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Readers respond to Tamayo, the First Maier Museum Deaccession, Offered Next Week: Erik Neil, executive director of the Heckscher Museum of Art in Huntington, NY, writes:This is a sad expedient for a college with such a distinguished legacy in the arts. A quick fix now and then in a couple years there will be reports about new financial and management problems. This sale will … [Read more...] about BlogBacks on Randolph College’s Sale of Tamayo

I've been shirking my obligation to give you my opinion of James Cuno's new book (above), Who Owns Antiquity?, because I wasn't relishing the prospect of slamming it. But on Monday, an e-mail hit my inbox from the book's Princeton University Press publicist, sending me links to other articles mentioning the book (including a Wall Street Journal review that found it … [Read more...] about Cuno Conundrum: Whose Law Is It, Anyway?

Before the Fall: Tullio Lombardo, "Adam," ca. 1490-95, Metropolitan Museum of Art Martin Bailey's report last week in the Art Newspaper about the damage to a 500-year-old panel painting by Domenico Beccafumi at London's National Gallery (which "slipped out of its temporary frame and dropped to the ground," breaking in half) brought to mind a major 2002 mishap at the … [Read more...] about Museum Objects Falling Down: London’s National Gallery, New York’s Metropolitan Museum

I've become an expert on museum issues, on museum problems, on the history of museums, on the nature and purpose of museums. I expect what I'll be doing will be more museological than art historical. It would be closer to what I would call high art appreciation than art history.---Philippe de Montebello at his January press conference, announcing his imminent departure from the … [Read more...] about Philippe at Abu NYU: Will He Still Blast Rent-a-Louvre?

WNYC had website audio glitches for most of the day. It wasn't just my particular segment that was silenced...dispelling my paranoid fantasy that an ingenious auction minion, embedded at the radio station, had prevented my embeddng this market-analysis podcast on my blog. Just kidding (I think). Here it is (I hope): … [Read more...] about New York Public Radio Podcast: You CAN Hear Me Now (really!)

Rufino Tamayo, "Trovador," 1945 The evening Latin American sale on May 28 at Christie's includes one of the four lots from the collection of the Maier Museum, Randolph College, Lynchburg, VA, that were supposed to hit the block last November---Rufino Tamayo's Trovador (above), estimated at $2-3 million. The sales were stalled by a lawsuit filed by opponents, including … [Read more...] about Tamayo, the First Maier Museum Deaccession, Offered Next Week

Roman Abramovich[UPDATE: You can now click on my podcast, at the end of this post. SECOND UPDATE: Oh what a glitchy morning! At this writing, nothing happens when you click the podcast, below. But I'm leaving it up because WNYC says it will fix the problem. We can only hope. THIRD UPDATE: There's now audio up, but it's the podcast for my WNYC auction report from last fall! … [Read more...] about Art Newspaper Pegs Russian Industrialist as Buyer of Freud and Bacon (UPDATED WITH MY WNYC PODCAST)

Art is long; technology, glitchy.Due to problems that WNYC had in establishing a phone line, I'm now scheduled to expound on the art market at 8:40 a.m. You'll note that when I inform you about my upcoming radio gigs, I always say, "if all goes according to plan"---because it frequently doesn't!So tune in, if you dare, to 93.9 FM or 820 AM, or tune in to CultureGrrl later, … [Read more...] about Due to Technical Difficulties…Hear Me on WNYC at 8:40 (maybe)

Can you sum up the current ambiguous state of the art market in a New York four minutes?New York Public Radio's Soterios Johnson and I will try, if all goes according to plan, tomorrow during the 7 a.m. hour on WNYC's Morning Edition. (I'm not usually even awake at 7 a.m., so we'll see if I can manage to be coherent when caffeinated.)Those of you who are early risers can hear … [Read more...] about My Art-Market Analysis Tomorrow on New York Public Radio

My guess as to how Judge Stanley Ott of Montgomery County Orphans' Court would rule on the question of whether to reopen the Barnes Foundation case has proven, unfortunately, to be correct.A bit less expeditiously than he had promised at the Mar. 24 court hearing, Judge Ott yesterday issued his ruling: He stood by his Dec. 13, 2004 decision to allow the Barnes to move from … [Read more...] about Judge Ott Declines to Reopen Barnes Case; Appeal Still Possible

A. Alfred Taubman, Sotheby's former chairman, out of jail and back (as a client) at the auction house last nightLast night was a watershed for Sotheby's, not just because of its many records broken by its Contemporary sale, but also because it was the last day for redemption of the antitrust settlement coupons (issued to compensate clients who were hurt by illegal collusion … [Read more...] about Another Sotheby’s/Christie’s Windfall: Unredeemed Auction Settlement Coupons

Why is this artist smiling?No, the above photo was not taken at the Brooklyn Museum. It's Takashi Murakami, posing in front of his $15.16-million "My Lonesome Cowboy," immediately after last night's Sotheby's Contemporary sale, which set auction records for him and 17 other artists.When I wrote yesterday about having once seen Robert Rauschenberg at a major auction of his work, … [Read more...] about Hits and Misses at Sotheby’s Highest-Grossing Auction in Its History

Top Lot: Mark Rothko, "No. 15," 1952 You've probably already heard about the bravura performance of Christie's in pulling off a highly successful contemporary art auction last night: ---Second-highest contemporary art auction total ever: $348,263,600---Record auction price for a living artist, set by Lucian Freud's "Benefits Supervisor Sleeping": $33,641,000---Auction records … [Read more...] about Contemporary Auction: Christie’s Roars Back

John Schaefer, referee for WNYC's "Soundcheck Smackdown"The undefeated CultureGrrl and my debate opponent, arts consultant Barry Hessenius, floated like a butterfly but didn't sting like a bee as we danced around the unanswerable question posed at yesterday's half-hour New York Public Radio Soundcheck Smackdown (for which I borrowed the empowering Wonder Woman costume from … [Read more...] about My “Youth vs. Experience” Musings on WNYC’s Radio “Smackdown”

Robert Rauschenberg at MASS MoCA during installation of "The 1/4 Mile or 2 Furlong Piece," 1999The above publicity image of the late Robert Rauschenberg is the only photo of anyone other than my own family that I display in my house. (It's taped to a wall in my office.) He inspired me with the breathtaking audacity of his improbable but irresistible inventions and his feisty, … [Read more...] about Robert Rauschenberg, 82: Forever Young, Always Remembered