Motion to Dismiss in Latest Prince Suit

Brian Boucher has a report here.  Background here.

This is an interesting strategic decision.  It's very hard to win a motion to dismiss on fair use.

Settlement in the Met "Suggested Admission" Lawsuit (UPDATED)

I suggest you read Helen Stoilas's report in The Art Newspaper.  Background here.

UPDATE:  More from Randy Kennedy in the Times.  I suggest you read that too.  I'm not recommending it -- don't get me wrong -- only suggesting it.

"The French ruling gives the Pelham side more legal justification to press for the discovery in New York about the terms of the Gagosian sale."

NYT:  Setback for Picasso’s Daughter in Battle Over Sculpture.  Background here.

"A guarantee—offered directly or by a third party— is a real price. Someone has to pay it."

The Art Market Monitor:  Guarantees do not "distort" the market.

"The Knoedler sales only dealt in a difference of degree, not kind, from the wholly legitimate day-to-day business of the secondary market."

"And in that sense, the circumstances surrounding the de Soles' 'Rothko' aren't quite the extreme outliers they're being made out to be."

Tim Schneider on How far is too far?

"I'm happy that we went to court, as the truth was established."

Domenico De Sole speaks.

The Knoedler Trial May Be Over ...

... but the Knoedler news keeps coming:  "Jose Carlos Bergantinos Diaz, the alleged partner of Glafira Rosales in her sale of a cache of counterfeit paintings through the Knoedler Gallery, can be extradited to the United States, Spain’s National Court has ruled."

"Perhaps the main takeaway is this: Hell hath no fury like a woman scammed."

The Observer:  More Than Money: Inside the Knoedler Art Fakes Scandal.

What it looks like to take the notion of the "public trust" too seriously

In a review of works from the collection of Paul Allen at the Phillips, Pulitzer Prize winning critic Philip Kennicott tells us:

"But the problem with collecting masterworks of great artists is that the act of ownership is in itself a kind of theft, stealing from the public commons of genius. Put another way, once a work of art is important enough to be of interest to a man like Allen, it belongs to all of us. He may not know that, but we do."

Correction

The narrative of the week seems to be that we're seeing a "correction" in the art market.  See here, for example, and here.

But I've never understood how that concept is supposed to apply to the art market.  "Correcting" to what?  Why do we assume the newer prices are correct and the older prices were incorrect? Sure, the newer price is lower.  But how do we know that it is more "correct" than the old one?

I still think this may be closer to the mark.

The Top 9 Takeaways From The Knoedler Trial

By Eileen Kinsella and Sarah Cascone at artnet.  I'm (briefly) quoted.

It's over (UPDATED 6X)

Knoedler trial settles.

UPDATE:  Here is the New York Times story.  Here is Eileen Kinsella at artnet ("It was an anticlimatic end to over two weeks of dramatic and often damning testimony ...").

UPDATE 2:  "The fact that this was a fraud from 1994 to 2009 was totally unavoidable to see. We are proud of these clients, who had the resolve to make it to court."

UPDATE 3:  The NYT's Patricia Cohen:  "[Knoedler] must have been worried about what former president Ann Freedman was going to say at trial."

UPDATE 4:  "When a litigant perceives, during the course of a trial, that there’s a good chance he’ll lose his case, there is an impetus to settle."

UPDATE 5:  Some final thoughts from Jay Grimm.

UPDATE 6:  Laura Gilbert's post-mortem.

MORE BREAKING KNOEDLER NEWS (UPDATED 3X)

"Due to 'unexpected developments', proceedings end abruptly today in Knoedler case just before Ann Freedman and Michael Hammer's testimony."

UPDATE:  "This led to a great deal of speculation among the lingering journalists about whether or not the De Soles were going to settle with Knoedler and 8-31."

UPDATE 2:  "The overwhelmingly likely explanation, according to legal scholars in the courtroom, is that the parties have reached a settlement in principle and will spend the afternoon working out the specifics."

UPDATE 3:  "[T]he crowd included an art law class from NYU."

BREAKING KNOEDLER KNEWS (UPDATED 2X)

Ann Freedman has settled with the De Soles.  The case against the gallery continues.  "The settlement follows damaging testimony about how much Knoedler and Ms. Freedman earned from the sale of more than 30 fakes that were said to be by Abstract Expressionist masters but were actually painted by an all but unknown Chinese artist in the garage of his Queens home."

UPDATE:  "A federal judge told jurors who have been hearing the fraud suit in Manhattan about the settlement and said that they should not speculate about the details or infer anything about the remaining case before them."

UPDATE 2:  Jay Grimm on the news:  "Freedman has claimed for years now that she too was a victim and that she was delighted that this case is going to trial so as to clear her name.  Settling at this juncture does the exact opposite.   From my perspective, then, the only logical way of interpreting the settlement is that Ann Freedman caved in because the trial was not going well for her."

"And so there's a reliance and a sort of gentleman's agreement within the art world that has existed for centuries now that says, you know, if we say this is authentic, it is to the best of our knowledge, and that's that."

Noah Charney on the Knoedler trial.

The 5 Best Moments of the Knoedler Fraud Trial So Far

From artnet's Cait Munro.

Knoedler Trial Day 10

New York Times story here.

Knoedler Trial Day 9 (UPDATED 2X)

"I think she may have brought it over in her car."

("It" being an $8.3 million "Rothko.")

UPDATE:  Purchase College's Jeff Taylor:  "If a Chinese immigrant in Queens could do them all quite convincingly, one has to wonder how many other abstract expressionist fakes have been bought and sold."

UPDATE 2:  Laura Gilbert:  Knoedler asked forensic conservator to revise "negative" report.

"Art Dealer Is Arrested on Charges of Selling Fake De Kooning Artworks" (UPDATED)

Brian Boucher has the story here.

UPDATE:  More details about the charges here.

Knoedler Trial Day 8 (UPDATED 2X)

Run like hell.

UPDATE:  Laura Gilbert:  "So far, seven of the 11 people listed have testified that they did not authenticate the work sold to the De Soles."

UPDATE 2:  Jay Grimm continues to provide the most in-depth coverage.  Keep scrolling.

Knoedler Trial Day 7

"You do understand that all of the works were fake?"

Knoedler Trial Day 6 (UPDATED 4X)

"It's a bit rich."

UPDATE:  New York Times story here.

UPDATE 2:  M.H. Miller here.

UPDATE 3:  Laura Gilbert here.

UPDATE 4:  The Guardian's Jonathan Jones here.

Wrapping Up Week 1 of the Knoedler Trial

M.H. Miller here.

Jay Grimm here.