THE ALBRIGHT-KNOX ART SALE

Letters opposing the auction of some 200 artifacts, sculptures and paintings going back some 3500 years—some having been cited as priceless—by the Albright-Knox Art Gallery reflect a city’s soul-wrenching sense of uncommon loss.

The board of the AKAG claims that its mission has always been, since the gallery’s founding in 1875 and stated in its charter from the State of New York, to act as a repository for contemporary art. How true to its stated purpose has the AKAG been when the 200 pieces span a period of some 3,500 years? A complete list of what is being deaccessed has still not been released to the public. One only has to travel the halls of the AKAG and engage with the art that still remains from the 20th and 19th centuries to see how this mission has been abrogated.

Citizens of Buffalo, the barbarians are at the gate. Don’t let theAKAG sever the legacy of art from our cultural heritage of our past through our present and our future.

What is to be done? Nothing is not an answer. All of us can do what we want and need to do to bring sanity and a sense of pride and self-respect to a city which has yielded too long to an habitually self-doubting miasma that clouds our inherent strength to act toward greatness.

Steps can be taken, however, to move forward to change the AKAG’s newly adopted direction.

I propose one step: The AKAG board wants the gallery to be known far and wide as one which will own and exhibit the best contemporary art in the world. To attain this objective it will sacrifice the 200 items with an imputed value of $15 million. This money will be added to the gallery’s present $58 million operating fund of which 8.5 percent is allowed annually for art acquisition. This will yield $4.93 million for annual purchases.

There are, as I am led to understand, 21 Clyfford Still oil-on-canvas paintings which were in the Clyfford Still room that has been empty of these paintings for the past several months, possibly placed in storage.

A Clyfford Still oil on canvas, 1947, was auctioned by Christie’s on November 15, 2006 for a little more than $21 million ($21,296,000). A Willem de Kooning oil on canvas, 1975, was auctioned by Sotheby’s on May 10, 2006 for $15.696 million.

I propose we select one, only one Clyfford Still painting of the 21 we have and have it auctioned at the estimated price of $21 million, which exceeds the total value of the 200 AKAG items planned for sale.

In addition, why not auction our own de Kooning to gain another estimated $16 million?

With the addition of $37 million, the AKAG fund would total $95 million. At the 8.5 percent rate the AKAG would have more $8 million to spend for contemporary art.

We are now looking at half of the equation of the AKAG’s reason to raise funds to purchase contemporary art; the other being the widely broadcast, but not widely accepted, need to go contemporary. Theirs is the notion that this is the only way to go in a world gone crazy and awash in money, where more and more art is being amassd for private collections. This deprives the vast majority of people from ever seeing history’s greatest art.

What to do: Write letters or emails expressing your thoughts and ideas to theAKAG and send copies to Artvoice the Buffalo News. Remember, public opinion is vital and persuasive. Speak to your friends and neighbors. Let us together as a great city bring back our 200 great legacies residing now at Sotheby’s in New York City, being prepared for sale beginning in March and extending into May.

Read the latest about the Philadelphia story, where Thomas Eakin’s masterpiece The Gross Cleric was stopped by the citizens of Philadelphia from being sold to the National Gallery in Washington, DC and the nascent Crystal Bridges Museum in Bentonville, Arkansas for a record-setting $68 million. Philadelphia said no. Buffalo can say no.

Allan Freedman

Tonawanda

Let us remember that Louis Grachos’ plan to deaccession the esteemed older pieces at the Albright-Knox is not his first attempt to eliminate part of the permanent collection. Grachos spent the first couple years of his tenure trying to get rid of the museum’s modern collection (the pre-1950 collection) by negotiating with te UB Art Gallery to take it on long-term loan. He held discussions with Sandra Olsen, director of the UB Art Gallery, to take these works off his hands so he could exhibit more contemporary art. When this plan failed, Grachos put the modern collection into storage. It remained there until he received lots of hate mail about this decision, leading him to reinstall some of these works. Grachos’ enthusiam for contemporary art is admirable, but his disrespect for everything else is not.

Let’s also recall that it was just six years ago (2000) that the Albright-Knox spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to have a special sculpture gallery constructed with custom-made display cases to celebrate the exact Chinese, African, pre-Columbian, Indian, Cycladic, Greek and Roman pieces that are now heading for the auction block. There was an opening reception for the new space. How is it possible that the trustees could be so filled with pride about these works at one moment that they went to considerable effort to show them off, and then a short time later deem them irrelevant to the mission of the institution and in need of being sold off?

The Albright-Knox already has one of the largest acquisition funds in the country for a museum. So it is not as if this deaccession plan is dire and crucial to the forward progress of the institution. Besides, if the trustees want the Albright-Knox to acquire more contemporary art, which is laudable, then why don’t they dig into thieir own pockets and buy works for the museum—as trustees do at art museums throughout this country—rather than liquidate the very works that have been entrusted to them to protect and safeguard for future generations? If the Albright-Knox wants to play with big boys, then why don’t they act like them? Why isn’t any trustee in this generation living up to the stunning example set in this regard by Seymour Knox himself, who used his own funds to enrich the museum and the people of Buffalo?

G. Smith

Amherst

THE GREAT PARK IN THE SKY

Decisions, decisions!

I read with interest and agreement the reasoning of Norquist and Bernstein on the removal of the skyway (“Bye-Bye Skyway!” Artvoice v5n51). It all made eminently good sense…until I turned the page and read Quigley’s “alternative alternative”! That seemed an original “out of the box” proposal that has amazing possibilities.

Can the powers that be not find some way to have the waterfront renewal envisioned by Norquist and Bernstein and the “park in the sky” concept of Quigley?

Paul A. Cassavaugh

Amherst

BENNIS, ARTVOICE AND THE PERPETUATION OF CONFLICT

If outsiders continually wonder why this conflict has gone on for so long without a resolution, they need only look at the “Letters to Artvoice” concerning the Phyllis Bennis interviews (Artvoice v5n50 & 51). In fact, the reaction to the articles has turned out to be much more illuminating than the original articles themselves. By printing such a blatantly one-sided argument (the merits and faults thereof have already been shown), Artvoice has simply grouped its readers into those who were either happy someone stuck it to the other side or those who rose to its defense.

The problem is not about which side Ms. Bennis took, but about the fact that clearly a particular side was taken and that no argument was made for a realistic and comprehensive solution. The declaration that the system in the occupied territories is oppressive is a truism, one which sadly has become a cliché; on the other hand, to argue that Israeli oppression is excusable because it is not as bad as that of any Arab or Muslim government is irresponsible and provides a fairly poor standard of behavior for the Israeli government. If an article in a local paper halfway across the world causes people to retreat into their respective camps of finger-pointing and defensiveness, it should be easy to see why the real populations involved cannot move past the status-quo. If Artvoice regards itself as a progressive forum, then it should attempt to take the path of progress and advocate for solutions.

Ms. Bennis’s main assertions are simplistic. To claim that is ultimately about land is to ignore the fact that Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon and Gaza has yielded no advances towards peace. While this is partly about land, it is about religion (but beyond Islam and Judaism, it is just as much about orthodoxy and secularism within each side), it is about resources, economics, honor and humiliation, the victim mentality on both sides and finally about the self-perpetuating inertia that any conflict creates. That is why a comprehensive solution must be reached, not simply the disengagement of the United States. Taking away American support for Israel will only make the latter more defensive; consider that no other country has an opposition that calls for its complete destruction (if not the governments, certainly large parts of the population). Believing that withdrawal of American support for Israel is the answer has more to do with naïve self-interest than with real progress. It comes out of the same culture that claimed that 9/11 would not have happened if the US were not allied with Israel. It ignores the larger picture of American meddling throughout the world both in the history of Cold War politics and that of putting short-sighted economic interests above all else. It ignores the economic and political situations of Muslims in their own countries and the European diaspora as well the rise of fundamentalism worldwide. Europe’s sanctimonious railings against American intervention are betrayed by the fact that they themselves have done nothing to resolve tragedies in Rwanda, Yugoslavia and Darfur. And while Europe in general has advocated the Palestinian cause, much of that advocacy comes out of an attempt to absolve itself of its own anti-Jewish past (and present), its colonial legacy as well as poor relations with its own Muslim population. Immigrants fare much better in the United States than in Europe and the French suburban riots seems to be only an indication of the future. Unfortunately, any country’s claim to the moral high ground is a futile competition in relative misdeeds.

I will add my own simplistic maxim: Israelis and Arabs should only criticize the actions of their own sides; anything else is only an excuse for misbehavior, and outsiders should only add their voices if they have something truly constructive to say.

Avi Stein

Buffalo