First off, super cool word – deaccession – officially remove (an item) from the listed holdings of a library, museum, or art gallery, typically in order to sell it to raise funds.
Two lightning rod deaccessions (I can’t use that word enough) are afoot with similar alleged ‘transgressions’ but slightly different contexts.
The Berkshire Museum wants to sell some famous paintings to keep their doors open and a Massachusetts stay-of-sale was just lifted.
The LaSalle Museum, part of Philly’s LaSalle University, wants to sell some paintings to pay for more education.
So many good questions to ask in order to determine if these sins be cardinal or venial. Does anyone “own” art or do we just pay to be the current custodian and that comes with implicit mores. Does affiliation with the AAM come with “laws” or “general guidelines”? Both are lovely instances of museum philosophy versus some real world intrusions.
First, the summary: museums own the paintings, they can sell the paintings unless some real law exists to prohibit it. These sales may trigger some unwanted secondary repercussions (below), but there is a place in commerce for intangible greater-good stuff (e.g., historical status of buildings) and that blanket has not been deployed (nor should it) across the art market. You occasionally here vague references to “art law”, but there is no such thing, there are just “laws”, and so, the sales should not be blocked.
Let’s begin with the Boys of Berkshire. This one feels easier to me, assuming the good intent of the curator and museum board and their assertion that the sale is required to keep the doors open. It feels like all incentives here are correct. No curator/board wants to be the ones to lead a deaccession (another use!) for non-acquisition, so I can’t imagine they entered the decision lightly. Certainly their plan five years ago was to have a thriving museum showcasing some magnificent pieces by Norm. But, to quote the great philosopher Mike Tyson, “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face”. Rent, salaries and restoration can be potent punches in the punim. The opinions of the family are being brought in, museum associations are giving their two cents, but it feels like “sell them now, or sell them when we close down”. This is a body willing to amputate a foot to live and they can’t be thrilled about it. As an addendum, any effort to put constraints on the sale might feel good, but again, there is no such thing as ‘art law’, just the ‘law’ and commerce shall not be restricted.
LaSalle stirs up the question of overriding missions — does the mission of art curation and display supersede the mission of a University to educate. Do I even care that the use-of-proceeds is going to be for art education? It makes me feel better, but doesn’t change my opinion that they can do whatever they want with their paintings. The bad feeling I have is that the University did not deem art education important enough to fund it out of the core budget, but they will let the museum pay for it. I have to guess that the funds given to the museum originally were not meant to fund an art investment to be reaped at a future date, but the University Board is now letting that happen. It’s like the bullshit rationalization for state lotteries…the “money goes to education”…what really happens is that the money in the budget already allocated for education is freed up to do something different much like the potential funding for LaSalle art education from the core budget is now freed up to do something else. If I’m feeling bent towards anyone, it’s the University Leadership, not the museums.
But what could be the fall out. The Berkshire Bailout would be much more palatable if it had come on the heels of five years of “we’ve got 60, 50 months, 40 months of runway left until we have to do something drastic”. This would have given all of the outsiders-with-opinions a chance to actively prevent this particular deaccession with fund raising or something. This could trigger a rise in more publicly accessible financials of museums, or financial disclosures as part of receiving major donations or gifts. It might also see the rise of “ownership riders” (which may exist already for all I know) which give a seller the right-of-first refusal to buy back a painting within a certain window at a pre-agreed price. Friction in the market is bad for the market. Lastly, it could add more clauses and guarantees given to major donors around collection integrity. Again, friction in donations is bad for donations.
Once more…deaccession. Yowz!