More on the Met Succession; Musings on the Guggenheim Departure UPDATED

Should I cross Max Anderson off my list of hot prospects for the Metropolitan Museum directorship?

Here's what he wrote me in response to yesterday's Who Should Succeed Philippe at the Met? An Update:

Jacqueline and I are having a great time here and are in no hurry to leave!

Let's see. If James Houghton were to call and say, "Max, we really need you at the Met," would the New Yorker-in-exile say, "Thanks, Jamie, I'd rather be in Indianapolis"?

Anderson also e-mailed this link to the prototype for the Indianapolis Museum's new website, launching soon. Although not fully functional yet, it looks to have many nifty features. Anderson was always the tech-friendliest museum director, even way back when he was at the Michael C. Carlos Museum at Emory University, Atlanta.

In other Met prospect news, Glasstire, an online visual arts journal in Texas (supported in part by the Texas Commission for the Arts), took exception to my endorsement of Timothy Potts for the post.

Rainey Knudson, in his July 30 entry, wrote:

Potts has made some interesting acquisitions and made a good hire in curator Malcolm Warner, but is hardly regarded locally as a big success story.

Maybe in accepting the Fitzwilliam top spot in Cambridge, England, he's going where his talents will be better appreciated. But the reasons for his precipitous and unexpected resignation from the Kimbell have yet to be revealed. Could this compromise his spot in the influential CultureGrrl rankings?

Speaking of unknown reasons for a director's departure, did the shock announcement today of Lisa Dennison's even more precipitous flight (leaving at the end of August) from the Guggenheim have anything to do with differences with Tom Krens? She was certainly taking the New York museum in a different (and to my mind, desirable) direction, privileging the permanent collection.

And what should we make of this statement, quoted in the above-linked NY Times article, by Bill Ruprecht, chief executive at Sotheby's, where Dennison will focus on international business development:

We've been working a lot with the Guggenheim recently and have gotten to know Lisa. She's great with clients.

"Working a lot with the Guggenheim"??? Is it deaccession time?

UPDATE: Sotheby's has just issued a press release, giving Dennison's new title as executive vice president, Sotheby's North America. Guggenheim spokesperson Betsy Ennis says that the recent working relationship between the museum and the auction house has consisted of Sotheby's sponsorship of the upcoming Richard Prince retrospective (opening Sept. 28) and the Guggenheim's participation museum in the recently announced Sotheby's credit card program.

Deaccessions? "I thought that was a joke! Absolutely not."