Thursday, October 31, 2013

"Forging an Art Market in China"

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The New York Times had a massive feature on the Chinese art market the other day, well worth reading. Felix Salmon adds his usual excelle...

You MUST read this post (just a suggestion)

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The Met got part of a lawsuit relating to its admissions policies thrown out -- the part alleging that it has no authority, under its lease ...

Let's get this started again

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I've been neglecting the blog lately -- and, like clockwork, there's been a ton of art law happening.  Let's see if we can play ...
Thursday, October 24, 2013

The latest on Prince-Cariou

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I'm quoted in this Art in America piece on the latest developments.
Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Tell me again about the public trust (education of Kevyn Orr edition)

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Gallerist's Dan Duray reports that the Cleveland Museum of Art is selling a pair of works at Christie's next month. This is a hel...

"We can clearly speak of negligence with serious consequences."

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A little swamped again, but this story is just too good not to pass along: "A Romanian man who has admitted to stealing masterpieces...
Tuesday, October 15, 2013

On the Smith-Clay Resolution (UPDATED)

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Art in America's Brian Boucher has a report on the agreement reached last week between artist Lauren Clay and the Estate of David Smith...

"The emergency manager’s deputies have repeatedly told DIA leaders that he needs $400 million-$500 million from them ...."

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The Detroit Free Press has a look at some possible ways to " squeeze cash from billions of dollars of city-owned masterpieces without ...

MoMA Acquires Occupy Wall Street Art

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And Jim Johnson says it's "very, very depressing news."
Monday, October 14, 2013

"The latest outdoor artwork by the modernist sculptor to have been nipped by thieves in Britain"

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The New York Times:  Another Henry Moore Work Is Stolen in Britain .
Saturday, October 12, 2013

"If people were able to exchange opinions freely, cases like [Knoedler] would come to light much more quickly."

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The Art Newspaper : AbEx fakes scandal silences the experts .
Friday, October 11, 2013

"Keep in mind that art sellers very often have preferences over the quality of buyers they sell to."

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Tyler Cowen:  Price ambiguity as a buyer sorting mechanism .
Tuesday, October 08, 2013

"Because Amazon does not disclose sales figures, it is unclear whether this gamble is paying off."

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The NYT's William Grimes: Art Collections a Click Away . More from Grimes here . Earlier post on the Amazon Art experiment here .

Sotheby's Battle

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The other big story has been hedge fund manager and "activist investor" Daniel Loeb going after Sotheby's CEO William Ruprecht...

Knoedler Knews

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One of the two big art law stories over the last few days was the Southern District decision denying a motion to dismiss a pair of collector...

And furthermore

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I've been busy with the day job, but, before moving on to catch up on some of the other big art law stories over the last few days, the ...
Thursday, October 03, 2013

Tell me he did not just say that

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Randy Kennedy has a story in today's Times about the situation at the Detroit Institute.  I hope to have more to say about it later, bu...
Tuesday, October 01, 2013

"[T]he institute has fallen back on the worthless response selling art 'just isn’t done' in the museum world"

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" But they’re not living in the museum world now. They’re living in the bankruptcy world ." Detroit News columnist Nolan Finley ...

"If They Replaced Detroit's Art Treasures with Fakes, Would Anyone be Able to Tell?"

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In The New Republic, Michael Kinsley says : "By not thinking outside the box, Detroit is losing an ideal opportunity to test a sugges...
Thursday, September 26, 2013

"The total excess payments in some years ran to more than $100 million, a crushing expense for a city in steep decline"

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The New York Times:  Detroit Spent Billions Extra on Pensions .
Wednesday, September 25, 2013

"The main point holds true I think, that nobody really loves the ALR, but they do perform a service for the Art Market."

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Derek Fincham weighs in on the NYT story on the Art Loss Register.
Monday, September 23, 2013

"You usually would expect a gallery ... would kind of do due diligence when they heard a story as cockamamie, far-fetched, and unbelievable as this"

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The Art Market Monitor:  Jerry Saltz Doubles Down on Due Diligence Doubt .

"78% of respondents said they oppose a possible plan to sell DIA art to help resolve the financial crisis."

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Story here . Here's my question:  what if 78% of respondents said they were in favor of  the plan? Would the Deaccession Police then...
Saturday, September 21, 2013

"But for the Register, despite its official-sounding name and pivotal role as a monitor, profits have not come easily, and the company’s future looks increasingly cloudy" (UPDATED 2X)

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The New York Times takes a look at the Art Loss Register. UPDATE:  Tom Flynn comes out of retirement to offer some (pointed) comments. D...
Friday, September 20, 2013

Restitution Symposium

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At DePaul Law, Nov. 14.  Details here .

"My fellow employees and I are entitled to a pension."

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NYT:  Residents of Detroit Go to Court for Pensions .
Monday, September 16, 2013

BREAKING: Rosales Pleads Guilty (UPDATED)

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Gallerist has the story . UPDATE:  Lots more coverage.  New York Times here .  Wall Street Journal here .  Art Newspaper here .  And, on T...
Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Ann Freedman Goes on Offense (UPDATED)

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She's filed a defamation suit against dealer Marco Grassi.  He was quoted in the recent New York Magazine article about her as saying:...

"The Louvre Is Allegedly a Hotbed of Crime"

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Including roving bands of aggressive pickpockets .

Roberta Smith weighs in on Detroit (UPDATED)

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She calls a possible sale "deeply alarming" and "cluelessly self-destructive."  The arguments will be familiar to anyon...

And speaking of Mark Stryker's exhaustive history of the DIA

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(Last one for tonight, I promise.)  I wanted to break out in a separate post his (excellent) summary of where things stand at the moment : ...
Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Speaking of clever ...

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James Cuno has an op-ed in The Art Newspaper under the headline " The Immorality of using Detroit's art to bail out bankrupt city ,...

Manufactured Intent

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This is interesting. The Detroit Institute is going to insert into its deed of gift form "a line stating that from any sale of the w...

"'Central Victim,' hmmmm.”

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Via Art F City , some thoughts from Josh Baer on Ann Freedman's NY Mag interview : "Now that it appears that the defense that th...

"Two more guilty pleas in case involving Helly Nahmad"

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The Art Newspaper's Laura Gilbert has the details .  Some background here .

"Christo is one step closer to realizing his dream of coating parts of the Arkansas River with shimmering cloth panels"

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The Wall Street Journal: Colo. Judge Refuses to Block Christo’s ‘Over the River’ Project .

By the way: the Royal Geographic Society is repulsive

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It's selling paintings to plug a pension deficit. Serious question:  what kind of belief is the belief that deaccessioning (other tha...

Where were we?

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A point I wanted to make before the holiday (and other impediments to blogging):  I don't know if it comes through on the blog, but I...
Tuesday, September 03, 2013

"Deciding that this was a reasonable decision, the association has become willing to judge each case on its merits."

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Judging each case on its merits -- what a novel concept!
Monday, September 02, 2013

Deviating

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Lee Rosenbaum continues to be outraged by the AAMD's lack of outrage at the Pennsylvania Academy's Hopper sale .  She's figured...
Friday, August 30, 2013

"Selling any art would be tantamount to closing the museum"

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The DIA's director Graham Beal would have you know . Any art!  Even one work. Tantamount. Unless of course the proceeds are used ...
Thursday, August 29, 2013

"We don’t need the AAMD to serve as a museum police force." (UPDATED)

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Exactly!  Where do I sign the petition? David Ross, in a BlogBack to Lee Rosenbaum, says she should lay off the calls for the AAMD to DO ...
Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Felix Salmon on the true age of mechanical reproduction (UPDATED)

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Good stuff . UPDATE:  The Art Market Monitor agrees .

Quick Hits

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Schulhof sues . McEnroe wins .

"Rub should take a short drive over to Philbrick’s place to explain why 'Weehawken,' entrusted to PAFA’s care, must remain in Philadelphia for the benefit of its public." (UPDATED)

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Lee Rosenbaum remains the only member of the Deaccession Police to seriously grapple with what it might mean for works to be held in the pu...

"The chart of historic gold prices does suggest that art prices may settle in where they are for some time to come"

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The Art Market Monitor:  If Gold Is Setting Up For A Historic Tear, What About Art?
Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Ann Freedman is more shocked than everybody (UPDATED)

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She tells James Panero in New York magazine. Judith Dobrzynski has "a nagging question; Knoedler sold 40 allegedly fraudulent works ...

Tell me again about the public trust (Edward Hopper edition)

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The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts is selling one of its two "signature oil paintings" by Edward Hopper.  Hey, what do you nee...

Knoedler's profits from Rosales sales were $43 million

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Lee Rosenbaum walks through the latest indictment .
Monday, August 26, 2013

"Will accurate 3-D reproductions disrupt art markets?"

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Some thoughts from Tyler Cowen .
Saturday, August 24, 2013

"Could museums routinely sell shares of their work, raising billions of dollars they never thought possible? Maybe so."

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Denver Post art critic Ray Mark Rinaldi makes a repulsive Stalinesque trickle down theorist suggestion:  " What if [Detroit] sold p...

"Perhaps the biggest question Detroit is forcing all of us to ponder is a basic one, and fundamentally political in nature: what is the value of art to a city?"

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Michael Bennett:  How Best to Spend The Detroit Institute of Arts' 15 Minutes of Fame .
Thursday, August 22, 2013

"There's nothing in Chapter 9 that enables creditors to force an asset sale." (UPDATED)

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Georgetown bankruptcy professor Adam Levitin on whether creditors can force the liquidation of the DIA collection .  He expands upon it at S...
Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Axa suing Christie's

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Sandy-related .
Monday, August 19, 2013

More arrests "expected" in Knoedler case

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Latest developments here .

"But the danger of the appraisal now taking place ... is that it will reveal a much greater value than the $2.5bn bandied about recently."

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The Art Market Monitor :  What if the DIA's collection is worth a lot more than people think?

"If it’s true, I’m shocked about it and disgusted. It’s crazy. Isn’t being Jasper Johns’s assistant enough?"

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The New York Times on the reverberations from the theft charges against a long-time assistant.
Friday, August 16, 2013

"The way we look at reality is highly influenced by the context it’s presented to us." (UPDATED 2X)

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New details about the creator of the Knoedler fakes, from the superseding indictment handed up Wednesday against Glafira Rosales. UPDATE:...
Thursday, August 15, 2013

"Jasper Johns Assistant Charged With Stealing the Artist’s Work"

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Patricia Cohen has the story .
Wednesday, August 14, 2013

"Christo Facing New Lawsuit To Stop His ‘Over The River’ Project"

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Story here .  Kriston Capps points out that "Christo and Jeanne-Claude's medium isn't fabric and nature, it's community he...

Rosales out on bail

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" Federal prosecutors have accused Ms. Rosales of selling dozens of fake paintings that she said were by Modernist masters like Jackson...
Tuesday, August 13, 2013

"Paintings worth tens of millions of dollars that were stolen last October from an art museum in the Netherlands have not been burned ..."

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" . . . and a Romanian gang behind the theft wants to cut an unspecified deal with the authorities so the artwork can be returned, lawy...
Monday, August 12, 2013

Detroit and The Barnes

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Interesting post from The Art Market Monitor.

"Hence a donation to prevent trachoma offers at least 10 times the value of giving to the museum."

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Peter Singer on how to give.
Sunday, August 11, 2013

Detroit Dialogue

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The responses to the NYT's " invitation to dialogue " regarding Frank Robinson's letter on Detroit are in.  You can read t...
Friday, August 09, 2013

"How, even at a theoretical level, can we elevate inanimate things -- no matter how transcendent they are in their beauty and history -- over the needs of human beings?"

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Bill McGraw:  Six Things About Detroit That Are Worse Than The Idea Of Selling Its Artwork .

"It is hard to imagine the revival of a city that divested itself of its great art museum for cash."

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The Weekly Standard 's Philip Terzian on Detroit.
Thursday, August 08, 2013

Clarifying (UPDATED)

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Judith Dobrzynski and Lee Rosenbaum get into it a little bit over Frank Robinson's NYT letter to the editor , and Robinson chimes in ...
Wednesday, August 07, 2013

"Detroit’s assets need to be understood in terms of what they can do to revive the city, not on what cash they will produce at auction."

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Bloomberg's James Russell is against a sale.

Customers who bought this Monet also bought ... (UPDATED 3X)

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Amazon Art has launched . The early reviews are not good.  Tyler Cowen does not think it will revolutionize the art world.  Greg Allen s...
Tuesday, August 06, 2013

"For some museum professionals, ... simply discussing the monetisation of the collection is worrisome."

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I missed this while I was away last week, but I'm quoted in this Art Newspaper article on Detroit.

"How can we equate a few pieces of canvas with paint on them with the pensions of thousands of firefighters, nurses, police officers, teachers and other civil servants?"

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In the latest installment of their "Invitation to Dialogue" series, the NYT runs this letter from former museum director Frank Ro...

Wait -- you mean this thing wasn't over when Peter Schjeldahl conceded?

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Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr has hired Christie’s to appraise "the city-owned multibillion dollar collection at the DIA." ...
Monday, August 05, 2013

"Deaccessioning debates are not for the faint of heart."

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A pair of good posts from Nicholas O'Donnell on the situation in Detroit.
Friday, August 02, 2013

And while I'm here ...

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Judge Oetken has dismissed the rest of Peter Paul Biro's defamation lawsuit against The New Yorker (and others).  See here on the earl...

"It's not an 'argument' to suggest that anyone who advocates selling off the DIA's masterpieces is an art-hating philistine."

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" Even if they're wrong, as I think they are, the sell-the-art crowd is making a morally serious case that can't be countered b...
Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Where I've Been

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When I saw what they did to Peter Schjeldahl , I went into deep hiding.  Never mess with the Deaccession Police!  Actually I've been on...
Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Peter Schjeldahl says Detroit should sell the art

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And it's not a close call : "Art works have migrated throughout history. Unless destroyed, they are always somewhere. It’s best ...
Tuesday, July 23, 2013

"How does a museum decide to dissolve?"

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The NYT's Robin Pogrebin has a piece asking whether the Fresno Metropolitan Museum of Art, which shut down in 2010, "holds any les...

Today's Detroit Links

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The bankruptcy judge has set a hearing tomorrow on the constitutionality of the proceeding. Jonathan Chait , who grew up there, says ...
Monday, July 22, 2013

Today's Detroit Links

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New York Times, page A1:  Cries of Betrayal as Detroit Plans to Cut Pensions . CBS Evening News had a segmen t last night on the possible ...
Friday, July 19, 2013

BREAKING: State court judge halts Detroit bankruptcy proceeding

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On the grounds that " it's not honoring the president ."

Detroit Links

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Randy Kennedy and Monica Davey in the NYT:  Detroit’s Creditors Eye Its Art Collection . A Q+A by Mark Stryker of the Detroit Free Press....

"So Mrs. Dogaru told the police that on a freezing night in February, she placed all seven works ...in a wood-burning stove used to heat saunas and incinerated them." (UPDATED 2X)

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The New York Times:  Romanian’s Tale Has Art World Fearing the Worst . Ann Althouse :  "If you're hardcore enough to burn these ...

Tell me again about the public trust (automobile edition)

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The Petersen Auto Museum in Los Angeles is selling off a third of its collection.

"Ten paintings stolen from Brussels museum"

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The Art Newspaper has a report here . The Art Market Monitor :  "Despite the fact it is nearly impossible to sell stolen art ... vand...
Thursday, July 18, 2013

Everybody's got one (UPDATED)

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CNN is first out of the blocks with a story on what Detroit's bankruptcy means for the DIA.  We talked recently about how much weight ...

BREAKING: Detroit files for bankruptcy

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" The largest American city ever to take such a course ."

Hey, go big or go home

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A whole museum full of fakes .

"The problem is that the art market isn’t allowed, by its practitioners, to be a real market, and instead operates on a series of conventions which make it deeply broken on many levels."

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That's Felix Salmon , connecting venture capital "down rounds" to the art market.  Related thoughts from Mostafa Heddaya here ...

"In Detroit, though, we run the risk of making smug assumptions about the nature of art and the public trust that won’t necessarily withstand scrutiny. "

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Detroit News columnist Laura Berman wonders whether the city really needs a million-dollar Howdy Doody puppet.  (I'm quoted in the colu...
Wednesday, July 17, 2013

BREAKING: New Rosales Indictment

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" The indictment depicts a complete circle of fraud perpetrated by Glafira Rosales - fake paintings sold on behalf of non-existent clie...
Monday, July 15, 2013

"It is a betrayal of trust toward the public to which the Foundation is beholden"

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Dia's founders continue to violate the rules of deaccession debate .  Somebody forgot to tell them that it's only a violation of th...
Saturday, July 13, 2013

"Artists and collectors will be reluctant to give works to Dia if this sale occurs."

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Paul Winkler, former director of the Menil Collection and the brother of Dia co-founder Helen Winkler, is not happy with Dia's deaccess...
Wednesday, July 10, 2013

"It’s a fairly lackluster group."

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Bernie Madoff's art collection heads to auction .
Tuesday, July 09, 2013

"The city is past being a city now; it’s gone."

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The NYT has a front-page story today on Detroit:  " Financial Crist Just a Symptom of Detroit's Woes ." And the Washington P...
Monday, July 08, 2013

"A key tax benefit for art owners in a same-sex marriage is that there will now be no federal estate tax due on the value of art passing to a spouse."

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The Art Newspaper’s Martha Lufkin on the DOMA decision’s effect on art collectors, artists and dealers who are in same-sex marriages.  My p...
Wednesday, July 03, 2013

"Dreier Victim Acquires Fraudster’s Fancy Art Collection"

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The WSJ Law Blog has the details .  No word yet on what's happening to the non-fancy art.
Tuesday, July 02, 2013

14.5% more in the public trust

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The Met is now open seven days a week .
Monday, July 01, 2013

"Here’s a great example of fair use."

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Says Sergio Muñoz Sarmiento .