Archives for June 2012

This press release (full text at the link) hit my inbox at 7:04 p.m. NYC time. It provides no explanation for the falling-out between LA MOCA and its suddenly departed, widely respected, veteran chief curator, Paul Schimmel.But MOCA's official announcement does tell us this:Paul Schimmel has resigned from his position to become an independent curator, after 22 years with the … [Read more...] about LA MOCA’s Schimmel Press Release: Independent Curator, with a Museum Gallery Named for Him

The late Ivan C. Karp, 1990Photo by Melanie Eve Barocas Ivan Karp, who died yesterday at 86, was one of those selfless mentors who were always profligate with their time and insights, even with little-known, fledgling art writers (including me in the 1970s). His artworld reputation was made while he was co-director of the now legendary Leo Castelli Gallery from 1959 to 1969, … [Read more...] about Ivan Karp, 86, the Most Uncommercial of Commercial Art Dealers UPDATED

Paul Schimmel, speaking at the Brooklyn Museum's April 2008 press preview for the Murakami show that he originally curated for LA MOCA (Takashi Murakami seated at the left)Photo by Lee Rosenbaum[More on this here and here.]My reaction, to say the least, is incredulity. But the LA TImes reported it, so I guess it's true:Paul Schimmel, the longtime chief curator at the Los … [Read more...] about Paul Schimmel, Curator Extraordinaire at LA MOCA, Reportedly Fired

Derek Gillman, the Barnes Foundation's president and executive director, speaking at its press preview in MayPhoto by Lee RosenbaumRobin Pogrebin's piece in today's NY Times---For Art Institutions, Thinking Big Can Be Suicidal---is based on the University of Chicago's just released study, Set in Stone: Building American's New Generation of Art Facilities (to which the Times … [Read more...] about Perils of “Thinking Big”: Barnes Foundation as Possible Candidate for a Future University of Chicago Study

Steve Miller, adjunct professor of Seton Hall University's M.A. Program in Museum Professions, responds to Blind Oversight: AAMD, AAM Condone Hispanic Society's Coin Dispersal:You are absolutely correct when you talk about the irretrievable and irreparable loss of the intellectual value of the Hispanic Society of America's coin collection. Museums are supposed to … [Read more...] about BlogBack: Steve Miller on the Hispanic Society’s Coin Dispersal

The unceremonious, sudden demise yesterday of the 16-year-old online Artnet Magazine marked another sad day in art journalism's survival struggle.The news leaked out yesterday (here and here), before the following official announcement of the loss of this important resource for art reporting and criticism appeared on the magazine's (above-linked) homepage:Artnet Magazine, the … [Read more...] about The Death of Artnet Magazine, Artworld’s Online News Pioneer

Catalogue for the "Extraordinary Auction" being held tomorrow in Madrid of 1,004 coins that were among the 37,895 sold last March by the Hispanic Society of America, New York, from the collection donated by its founder, Archer HuntingtonIn advance of tomorrow's resale of 1,004 coins selected from the 37,895 that were sold en bloc in a sealed-bid auction in March at Sotheby's, … [Read more...] about Blind Oversight: AAMD, AAM Condone Hispanic Society’s Coin Dispersal

Left: Picasso, "Woman in a Red Armchair," 1929, before the attackRight: Detail showing the defacement, as caught on a visitor's videoThe story of the spray-paint attack on a Picasso at the Menil Collection, Houston, keeps getting curiouser and curiouser. Tyler Rudick of CultureMap Houston reports that "a Monday afternoon e-mail circulated among faculty and staff at the … [Read more...] about Menil Menace: Picasso Vandalism Story Grows More Bizarre

Back to Italy: Etruscan black-figure kalpis, attributed to the Micali painter or his workshop, late 6th century B.C. In his announcement late yesterday of the Toledo Museum's agreement (full text, here) to relinquish to Italy an important Etruscan black-figure kalpis (water vessel), Steven Dettelbach, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, exulted: This is an … [Read more...] about Kalpis Fracas: Toledo Museum Agrees to Relinquish Etruscan Water Vessel UPDATED

Some of the Hispanic Society of America's 37,895 coins, on pre-auction display in February at Sotheby'sPhoto by Lee RosenbaumIn today's NY Times piece, which followed up on my June 13 post about on the fate of the nearly 38,000 coins sold last March by the Hispanic Society of America, Felicia Lee gave a brief description of the 9,000 pieces that recently came back to the … [Read more...] about Counting the Money: More Details on Hispanic Coin Trove Returned to the American Numismatic Society

Detail from YouTube video screenshot (Photoshop enhanced) of vandal spray-painting the Menil Collection's Picasso, "Woman in a Red Armchair," 1929What would you do if you witnessed someone on the verge of damaging an artwork hanging in a museum?Would you record the event on your cellphone and murmur "WTF?" into its microphone, like the person at the Menil Collection last week … [Read more...] about Menil Menace: What Not to Do When You Spot Someone Spray-Painting a Picasso

I'll have more for you on the Hispanic coins story, coming soon.But for now, I'm rubbing my eyes and saying, "Thanks, Felicia.!" Scroll down to the ninth paragraph in NY Times reporter Felicia Lee's story, Coin Collection Is Partly Saved by a Loan. They buried the credit and the link, but at least CultureGrrl (if not her alter ego, Lee Rosenbaum) is cited. It was Felicia who … [Read more...] about NY Times Plays Catch-Up on Hispanic Coins Story, Credits CultureGrrl’s Scoop

Still a work-in-progress: The Barnes Foundation's waterless water feature, with a worker (in the distance, on right, in turquoise shirt) installing outdoor lightingHaving seen the photos of mobs of ticketholders waiting for admission to the Barnes Foundation's new galleries during the opening weekend of its new Philadelphia facility, I approached its cavernous light court with … [Read more...] about Back to the Barnes: Some Improvements, but Some Security Concerns (with videos)

Jackson Pollock, "Mural, " 1943, at the Des Moines Art Center, on loan (to July 15) from the University of Iowa Museum of ArtSean O'Harrow, director of University of Iowa Museum of Art, which has held onto its great masterpiece, Jackson Pollock's 1943 "Mural," despite several legislative attempts to convert it to cash, suspected that some mischief was afoot after the university … [Read more...] about Iowa Pollock or I-Owe-a-Pollock? Monetization Monster Again Rears Its Head UPDATED

Hispanic Society of America's main court, with Goya's "The Duchess of Alba," 1797, at right (on lower level)The duchess of Alba, 1797 Photo by Lee Rosenbaum In yesterday's post on the Hispanic Society of America's deplorable disposal of virtually its entire coin collection (some 37,895 pieces), I asserted that the coins' donor, HSA founder Archer Huntington, had surely … [Read more...] about Monetizing the Money: Why Did No One Stop the Hispanic Society’s Coin Disposal?