Lee Rosenbaum's cultural commentary

On Apr. 23, the U.S. Copyright Office will conduct a public hearing on the pros and cons of possible federal legislation to mandate artists' resale royalties. In advance of the hearing, the Copyright Office invited statements from interested parties. Some 59 comments are posted here. Among them---an astonishing missive from the Association of Art Museum Directors, finding fault with the notion of granting artists the right to participate in the profits from resales of their work. You can read about the specific issues that the Copyright … [Read more...]

It's no secret that I haven't always seen eye-to-eye with the Washington Post's Philip Kennicott, the art-and-architecture critic who on Monday was named to receive the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for criticism. But reasonable critics can disagree, and it's good to see art criticism once again getting the spotlight. The Pulitzer had now gone to three art critics in the past five years---Holland Cotter (NY Times), Sebastian Smee (Boston Globe) and now Kennicott. UPDATE: The year before Cotter, another art critic won---Mark Feeney (Boston Globe). … [Read more...]

My glitchy "Contact" link on the blue strip in the upper left corner of this blog is now working again. If you sent me a message in the last few weeks, I did not receive it. Please send it again. (But try not to inundate me all at once, art-lings!) While you're clicking "Contact," please don't forget to also click "Donate" (in the right column), if you care about what I do and would like to support it. Support via speaking engagements (such as my recent gig in St. Louis) is also welcome. Now that this brief commercial is done, back to … [Read more...]

The Boston Museum of Fine Arts this morning added the missing ingredient (which I had been hoping for) to last night's message regarding its role as refuge for traumatized Bostonians. This just in from the BMFA: In response to the tragic events at yesterday’s Boston Marathon, general admission to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), will be free to the public [emphasis added] today, Tuesday, Apr. 16.  The Museum’s galleries and special exhibitions will be open for visitors who wish to find a place of respite during this painful time … [Read more...]

As we all struggle to comprehend the incomprehensible, here's how the Boston Museum of Fine Arts responded last evening to the Marathon Massacre: Our hearts go out to the runners, families, fans and first responders impacted by the tragic events at the Boston Marathon finish line today. The Museum will be open tomorrow (Tuesday, Apr. 16). We hope to be a place of comfort, refuge, and joy for thousands of families during this vacation week. Museum security staff will be on high alert and in communication with the Boston Police Department to … [Read more...]

If you've been trying to reach me through the "Contact" link in the upper left of this blog, I just realized a few days ago that it's not working and hasn't for many weeks. From your end, it has looked like it worked, but those messages never got through to me. The ArtsJournal techies are trying valiantly to vanquish these gremlins. I'll let you know if and when they succeed. Meanwhile, there's always carrier pigeon. I apologize, but I can't post my e-mail address on the blog, due to the spam factor. If you already do have my e-mail … [Read more...]

While in St. Louis for my speaking engagement at the Contemporary Art Museum, I also got a chance to explore the exterior of the soon-to-open David Chipperfield-designed, LEED gold-certified expansion of the St. Louis Art Museum, fully funded at a thrifty $160 million, including about $30 million for endowment. The new East Building, more than 200,000 square feet in size, will contain 21 galleries, increasing the museum's total space for exhibiting art by about 30 percent. It will be be a place for post-1945 works and some ancient art from … [Read more...]

There was a lot of late-night handwringing (some of which you may have caught on my Twitter feed) bemoaning yesterday's announcement of the imminent demolition by the Museum of Modern Art of the 12-year-young former flagship facility of the American Folk Art Museum. I regard its failed interior as unworthy of saving, although its distinctive (if somewhat forbidding) sculptural bronze façade (with its almost hidden recessed entrance) might have merited preservation: MoMA bought this building (which adjoins it) from AFAM in 2011 for … [Read more...]

In his just submitted proposed budget for 2014 (on P. 36), President Obama ignored the plea of nonprofits to preserve the current level of deductibility for charitable donations, sticking to his plan for a 28% limit on the combined financial benefit to taxpayers from charitable donations and mortgage deductions. The current limit is 39.6%. Here's an example to illustrate what this means: Under current law, if you donate $100 and are in the top tax bracket, your deduction of $100 from your taxable income could be worth a maximum of $39.60 in … [Read more...]

I got this one right. The Metropolitan Museum this evening announced what director Tom Campbell called, with no hyperbole, "a truly transformational gift"---the pledge by megacollector Leonard Lauder of 78 works, including 33 by Picasso (including the painting shown above), 17 by Braque, 14 by Gris, and 14 by Léger. The gift will be accompanied by the establishment of a new Leonard A. Lauder Research Center for Modern Art, which will be bankrolled by a $22-million endowment, contributioned by Lauder and other Met trustees and … [Read more...]

In Wednesday's press release announcing its new strategic plan to forge a close connection with the University of Maryland (UMD), the financially foundering Corcoran Gallery and College of Art + Design described their proposed relationship as a "partnership." But reading between the lines of the institutions' Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) strongly suggests that far from a collaboration of equals, this a takeover by the fiscally and administratively stronger institution. He who pays the piper calls the tune. What's more, it appears that … [Read more...]

I had a good-sized, lively audience Friday evening for my St. Louis lecture at the Contemporary Art Museum (CAM) on the precarious state of museum finances. But I was working against tough competion: Bill and Chelsea Clinton (not Hillary) were in town, speaking at Washington University at the exact same time as my talk. Perhaps that's why not too many students showed up at CAM, even though Elizabeth Childs, the chairman of Wash U's art history department, told me after my lecture that her students all read and savor CultureGrrl. ("Let's … [Read more...]

I've been mostly off-blog this week (save for a flurry of news-related posts today), because I've been preparing for my lecture this Friday on museum finances---Monetizing Culture: Will Museums Fall Off the Fiscal Cliff? It's under the auspices of the Greater St. Louis Humanities Festival, whose somewhat mercenary theme this year is: "Money, Money: Need, Greed and Generosity." The speaking invitation was extended to me by the Laumeier Sculpture Park. As I was preparing for this talk, with its now anachronistic title (since we've now moved … [Read more...]

The Corcoran Gallery and College of Art and Design today announced a Memorandum of Understanding with the University of Maryland that "opens the way to further negotiation to achieve a partnership. The announcement states: Over the next several months discussions and research about the specifics of the partnership will proceed with guidance from a Strategic Framework for a New Corcoran that has been developed by the Corcoran’s Board and leadership. The collaboration would make possible programmatic and operational initiatives that would … [Read more...]

Jean-Luc Martinez, 49, the Louvre's head of Greek, Etruscan and Roman art since 2007, has been named to succeed Henri Loyrette as director of the world's most visited museum, effective Apr. 15. The early word on la rue about the new director is enthusiastic. In a detailed analysis of the appointment (and of the other candidates who were in the running), Nathaniel Herzberg of Le Monde said this promotion-from-within was "without doubt, the consensus choice." Herzberg noted that this will be "the first time in 50 years" that an archaeologist … [Read more...]

It's probably a good thing that Colin Bailey wasn't present at the de Young Museum for yesterday's celebratory announcement of his selection to be the next director of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Had he been there, he would likely have winced at remarks by Diane "Dede" Wilsey, the museums' voluble president. During the question-and-answer part of the event, she stated that Bailey would "evaluate whether we have the finest people we can have," in consultation with Richard Benefield, the deputy director, "should he [Bailey] choose … [Read more...]

"It's a dream come true....I've long wanted to be a director of a museum!" exulted the absent Colin Bailey in a video (at the bottom of this post) prepared by search firm m/Oppenheim for the rollout of his directorship today at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. Museum president Diane "Dede" Wilsey described Bailey, currently deputy director and curator at the Frick Collection, New York, as "a leader known internationally as a scholar" and "also somebody who is fun!" Here's what the Frick's director, Ian Wardropper, said about … [Read more...]

I still have had no response from LA MOCA to my various questions, regarding the museum's uncertain future and checkered past, but CultureGrrl reader John Sandercock, a New York attorney with no connection to the in-recovery Los Angeles museum, helpfully explains for us why officials from MOCA and legal experts might disagree with the assertion in a 2010 LA Times article (which I repeated, here) that MOCA had "broken state laws": The MOCA Board did not "break the law" in the sense that most people use that expression, which is the violation of … [Read more...]

Wanna see the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco's "Special Announcement," streamed live from the de Young Museum? Soon you can! Go here today at noon, California time, to learn the results of the board's special meeting today to select the museums' new director. … [Read more...]

On P. 3 of its publicly posted agenda for tomorrow's Special Meeting, the board of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco has revealed that it will take up the following item in closed session: Consideration and Possible Action to Appoint a New Director of Museums of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco The trustees will then reconvene in open session and provide a "Possible Report on Action Taken in Closed Session." I'd better be right about this. If the designee is not Colin Bailey, I will be eating the bread of affliction and bitter … [Read more...]