Installing Christoph Büchel’s “Training Ground for Democracy” at MASS MoCA (before it was dismantled, unfinished)
Just when we thought MASS MoCA had moved on from its Büchel Debacle, we’ve learned from Martin Bromirski‘s Anaba blog that artist Christoph Büchel has pursued the appeal of his case against the North Adams, MA, museum to the U.S. Court of Appeals, First Circuit, Boston. According to the website for the court’s documents, arguments were heard on June 2. (You can listen to audio from that legal wrangle here, courtesy of Anaba.) No decision has come down yet.
Bromirski has also posted these links: Büchel’s brief, MASS MoCA’s brief.
The contemporary art museum won the first round in 2007, when Judge Michael Ponsor of U.S. District Court, Springfield, MA, ruled that “an unfinished work [such as Büchel’s] didn’t qualify for protection under the [Visual Artists Rights Act] law.” I previously described the contretemps over Büchel’s aborted “Training Ground for Democracy” and explained (in advance of the court ruling) why I didn’t think VARA applied, here and here.
Donn Zaretsky, the Art Law blogger, who was one of Büchel’s attorneys the first time around, is no longer on the case. While the wheels of justice grind slowly, life goes on at MASS MoCA.