Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Tell me again about the public trust (a continuing series)

Lee Rosenbaum:  "November is rapidly becoming Deaccession Month."

The latest:  MoMA is selling a Rufino Tamayo painting with "a distinguished exhibition history":  it's "been in the museum's collection since 1953...and has been included in exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art...and Tate Gallery."

Hey, isn't a work like that held in the public trust, to be accessible to present and future generations?

I guess not so much.

Lee explicitly connects this Tamayo to another one that was deaccessioned, by Randolph College a few years ago.  That sale, or course, was the Worst Thing That Ever Happened.  (Lee is still having "traumatic flashbacks.")

This sale of a Tamayo, on the other hand?

Come on, don't be so touchy.