Who Gets Remembered?
Artist Legacies and Our Collective Responsibility
By Ruby Lopez Harper, Executive Director, Craft Emergency Relief Fund (CERF+)
What happens to an artist’s work when they are no longer here to tell its story? Who decides what is preserved, what is remembered, and what becomes part of our collective cultural history? And perhaps most importantly, who is responsible for making sure those stories survive?
These are among the questions explored in the Joan Mitchell Foundation’s new report, Creating Future Memory: Building the Field of Artist Legacy Stewardship. Drawing from research and a 2025 convening of 145 artists, cultural workers, archivists, funders, family members, and others, the report examines the often invisible labor of preserving artists’ work, histories, and contributions.
As I think back on the convening and the compelling stories and experiences that were shared, one thing I keep coming back to is how often we think about protecting an artist’s practice in the present without giving the same attention to what happens to that practice over time. Or how we might embed legacy considerations into the very beginning of an artistic practice.
What we do to help artists sustain and protect a practice today has consequences for what survives tomorrow.
For those of us working with the craft community, that connection deserves particular attention.
More Than the Work We Leave Behind
When we think about an artist’s legacy, we might imagine a collection of finished works, an exhibition history, or an archive of photographs and documents. But a legacy encompasses so much more.
For craft artists, it may include techniques passed between generations, relationships with materials and place, cultural traditions, tools, processes, and knowledge that cannot always be captured through conventional documentation.
A ceramic vessel, woven textile, piece of jewelry, or carved object carries more than its physical form. It can carry stories of community, identity, innovation, and belonging. In craft, the finished object is only part of the story. There are processes, techniques, relationships, and histories that may never be formally documented. Some of that knowledge is passed from one person to another. Techniques are refined. Tools are fabricated. And some of that knowledge can disappear when an artist is no longer able to share it.
Preserving those contributions requires us to think beyond the objects themselves. The report describes artist legacy stewardship as an interconnected set of activities involving documentation, archives, oral histories, creative spaces, and the many people responsible for caring for them.
If our approaches to preservation are shaped primarily by institutional collecting practices or commercial recognition, whose histories are we overlooking?
Preservation Is Also a Question of Equity
One of the report’s most compelling arguments is that the historical record is not neutral. We have to acknowledge and grapple with the reality that the systems deciding which artists are collected, documented, and remembered haven’t treated everyone equally. What survives, what is collected, and what is celebrated have long been influenced by access to resources, institutional relationships, and systems of recognition that have not served all artists equally.
The report cites research showing that, among acquisitions made by the U.S. museums studied between 2008 and 2020, only 11% were works by women artists, 2.2% by Black American artists, and 0.5% by Black American women artists. These figures are a reminder that recognition is not simply a reflection of artistic contribution. It is also shaped by decisions about whose work is collected, documented, funded, and studied.
If we keep relying on the same institutions and standards to decide whose work deserves preservation, why should we expect a different historical record?
For me, as I think about the craft community, this raises important questions about artists whose practices exist outside dominant culture and institutional pathways, particularly those whose creative knowledge is rooted in community, cultural traditions, or informal learning.
Who is documenting their contributions? Who has access to the resources needed to preserve them? And who gets to decide how their stories are told?
The report emphasizes the importance of artist agency and community relationships in answering these questions. I believe that is essential. Preserving an artist’s legacy should not mean separating their work from the people, places, and traditions that give it meaning.
When Loss Happens Before We Are Ready
A wildfire, flood, hurricane, or other emergency can destroy not only finished artwork but also tools, materials, records, photographs, and years of accumulated knowledge. Some of those losses can be addressed through financial assistance and recovery resources. Others cannot be replaced. We know that the loss of an artist’s work or studio can happen suddenly.
The report identifies access to knowledge, funding and resources, and coordination and collaboration as three central challenges facing artist legacy stewardship. These challenges are also familiar to those working in disaster readiness and recovery. An artist who cannot afford secure storage or documentation today may face irreversible losses tomorrow. An artist whose practice is already financially precarious may have little capacity to undertake the additional work of preserving an archive.
This is why I see artist readiness and legacy stewardship as connected responsibilities.
Through the work of CERF+, we see how quickly an artist can lose years of work, records, tools, and materials. During the convening, and again while reading this report, I found myself drawn to the idea of preservation while artists are still actively creating, especially those without the resources to protect or document their work. I also think about our stewardship of the stories we are entrusted with. What is our duty of care, and how do we honor those experiences with dignity and respect?
Helping artists protect their practices today is also part of protecting what future generations will be able to learn from them.
It Takes More Than One Village
The report makes a strong case that artists and families cannot be expected to carry legacy stewardship alone. This work needs to move from an individual burden to a shared responsibility. Too often, we expect artists and their families to carry this work with limited financial resources, technical knowledge, or institutional support. And too often, our organizations approach related challenges separately.
One organization focuses on readiness, relief and recovery. Another on archives. Another on professional development, preservation, cultural heritage, or funding. Each plays an important role, but none can address the full range of needs alone. We often say it takes a village. But what happens when the needs of our community extend beyond the resources of our particular village? How are we connecting with other communities, institutions, and systems that have both the expertise and responsibility to contribute?
Libraries, historical societies, universities, cultural heritage organizations, local governments, and philanthropic institutions all have roles to play. We can’t keep expecting a handful of arts and culture organizations, or even families on their own, to address needs that extend well beyond the arts. If it takes a village, how is our village connected to others with resources, expertise, and responsibilities we don’t have?
The rising tide does not automatically raise all boats. We have to pay attention to who has access, who is being left out, and what it will take to change those conditions.
A Responsibility to the Future
The report asks us to recognize artist legacy stewardship not as something to consider at the end of an artistic career, but as an ongoing responsibility connected to how artists live, work, and participate in their communities. It also asks us to imagine a more connected and equitable system of support.
For me, that means expanding our understanding of artist readiness, strengthening relationships beyond our immediate circles, and recognizing that preserving creative knowledge is part of caring for the people who create it.
The question is not only what artists will leave behind. It is what we are doing, collectively and intentionally, to ensure their contributions have a future, and whose stories we are willing to take responsibility for carrying forward.
If we agree that artists’ contributions are part of our shared cultural history, then we have a responsibility to support them.
Especially while they’re still here to tell us what matters to them.
Especially while they have the agency to direct what happens to their legacy.
Source: Joan Mitchell Foundation, Creating Future Memory: Building the Field of Artist Legacy Stewardship (2026).
This reflection was developed by Ruby Lopez Harper with drafting and editorial assistance from ChatGPT (OpenAI).
