Richard Koch, former deputy director and general counsel of the Museum of Modern Art
The tech gremlins delayed for a few days my receiving a photo from the family of Richard Koch (to whom I paid tribute here). But thanks to his family, here it is at last, along with additional biographical information:
While serving as general counsel, director of administration, and secretary of the Museum of Modern Art for 20 years, from 1959 to 1979, Koch recognized, in the late 70’s, the latent value of the museum’s undeveloped mid-Manhattan air rights, and devised a plan to use them to fund its Cesar Pelli-designed expansion. He was instrumental in the development of legislation establishing the Trust for Cultural Resources, a public benefit corporation that enabled MoMA to use its air rights to obtain substantial tax benefits and to subsidize the expansion of its facilities.
Subsequently, the Trust was called upon by a number of other major cultural institutions to support capital projects—WNET/Channel 13; Carnegie Hall; the American Museum of Natural History, Lincoln Center.
When Koch left MoMA in l979, a letter from David Rockefeller recalled that “the original conception and most of the early trail blazing for our expansion plan were your own.” A board resolution then praised Koch’s “creativity of mind, which brought into being the Museum’s expansion plan.”
After Koch left MoMA, Martin Segal, then president of Lincoln Center, and its chairman, Amyas Ames, engaged him to conduct a needs assessment for the Center and its constituents and to submit a plan of action. He performed a feasibility study of the land now occupied by the Rose Building and its potential as a combined-use building, which would include dormitories, rehearsal studios, offices, a garage for patrons and a film theater. The key to his plan was a residential apartment tower that could attract a significant capital investment and provide a permanent revenue stream. In December, 1980, Lincoln Center’s board voted to proceed with the project.
Before coming to MoMA, Koch worked for five years as an associate at the law firm of Winthrop, Stimson, Putnam. There he had handled legal issues in connection with the fire at MoMA in the late 1950’s.