.

01:01:00	RP describes the contents and acquisition of Lane’s collection.  He enlisted Donna Shalala to help acquire the collection, but this move backfired.

01:09:30	Lane allowed RP to put the collection on exhibit in 1995.  He talks about his relationship with Lane.

01:15:20	Lane promised the collection ca. 2000.  RP describes the conditions of the agreement and his relationship with Lane thereafter.

01:22:20	RP remains concerned that Lane may revoke the agreement; he talks about his efforts to prevent this.

01:29:40	End of side.

Tape 4/Side 2

01:29:50	Russell Panczenko speaks about other collectors with whom he has worked.

01:28:55	Chipstone Foundation, material culture, and associate professor Ann Smart Martin.

01:45:55	RP talks about the Garfields.

02:00:25	End of side.  End of tape.

Third Interview Session (January 25, 2006): Tapes 5-6

Tape 5/Side 1

00:00:15	Russell Panczenko continues to discuss his relationship with artists and collectors.  He describes John and Carolyn Peterson.

00:10:30	RP talks about acquiring a major work by Strozzi.

00:19:40	John and Carolyn Peterson Foundation.

00:23:00	RP relates a story about a benefactor who offered two million dollars to the Elvehjem.

00:27:50	The small size and demographic profile of the city of Madison poses challenges to building a collection for the museum.

00:29:25	RP describes the Elvehjem Council, which was a crucial social setting that brought together university administrators and the collecting community.

415	End of side.

Tape 5/Side 2

00:31:20	Russell Panczenko discusses the competition for funds between department chairs and the Elvehjem Council.

00:39:20	RP talks about the relationship between the Frautschi family and the museum.

00:44:10	Calls to potential donors.

00:46:10	Challenge of raising funds.

00:49:00	He talks about pruning the museum collection.

01:02:10	End of side.  End of tape.

Tape 6/Side 1

01:02:15	Russell Panczenko talks about the Van Vleck collection.

01:04:45	Disposal of paintings not fit for the collection.

Fourth Interview Session (February 28, 2006): Tape 6

Tape 6/Side 1, continued

01:06:40	RP comments on Chancellor John Wiley’s commitment to supporting the arts.  He talks about the need to develop a mechanism to raise funds through the UW Foundation.  An outside chancellor might be necessary to develop this mechanism.

01:14:50	General climate for visual arts on campus.  The university has not put much effort into the arts.  Reputation of the art and art history departments.

01:18:45	RP describes efforts to found the Arts Consortium.  He describes E. David Cronon’s leadership of the consortium.

01:22:00	Problems with establishing a school for the arts.

01:28:00	He comments on Tino Balio and the Arts Institute.

01:33:20	End of side.

Tape 6/Side 2

01:33:40	Russell Panczenko assesses students’ attitudes toward the arts.

01:37:20	He talks about changing the name of the museum from the Elvehjem to the Chazen Museum.

01:50:25	Relationship with the Chazens.

01:52:05	Criticism from The Capital Times.

01:56:50	The Elvehjem family supported the name change.

01:58:55	RP comments on the future of the Chazen Museum.

400	End of side.  End of tape.  End of interview.

END