Lisa Bertagnoli, Crain’s Chicago Business columnist
She quoted my misgivings about the restrictions on the 44-work gift from the Edlis/Neeson Collection of contemporary art, which I said were “really putting the collectors before the artists. You should be able to intermingle different works,” rather than create a separate fiefdom for one collector.
Bertagnoli also looked into in the suggestion in my Edlis post that Kenneth Griffin, who had once told me he’d “like to think” his collection would one day go to the AIC (where he is a trustee), might expect equal treatment for his own trove—another separate fiefdom.
Here’s what Lisa got from Griffin:
Griffin, who has lent many works from his collection to the museum, says neither Rondeau nor [Douglas] Druick had direction on where or how to show the loans. “They are consummate professionals,” he says. “I trust their judgment.”
Rondeau, he adds, tops his go-to list of advisers for art purchases, including that of the Pollock and de Kooning paintings (“Number 17A” and “Interchange,” respectively, thought to be worth some $500 million). “That tells you how much I trust him,” Griffin says. “That purchase was made a year ago” [but only recently came to light].
L: de Kooning, “Interchange,” 1955; R: Pollock, “Number 17A”, 1948 Photo: Art Institute of Chicago
For an interesting insider’s perspective on AIC’s deals with art donors, here’s what Michael Dorf, a Chicago lawyer and adjunct professor at School of the Art Institute, emailed to me, with permission to publish:
I enjoyed your piece on the Edlis collection. This type of arrangement is not new at the Art Institute of Chicago. Years ago I was part of a negotiation between AIC and my clients, the Gabriella Rosenbaum Trust and the Paul and Gabriella Rosenbaum Foundation [no relation to CultureGrrl], revising the terms for a bequest of five Georgia O’Keeffe works owned by Mrs. Rosenbaum. (The Rosenbaum family had previously split the cost with AIC for the purchase of “Sky Above Clouds IV.”)
James Rondeau in front of Georgia O’Keeffe, “Sky Above Clouds IV,” 1965 Image used in AIC’s announcement of his appointment
Not only does the deed of gift remove most of AIC’s curatorial discretion with respect to exhibition of the bequest (and the works that can be exhibited with those works), it remains in effect for 21 years following the death of Mrs. Rosenbaum’s two daughters. The surviving daughter, Madge Goldman, is still active at 86, so we’ve got a way to go.
I teach this deed (with the Rosenbaum Family’s permission) as part of my graduate student class on Law, Politics, and the Arts, in the Masters of Arts Policy and Administration Program at the School of the Art Institute. I use it as an example of what a donor can negotiate if an institution wants something badly enough.
I was with James Wood [then director of the AIC] at Mrs. Rosenbaum’s apartment following her death in 2000, when the movers came to take the O’Keeffes off her walls. We joked about the deed and Jim told me he would never enter into that type of deal again.
I guess that vow wasn’t binding, however, on Wood’s successors.
