To the Editors:
Re: “The Whitney’s New Graves,” by Hilton Kramer (September, 1985).

I am writing in this matter not as a disinterested party. First as a trustee of the Whitney Museum of American Art and second as a member of the National Council on the Arts on which I serve together with The New Criterion’s publisher, Mr. Samuel Lipman.

In the latter capacity I share many of the same principles and objectives of Mr. Lipman and his colleagues at The New Criterion as well as fellow appointees to the National Council. Foremost among these is a dedication to excellence in the arts and high standards of purpose and professionalism.

For that reason it concerns me when I find an extensive critique that belies these standards by the editor of a journal which so scrupulously exacts them from others. Needless to say, my own involvement with the Whitney will make my comments suspect. But, perhaps because I am so closely informed I am better able to perceive the lack of background work or scholarly balance brought to the subject at hand.

Mr. Kramer, quite naturally, has every right to his own opinion.. He obviously does not like the “Graves” solution to the much needed Whitney expansion. So be it. Perceptions and tastes vary. An example in an area more directly in Mr. Kramer’s purview, neither does he admire the painter Phillip Guston whose exhibitions he likewise savaged (“silly,” “clumsy,” “demotic,” “stumble-bum” etc.) at key junctures