Today, Berkshire Superior Court Judge John Agostini ruled that the museum could auction off many of the most valuable works in its collection.
deaccession
Posted inNews
The Berserk Battle Over the Berkshire Museum and Its Art Collection
This week, the state’s attorney general called for a temporary restraining order to block Sotheby’s from selling works from the museum’s collection.
Posted inNews
How an Oversight in Public Arts Policy Caused a Kerfuffle in Palo Alto
The case emphasizes the importance of clear formal agreements between public art commissions and artists.
Posted inArt
How the Met’s Sale of a Max Beckmann Painting Changed US Museums
Beckmann’s “Self-Portrait with Cigarette” belonged to the Metropolitan Museum until 1971, when its deaccession set off a series of disputes that reshaped museum practices.
Posted inIn Brief
Deaccessioning Crisis Has UK Museums Group Contemplating Stricter Guidelines
The Museums Association, the largest professional membership organization for UK museums and their workers, is planning to revise its ethical guidelines in the hopes of dissuading institutions around the country from selling off works in their collections, the Independent reported.
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Historic Home Dumps $100 Million Cézanne
The Edsel and Eleanor Ford House in Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan, a wealthy suburb north of Detroit, sold a Paul Cézanne painting for $100 million last year, the historic home’s 2013 tax forms recently revealed.
Posted inNews
Delaware Museum Plans Art Sale to Pay Debt
The Delaware Art Museum will sell at least three, possibly four artworks, to raise money to pay off its debt, the News Journal has reported. The move would violate the rules of both the Association of Art Museum Directors and the American Alliance of Museums, likely bringing sanctions on the Delaware institution.
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Out with the Old, In with the New: Museum Will Sell Hopper to Buy Contemporary Art
The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) will sell one of its two oil paintings by artist Edward Hopper and use the money raised to increase acquisitions, particularly of contemporary art.
Posted inOpinion
Georgia Museum of Art Crowdsources a Deaccession Decision
Once upon a time it was provocative, but today crowdsourcing in the art world is pretty much commonplace. There are crowd-curated exhibitions, crowdsourced prizes, volunteer transcription, and crowdsourced art/life. But the Georgia Museum of Art seems to be taking things to a new level: it’s asking visitors to vote on which paintings should be deaccessioned.
Posted inNews
Istanbul University Responds to Deaccession Controversy with Press Release
The latest news coming out of Istanbul in the story of the impending museum deaccession auction is that the focal point of the controversy, Istanbul Bilgi University, has issued a press release and agreed to a meeting with activists. The university administers the recently closed Santralistanbul Museum of Contemporary Art, and two weeks ago, the news broke that the school was planning to sell off a good chunk of the museum’s collection — some 150 artworks that were purchased by the institution. A group of activists started a petition in response and has been working hard to protest and publicize the issue.
Posted inNews
An Istanbul Museum Is Auctioning Off its Art Collection
Today, Istanbul’s art world is in shock over the news that works of art from the collection of the recently closed Santralistanbul Museum of Contemporary Art were set to hit the auction block in an upcoming sale.