Real Clear Arts

Judith H. Dobrzynski on Culture

Detroit Institute Addresses Compensation Complaints

A short time ago, the Detroit Institute of Arts responded to the criticism that has kept it in the news for the wrong reasons this week–and threatened to undermine support for the millage tax that provides $23 million on operating support each year. Board chair Edward Gargaro signed the statement, which said that “unfortunately misunderstandings have occurred.” Indeed.

AMEricksonIn a key paragraph, Gargaro promised to discuss the matter the public officials threatened to repeal the millage:

We will continue to provide our community with exceptional museum programs and will do so in a way that is responsible, transparent and reflects proudly on the history of this great institution. Representatives of the DIA Board of Directors will meet in the near future to consider the best means to work with elected officials in Macomb, Oakland and Wayne Counties to ensure that there is full transparency on compensation decisions. We will continue to steward our resources, which to a significant extent have been entrusted to us by citizens of the tri-county area, in a very careful, responsible manner that recognizes both the exceptional quality of the museum and the exceptional leadership of those who are directing its course, and we appreciate the continued support of all of the citizens of the tri-county area.

The statement runs through all the numbers, and adds a critical fact–that Annmarie Erickson (at right) was promoted at one point, but did not receive compensation for that until much later, retrospectively. Consequently, she did receive a 36% pay increase.

When the contract was finalized, Ms. Erickson received her salary increase at that time retroactive to the date of her assumption of her new duties, and in 2012 she received a 2011 performance bonus as well. The 36% pay increase which has been reported so prominently in the press resulted from this “bunching” of compensation related to 2011 into 2012. Had the compensation been paid in 2011 when it was earned, the increase in compensation from 2011 to 2012 would have been 4% not 36%.

This is all critical information to voters and residents. As I said earlier, Beal and Erickson probably deserved their raises–but optics are important. Good that they are being addressed. especially now that the last piece of the Grand Bargain puzzle is falling into place.

At The Philbrook: Retrospective For A No-Longer-Needed Exhibition

1954_12_PressThis Sunday, the Philbrook Museum of Art in Tulsa opens what I think should be a fascinating show: IMPACT: The Philbrook Indian Annual. It’s a retrospective on the competition the Philbrook held for 33 years, from 1946 to 1979, open to Native American artists. The museum says that

Over the years nearly 1,000 artists from 200 Native American communities entered almost 4,000 works of art for judging, exhibition, awards, and sale. The Philbrook Indian Annual played a pivotal role in the definition of twentieth-century Native American fine art through several key aspects of the competition’s design…

It stopped before I was paying much, if any, attention to Indian art–but I can believe that the month-long Annual played an important role in the recognition of the value of Indian art. Here are some aspects of the annual that made it different, drawn from the press release:

  • The Philbrook Indian Annual focused on paintings, in a variety of styles, while other juried shows of the era emphasized traditional Native art forms like pottery and basketry.
  • It was a juried exhibition, not an outdoor festival.
  • Jurors were mostly other Native American artists reviewing the work of their peers, rather than exclusively non-Native art critics evaluating work emerging from Native American communities.
  • It sparked a significant critical dialogue surrounding the definition of Native art: what it was and what it should be,  In 1958 Philbrook became the site of a national conversation about this subject when judges rejected a painting by Yanktonai Dakota artist Oscar Howe (1915–1983). They thought it was too contemporary to be Indian art. (His Dance of the Heyoka, c.1954, is above left, while  W. Richard “Dick” West, Sr.’s Water Serpent, c, 1951, is at right, below.)

Howe, who criticized the panel for its narrow view, catalyzed the Philbrook to create a new category for Non-Traditional Painting the following year, 1959.

1951_11_PressThe Philbrook’s curator Christina E. Burke organized IMPACT, drawing from the Philbrook’s permanent collection. As the release notes:

The Annual helped shape the Philbrook collection into one of the finest surveys of twentieth century Native American art in the world. From the Museum’s announcement in 1938, Philbrook received important collections of such traditional Native objects as beadwork, pottery, textiles, and baskets from donors like, Roberta Campbell Lawson and Clark Field.

But I still wondered why the Philbrook discontinued the Annual. Here’s what they said:

By then [1979] the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe had opened in 1962; major museums had begun to include Native American art in their exhibitions and galleries; and media, collectors, and museum professionals began recognizing Native artists for their fine art over traditional art forms. Philbrook made its impact on Native American art through the Annual during those 33 years and encouragingly created its own obsolescence when the conversation surrounding Native American art began to evolve. We continue our emphasis on Native American fine art today through our exhibitions and extensive permanent collections at both Philbrook locations.

Clearly, what constitutes Native American art versus contemporary art continues today, at museums like the Peabody Essex and the Brooklyn Museum. The Annual may not have lost its relevance.

But there’s some good news: IMPACT may travel, the museum says.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of the Philbrook

Five Questions For Leonard Lauder As The Met Reveals His Cubist Collection

So this week the art world and the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s* members are getting a first look at the Leonard Lauder Cubist collection–assembled over the past 40 years. The masterpieces and seminal works he has purchased amount to the best private Cubist collection in existence, by design:  He always has a museum gift in mind as he collects. When I spoke with him in 2012, he said: “Many people collect to possess. I collect to preserve, and no sooner do I have a collection put together than I am looking for a home for it in a public institution.”

TerraceOftheHotelMistralThat belies reality, a little–he has told me that it’s long before he starts looking for a museum that he thinks about the coherence and importance of a collection he’s assembling. That quote came from a visit I made to him to discuss his postcard collection, much of which he gave to the MFA-Boston.  I wrote about it in a short piece for New Yorker.com, which relates–among other things–how he became a collector as a child.

More recently, but before he was giving interviews for the big Cubist reveal, I asked Lauder some questions via email. most of which I’ve  not seen asked or answered elsewhere. Here are his replies.

Which purchase/which painting convinced you to focus on Cubism, why and when was that? 

The picture that prompted me to focus on Cubism in a big way, and not just as part of a modernist collection, was Picasso’s Scallop Shell (Notre Avenir est dans l’air), which I acquired in 1980. But it is was a few years later, while attending a lecture by Kirk Varnedoe at the Institute of Fine Arts in New York, that the importance of this picture for my future collecting really hit me. The slide of it was projected on the screen and Kirk discussed it at length and I learned things about it that inspired me to dig even deeper into Cubism. I had bought it from the Leigh and Mary Block Collection, when it had been partially dispersed and I realized that if I could obtain pictures of this quality I was going to keep them together. As it happens, not that many people were collecting cubism at that time: Impressionism and Post-Impressionism were driving the market.

What was your first purchase of a Cubist work? Does it remain in the collection, or was it sold? Has there been much selling, to refine the collection?

I bought two drawings by Fernand Léger in the early months of 1976: Drawing for the “Staircase”, 1913, and Study for the “Aviateur”, 1920. The first was a beautiful gouache and oil on paper, from his famous pre-war “Contrasts of Forms” series and the second, a watercolor in his postwar Purist period style that really grabbed me for its clean lines and precise design. (I have a few Legers from the early 1920s, and think of Purism as the last moment in the original heroic years of Cubism.)

I have sold very few of my Cubist works– I think I can count them on one hand, and only when I wanted to refine the collection, or in another case, because I was feeling financially pressed at the time.

You have two works from the historic first show of Cubism in 1908–when did you get them, and what are the stories behind their purchases? (E.g., were they hard to find, were many other collectors after them? Etc.)

The Terrace of the Hotel Mistral, 1907, was in a fine American private collection for years–the Werner and Margaret Josten collection. It was the dealer Stephen Mazoh who brought it to my attention in 1994. Since I was already known by then as a collector of Cubism, dealers often put me on the list to contact–maybe even the top of the list. This was not a picture that I had identified and chased as was often the case, but one that came to me. As soon as I saw it, I knew what it was: Braque’s last fauve, first proto-Cubist picture, and that it was in the famous show. Trees at L’Estaque, the second picture that I own that was in the historic Kahnweiler show and part of the breakthrough landscapes by Braque of “little cubes” (as the critics called them), came from the Douglas Cooper estate, the majority of which I had purchased in late 1986.

ScallopShellWhich work had the place of honor in your apartment–and why?

They are equally honored. But the one that takes up the largest wall area is Léger’s The Typographer, (1918-1919), simply because it is by far the largest in scale, a scale unusual for a Cubist picture.

What will hang in your apartment when the exhibition is up at the Met?

Before I started to collect Cubism, I had started to acquire works by German and Austrian modernists. I still have several painting and drawings from this earlier phase of my collecting and those will take pride of place while the works are on exhibition at the MMA. As you know, I have also bought fabulous modern posters over the years, from the first half of the twentieth century. I also intend to hang some works by my fiancé, Judy Ellis Glickman, who is an acclaimed photographer.

The exhibition, which opens on October 20, presents 81 works of art. You can bet they will be a treat to see.

Photo Credits: Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum

*I consult to a foundation that support the Met

Mistake at DIA: A Pay-Raise Ruckus And A Solution

In the last two years or so, I’ve often praised the Detroit Institute of Arts for conducting itself in the right way–with respect to passing the millage and in how it has handled itself during the city’s bankruptcy. Now, though, it has made a major mistake–in terms of optics if not substance.

GargaroAnd it may cost the museum big, in terms of local support. Some local legislators are threatening to take action.

According to several reports, the board handed out big raises to the top two execs in 2012: Director Graham Beal received a 13% raise in total compensation to $514,000, including a $50,000 bonus, and COO Annmarie Erickson saw her pay rise 36% to $369,000, including the same bonus.

Both undoubtedly worked hard: 2012 was the year they campaigned hard to persuade voters in three Detroit counties to tax themselves a tiny bit, about $15 a year on every $150,000 of a home’s fair-market value, for 10 years and hand over what would amount to $23 million a year to the DIA for operations. In return, residents received free admission to the permanent collection galleries. As I wrote then, in an article for The Wall Street Journal,

In recent months Graham Beal has been working all but nonstop, speaking at community breakfasts and Rotary Club lunches, appearing at city council meetings, county hearings and fund-raising events, doing media interviews, conferring with political strategists. “I have not yet kissed any babies,” he says, with a slight chuckle that turns into a sigh.

So did he and Erickson deserve a raise? Probably–at least the bonus.

Detroit didn’t declare bankruptcy until July, 2013, but the  DIA board must have seen a crisis coming in some manifestation. Now, when pensioners and Detroit’s creditors are all taking haircuts, the action of trustees, no matter how well-meaning, looks off-key and out of line.

As the Detroit News reported:

Oakland County Commissioner Dave Woodward, D-Royal Oak, said he spoke Friday with Gene Gargaro (pictured), chair of the DIA compensation committee, and asked him to either have the money returned or put measures in place to ensure this does not happen again.

If nothing happens, Woodward said, he would take steps to dissolve the Oakland County Arts Authority that collects the voter approved $11 million annually for the DIA.

“The DIA must act now to acknowledge the mistake, apologize and fix it,” Woodward said. “Otherwise, I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to see that no further Oakland County monies go to it.”

Asked for comment Monday, Gargaro confirmed he spoke with Woodward on Friday and told The News: “I need time to consider what Dave and I discussed … when I have something meaningful, I will share it with you.”

Another lawmaker, Eileen Kowall, also said she’s talking to the DIA board of directors in hopes that they will reconsider.

Kowall, the Detroit Free Press reported, “…said she has gone to bat for the museum in the past, supporting legislation to ensure money from the millage goes to the DIA and not other uses. “I felt kind of blindsided I guess,’ she said. ‘I felt a little bit like a chump.’ ”

Optics matter in cases like this. It’s going to be sticky no matter what happens, but I think the DIA board should reconsider–and either make its case publicly or find another solution.

Way back when, you may remember, some rich board members of the Museum of Modern Art supplemented Glenn Lowry’s salary with their own funds. Mike Bloomberg did the same for some members of his mayoral staff. Perhaps that is what can happen here.

 

Mystery Solved: The Man Who Bought The Rothschild Prayerbook

Though I was hoping, last January, that the Getty Museum had purchased the marvelous Rothschild Prayerbook when it came up for auction at Christie’s, no press release ever emerged from Brentwood, so I had long since figured that it had disappeared into a private collection and wouldn’t be seen for some time. I was wrong.

RothschildPrayerbookThe 150-page prayerbook, you’ll recall, is a lavishly illuminated medieval Book of Hours, and at the time of its sale was considered to be the most important illuminated manuscript in private hands. It had been commissioned by a member of the Dutch imperial court, made in Ghent or Bruges around 1505-1510, and contains a Madonna and child by Gerard David, plus 67 full-page illuminations by Gerard Horenbout, Simon Bening and Alexander Bening, the top illuminators of their day. Baron Anselm von Rothschild (1803-74) bought it sometime in the 1800s, but the Nazis grabbed it from his heirs in 1938. Soon after Austria finally returned it to the family in 1998, the late Baroness Bettina de Rothschild consigned it to Christie’s. In 1999, it fetched almost triple its presale high estimate of about $4.7 million–setting a record of nearly $13.4 million. There were five bidders.

In January, I think, there was only one bidder, or maybe two, and the winner got it for $13.6 million. The hammer price was $12 million — exactly at the low estimate of $12 million to $18 million. Last month, he revealed himself–and far from hoarding it, he has put the prayerbook  on the road.

Trouble is, his road is in Australia. His name is Kerry Stokes, and he is chairman of Channel Seven there. He also has interests in other media, both electronic and print, plus property, mining, and construction equipment, according to Wikipedia. Based in Perth, he’s sending to Canberra and Melbourne, according to Australian reports.

Having paged through it myself, I know what he meant when he said “When I first saw it, I actually didn’t know if I should touch it and open it. I started to turn the pages and the hair on the back of my arm stood up. I’m a pretty tough nut, I guess, and I love art as one of the expressions that…probably appeals to the softer side a lot of people would deny I have. This is so unique I expect a lot of people will want to come and see it – we will have something else to offer that nobody else has and that’s the Rothschild Prayerbook.”

That’s from an account in the Daily Mail.

Stokes reportedly has a large art collection. In 2008, the Art Gallery of Western Australia presented an exhibit called PEEP: GLIMPSES OF THE LAST 4 DECADES FROM THE KERRY STOKES COLLECTION. It included Australian artists and others such as Andy Warhol, Bridget Riley, Alfred Jensen, Philip Pearlstein, and Walter de Maria. Then, last November through March, the AGWA presented A PRIVATE VIEW: MODERN MASTERS FROM THE KERRY STOKES COLLECTION, which included works by Monet, Courbet, Matisse and Magritte.

About the same time, he was said to be an “avid collector of rare illuminated manuscripts” and he lent twelve of them to the New Norcia Museum and Art Gallery in Western Australia, in show called Celebrating Word and Image 1250 – 1600. A slide show at the link shows they are nice, but cannot compare with his new prize, a true treasure.

Even if you do not travel to Australia to see this (and it is amazing, as I was allowed to page through it at Christie’s), Stokes wants to share it–I’ve heard unofficially that he is making a documentary about the prayerbook.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Christie’sÂ