In January of 1940, Stephen C. Clark, chairman of the Board of Trustees at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), received an irate letter. “As a visitor of the Museum of Modern Art I object very energetically to seeing this boring old stuff,” it read. “I do not use a buggy either when I can ride with motor cars.”

The exhibition that provoked this outcry was Italian Masters, an incredible gathering of 21 paintings and seven sculptures from the Italian Renaissance. In Esopus 24, the most recent issue of the nonprofit Esopus arts magazine, MoMA Chief of Archives and Library Michelle Elligott shares the story of the exhibition. It’s part of the recurring “Modern Artifacts” series in Esopus, which excavates narratives from the MoMA archives.