Archives for November 2007

I'm a lover (and closet singer) of old standards---the songs that were popular back in my parents' day. So when Matthew Price, a BCC-TV journalist who had just arrived here from Jerusalem, began the auction report, in which he gave me my two minutes of fame, with the words, "Autumn in New York," my thoughts of course strayed to that Vernon Duke classic. Being CultureGrrl, I … [Read more...] about Singing Podcast: “Auctions in New York”

I'm sure that many of you interrupted your Thanksgiving revels yesterday to see that the NY Times actually did run a correction to Carol Vogel's article that had misidentified purchasers of works at Sotheby's contemporary sale. But I just got back into the CultureGrrl newsroom this afternoon, and discovered that this correction (scroll down) had slipped into the paper while I … [Read more...] about Department of Impossible NY Times Auction Corrections

Having reported yesterday on the big-money auction buyers identified in articles in the NY Times and London Telegraph, I've now been getting e-mails suggesting that some of those deep-pocketed collectors did not actually purchase the objects connected to them in those reports. Carol Vogel had announced that Laurence Graff "is thought to have bought Jeff Koons's 'Diamond … [Read more...] about Department of (Possible) Corrections: The Big-Money Auction Buyers UPDATED

The Guggenheim...Unpainted Traditionalists rejoice: The restored exterior of the Guggenheim Museum will not be buffed with Powell Buff after all. So decreed the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission today in a 7-2 vote. Sewell Chan reported this afternoon on the NY Times' City Room blog that the commission's public meeting today included a presentation by Tom Krens, … [Read more...] about Guggenheim News Flash: Landmarks Preservation Commission Preserves Familiar Exterior Color

Whether you side with some archaeologists and scholars who believe that the U.S. State Department's Cultural Property Advisory Committee is admirably safeguarding the cultural heritage of foreign countries, or you agree with some dealers, collectors and museums who feel that CPAC inappropriately rubber stamps source countries' excessively retentionist requests, you ought to buy … [Read more...] about Numismatists Sue Secretive Cultural Property Advisory Committee for More Transparency

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Last Wednesday, I noted that dealers had been the top bidders on a number of key lots in Christie's contemporary evening sale, which caused me to observe: [This] raises the question of how much of the results of this sale, which everyone had been eyeing warily as a barometer of the art market, were bolstered by dealers who have a big … [Read more...] about Post-Auction Reports Identify Clients for Whom Dealers Bought Top Lots

Bruno LeMieux-Ruibal, a New York correspondent for the Spanish-language Lápiz International Art Magazine, comments on Alice Walton, MoMA's planned skyscraper and Hirst's shark at the Met. On the shark, I want to clear up one misunderstanding (which other readers shared, because I wrote unclearly in my original post): I don't object to the photography ban. What irked me was the … [Read more...] about BlogBack: Alternate Take on Alice Walton’s Collecting, MoMA’s Skyscraper, Hirst’s Shark

(Part I is here.) The most important next step in achieving a ceasefire in the cultural-property wars is to move beyond the current case-by-case chaos to a more reasoned, consistent handling of these issues. The most obvious need is for some sort of consensus about a cutoff date for future acquisitions: Should museums not acquire any objects that don't have a known provenance … [Read more...] about My Ceasefire Proposals for the Cultural-Property Wars–Part II

The topic that I chose to address in my two talks at the University of Pennsylvania on Thursday was Towards a Ceasefire in the Cultural Property Wars, in which I discussed the recent repatriation agreements between American museums and source countries, and made some proposals about where things should go from here. I think it's safe to say that my ideas are not squarely in … [Read more...] about Penn Professor-for-a-Day: My Ceasefire Proposals for the Cultural-Property Wars–Part I

Jori Finkel's excellent NY Times "Arts & Leisure" article today, Museums Solicit Dealers' Largess, brings to mind how much the Brooklyn Museum's director, Arnold Lehman, was criticized for asking dealers to become patrons of the benefit gala for the highly controversial "Sensation" show, drawn from the Young British Artists collection of Charles Saatchi. What to many seemed … [Read more...] about The Slippery Slope of Dealer Support for Museum Exhibitions

The Virginia Supreme Court yesterday handed a major victory to the opponents of the sale of four works from the Maier Museum of Randolph College. At the very least, the auctions of the works planned for this month at Christie's, where they were to have been star lots, will be postponed. The court denied the college's request that the temporary injunction imposed by Lynchburg, … [Read more...] about VA Supreme Court Gives Big Win to Maier Museum Art Sale Opponents

75 stories? Did they say 75 STORIES??? Trust me, the neighbors and, hopefully, the City Planning Commission are not going to stand for a 75-story look-at-me skyscraper on this cross street. New York skyscrapers in this part of midtown are customarily consigned to the avenues; the cross streets are less dense and more lowrise in character. West 54th Street is partly … [Read more...] about It’s a MoMA Monster! Nouvel’s Towering Ambitions

I've been uncharacteristically offline today because of my enjoyable foray into academia. But while you await my return from Philly, here are some cultural-property links that I've prepared for my captive University of Pennsylvania audience, which you might also find of interest: Princeton Art Museum Agreement with Italy Yale University Agreement with Peru Getty Museum … [Read more...] about More CultureGrrl Curriculum: Antiquities Agreements and Museum Acquisition Policies

Travel complications preclude me from giving you a complete rundown of Sotheby's strong contemporary art sale tonight, other than to say: ---The total of $315.9 million fell just shy of Christie's $325 million the night before. ---Sotheby's decisively won the battle of the mega-Koonses with a $23.56 million price for "Hanging Heart" (again, as at Christie's, from Koons' dealer, … [Read more...] about Contemporary Contentment: Sotheby’s Happy Night

I could not find this anywhere on the Wall Street Journal's website, but on its "Letters to the Editor" page today it ran the following as a correction, concerning Alexandra Peers' article that had suggested that the major art auction houses sometimes reduce the buyer's premium for third-party guarantors who are successful bidders: Christie's does not discount its buyer's … [Read more...] about Wall Street Journal Runs Buyer’s Premium Correction