Archives for December 2010

Here’s one for the books: Last night, at Sotheby’s, a 2nd century marble Roman bust sold for a record $23,826,500 — more than 7 times the high presale estimate, which was $3 million (not including the buyer’s premium).

The portrait bust, “of the Deified Antinous, Roman Imperial, Reign of Hadrian,” came from the estate of Clarence Day, who was known to have a fine antiquities collection. Still, the entire sale was estimated at $5.7- to $8.6 million before the auction, and it fetched nearly $36.8 million.

Day died in 2009 after a car accident and, according to the Commercial Appeal of Memphis, inherited land in Mississippi that he expanded into “a collection of companies that dealt with everything from plywood to oil and gas exploration.” In his obit, the Appeal said that he had given away about $50 million in his lifetime. The Memphis Brooks Museum of Art was among his beneficiaries — in 1989, he donated 60 pieces of Roman, Greek, Etruscan and other anitquities (but I found no mention of them in the collections area of the Brooks website), the paper said. 

According to Sotheby’s:

The Marble Portrait Bust of the Deified Antinous is the only known Classical representation of Antinous, outside of his coin portraits, to be identified by an inscription. Auctioneer Hugh Hildesley opened the bidding at $900,000 and two clients in the room and one on the phone began to battle. The winning bidder, a European collector, entered the fray at $6.5 million and prevailed against the three existing bidders and another client who only joined the competition at $11.2 million. In all, it took more than eleven minutes for the lot to sell and when the hammer finally fell the room broke out in applause.

Other lots also fetched much more than the estimates — results are here. Which shows there is no lack of interest in antiquities. Auction houses always say “it only takes two,” but in this case, there were a lot more.

Sotheby’s also racked up another record yesterday, when a first edition of John James Audubon’s “Birds of America” — which has 435 hand-colored illustrations — fetched $11.5 million, a record for any printed work sold at auction. The previous record was $8.8 million, for another copy of Audubon’s work.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Sotheby’s

 

Today’s Wall Street Journal carries a Cultural Conversation I did with Rebecca Robertson, president and executive producer of the Park Avenue Armory. It lays out the challenges she has creating a new cultural venue for New York City, one that will stand out in a place that’s already full of cultural offerings.

The peg was “Leonardo’s Last Supper: A Vision By Peter Greenaway,” which opened last Friday and runs through Jan. 6. But the piece was more about her plans for the giant drill hall. Her strategy is about “the power of the space.” She wants to “do all of the arts equally,” offering a home to arts installations, dances, operas, etc. that don’t want to contain themselves in other places.

Her challenge, as I see it and as she acknowledges, is to create a large constituency from people who are interested in all of the arts. Traditionally, many have not been — they favor one or two over others. Her response:

I think crossover is really important if you look at the way arts are going. People want multimedia.

She may be right. (But she can’t be happy with Holland Cotter’s review of the Greenaway piece, which called it “a dud” — personally, I liked it better than he did, but not all of it. I though the prologue was lame and the main section too repetitive.) Other institutions, like the Walker Art Center, successfully draw people interested in many art forms, though perhaps not all.

But visitors are not the same as financial supporters, and it remains to be seen if she can attract them as well. Part of that will depend on the vision she reveals — created by Herzog and de Meuron for additional renovations, including the 19th Century period rooms. They are set to be revealed next spring. Robertson declined to discuss, or even hint at, what the architects are planning. But she has seen some ideas and says they will surprise people.

As someone who generally favors historic preservation, it’ll be in a good way, I hope.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Park Avenue Armory (bottom) 

The art world and much of the political world got all tangled up over the past week about the Hide/Seek controversy at the National Portrait Gallery, but I have to say that I’ve not been thrilled with the level of discourse. Much of it has been knee-jerk, a “whose ox is gored” and “where you stand depends on where you sit” stance that sheds little light on anything and does not advance the ball.

In that vein, it troubles me that the Association of Art Museum Directors — issuing what many described as an unusally tough statement on Friday — threw around of the term “censorship.” As in:

More disturbing than the Smithsonian’s decision to remove this work of art is the cause: unwarranted and uninformed censorship from politicians and other public figures, many of whom, by their own admission, have seen neither the exhibition as a whole or this specific work.

I commend the group for acting swiftly, but I beg to differ with that comment.

It’s unclear to me, having read much but not all of the reporting on the subject, whether NPG director Martin E. Sullivan (below) acted alone in removing the “offending” piece (not having seen it, I have no idea if I would be offended) or whether he was ordered to by G. Wayne Clough, Secretary of the Smithsonian.

If he acted alone, there was no censorship — and AAMD’s beef is with Sullivan, seems to me. If Clough ordered it, one could make a case that it was censorship — though there was no prior restraint.  

To imply, as AAMD does, that incoming Speaker of the House John Boehner and incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor practiced censorship is misconstruing their protests. Yes, they have leverage over the Smithsonian budget, but they can’t control it on their own — what they can do is stir the nation, yet again, against art.

Yet they, and others who called the work offensive, are just as entitled to free speech as was artist David Wojnarowicz. The very next line in the AAMD statement says this:

The AAMD believes that freedom of expression is essential to the health and welfare of our communities and our nation.

If so, it’s free speech for all, including those one vehemently disagrees with — isn’t it? Their right to free speech should have been acknowledged in the statement. The art world does not cover itself in glory by implying it is sacrosanct and that art (especially political art, which this was) can not be criticized.

It’s also unclear to me whether Sullivan himself saw the entire 4-minute video piece in question, including the 11 seconds in questions, before the controversy. If he did not, he set himself up for criticism.

Sullivan’s short statement about removing the work may have been designed to put an end to the controversy, but it leaves open exactly what happened.

Call me conservative, but I do believe that national institutions like the Smithsonian should play by slightly different rules than museums that draw no funds from the public purse. That’s not to say controversial art should be avoided — how could it be? — but that costs must be weighed. Trying to say, as the NPG did, that exhibitions are privately funded, while the staff and buildings are not, is no excuse. (Logically, that would lead to firing the curator…) 

I have another question that I have yet to see addressed: the NPG show has been on view since October, but it was only last week that the flareup erupted — and not on Fox News. I believe it came first on CBS. CNS [Please see comment from Michael Botwinick below]. Who, in particular, is trying to re-ignite the culture wars? And why is the art world playing into his or her (actually probably “their”) hands?

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the NPG (bottom) 

 

Has it come to this? Vandalism against property of Friends of the Barnes Foundation members?

That’s what artist Nancy Herman is reporting today. For years, she and her husband Walter have planted large signs opposing the move to downtown Philadelphia on their property on Latches Lane, where the Barnes is located. 

Last night, someone defaced the newest sign, which was on a fence, with red paint. It showed Dr. Albert C. Barnes, surrounded by many artists whose work he collected, and read: “Why spend hundreds of millions on a faux Barnes when we have the original?” Another sign, on their lawn, which read “Join the Fight to Save the Barnes” had been torn away and thrown over the fence of the Barnes Foundation, which is directly across the street, Herman says.

Friends’ members are calling it an act of intimidation — which is possible, though not the only possibility. It might simply be vandalism. However, it is curious that just this week, state politicians gave opponents of the move a glimmer of hope, saying that they may not approve a $1 billion bond issue that included funding for the move. Friends also note that the Barnes Society was having its annual holiday party in the galleries this afternoon.

The Hermans attached temporary signs to the defaced poster saying “The Barnes Belongs In Merion” and “Join The Fight To Save The Barnes.”

I sure hope the fight isn’t getting physical, and it’s sad that I have to even express that.

Photo Credit: Courtesy Friends of the Barnes Foundation

 

Some self-portraits stop people in their tracks; you have to look. Max Beckmann’s 1927 Self-Portrait in Tuxedo is one of them.

In today’s Wall Street Journal, for the Saturday “Masterpiece” column, I analyze that painting, which was once owned by the National Gallery of Berlin, but — thanks to Hitler — was sold and now is the propoerty of Harvard’s Busch-Reisinger Museum.

Beckmann was a master of self-portraits. As I wrote, “Over the years, he painted himself with a horn, with a champagne glass, in a hotel, with a red scarf, with a saxophone, in a bowler hat, with soap bubbles, as a medical orderly, in Florence, in front of a red curtain, in a sailor hat, as an acrobat on a trapeze, in a blue jacket, on and on–and, in 1927, in a tuxedo.”

This one is clearly the best. In it, Beckmann “exudes self-confidence, control, power, singularity (brilliance?) and even arrogance.”

To read more, here’s the link. Or you can just gaze at the work yourself.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Busch-Reisinger Museum