Brooklyn Museum is selling Old Masters

I wonder who’s going to make bank with these sales...

There is no preview yet. I'm curious to see what exactly they are selling.

All the buyers will be Russian or Middle Eastern.

The Brooklyn Museum was founded with such high-minded ideals but unfortunately not endowed accordingly. Like St Louis Art Museum, the edifice is beyond magnificent in both scale and design, but the collections...not so much.

Maybe some Broodlynites like Matt D. or Maggie G. can throw them a few million to call off the sale.

When you need to start selling off the family silver, the writing is on the wall.

Can't they do the nude calendar and behind-the-scenes video thing to raise money? Desperate times call for desperate measures. People still collect these things, you know......

Her father Boris must be spinning in his grave.

Why can't Lens Dunham kick in a few bucks? She could forego another tattoo and donate it to culture.

The Brooklyn Museum has always had a troubled history. In the 1930s, they demolished the grand staircase because it was perceived as elitist. The closed the costume collection in the early 1990s because "nobody was interested in the clothing of dead white women." This was after a highly successful exhibition of Worth, Doucet and Pingat gowns.

They had an excellent collection of dolls both antique and prototypes from NYC doll companies that became a lending library so the community children could have a nice doll. Obviously, the dolls were destroyed over time.

Yes, sure, sell the stuff by old (ew!) male (OPPRESSIVE) white (EEEEEVIL!!) artists to acquire something more socially relevant. Perhaps a shat-on, bedraggled, torn bridal train floating in a tank of rancid piss, after having been worn at a protest by a Muslim trans womyn of color and titled REPARATIONS, which can be mounted on a white plinth and admired by throngs of morons who read about it in the NY Times and had to buy tickets for it weeks in advance.

The rich liberal Brooklynites who subsidize the place will eat it up, pony up for the platinum-memberships, and casually drop a mention of it during their next 25 conversations.

It seems they picked the biggest ticket items that would provoke the least outcry, because they are expecting 40 million from the sale, to support operations in their painting departments. I don't see how 40 million reliably produces 2 million a year in return while still growing the endowment, but what do I know.

If that Corot is the best of the bunch, meh... are we missing much? I agree with the Times commenters. A few rich benefactors can bid on them and loan them back to the museum.

They claim not to be selling the best stuff.

But how many Cranachs could they have?

R15 one amateur sleuth in the comments of the article claims that this in fact might be their only Cranach.

[quote]The Brooklyn Museum has always had a troubled history. In the 1930s, they demolished the grand staircase because it was perceived as elitist.

I don't know if I'm the only person who thinks it or if it's just that no one's had the guts to say it publicly, but the "Flying Saucer Stuck to the Façade of a Neoclassical Building" renovation they did about 15 years ago is the architectural equivalent of smashing the Pietà with a hammer. Absolute vandalism of one of McKim, Mead and White's local masterpieces.

R15 yeah I just read that. And the directrice is apparently a big gaping cunt.

I can't be down with selling the Cranach. The times article is weak sauce. No investigation whatsoever.

That’s more for the Getty Museum, or other well-funded collections, I guess.

And how does the museum have 1 Cranach and keep it in storage for decades? What the fuck. Woke bullshit.

Well if they end up in UAE in a fabulous museum with hordes of tourists, I suppose that's OK. Since nobody can be assed to get to Grand Army Plaza Brooklyn.

I completely agree with you, R16. I used to be a member of the Brooklyn Museum, but not after they built that new entrance.

When their development people called asking me to re-up my membership, I told them that was not happening and would not happen until they removed all that shit stuck to the front of the building. "Oh, we love it!," she told me. "Then you're fools," I told her. It looks like a huge hamburger stand and all that is missing is a team of car hops on roller skates with big trays of burgers.

It's a very visible sign of mismanagement by the board and the administration.

Why is there no "NO" option in that stupid poll in OP.

To whom,

They should be able to sell to another Museum. This is so sad if they are selling to a private rich person. It's gone. It will be lost.

It's a shonda = no, bubala

I'm sorry sir I don't speak Jive

The Museum is really only worth visiting for Judy Chicago's awesome masterpiece, "The Dinner Party."

All the art by dead white cisgender males in that big barn should be sold off, or burned if it doesn't sell. Empty the place out and make room for art by current artists of color and/or non-heteronormative!

Yes that would attract lots of donors, r26!

Yes maybe all the new fluid non-gendered artists of color should live there and create art. Stipends of 95K a year plus full medical.

If these works have not been exhibited for decades, whose fault is that?

Perhaps they can send their works to other museums around the country and close up shop. Does NYC really need that place when other burrows, such as Manhattan, have fabulous museums?

It's one of the weakest museums in NYC or even the greater metro area. I went once for the Bowie exhibit and wasn't impressed with the rest of the museum.

It's tacky to accept art - which was probably donated - and not show it and then sell it. They should have their non-profit status removed.

Everyone thinks Brooklyn is so hip - they just want to be hip. They have no comprehension of creating a memorable and ethical museum.

It's actually one of the oldest museums in the city. (The Met was founded in 1870 with the core of the present building completed in 1902)

[quote] The roots of the Brooklyn Museum extend back to the 1823 founding by Augustus Graham of the Brooklyn Apprentices' Library in Brooklyn Heights. The Library moved into the Brooklyn Lyceum building on Washington Street in 1841. Two years later the institutions merged to form the Brooklyn Institute, which offered exhibitions of painting and sculpture and lectures on diverse subjects. In 1890, under its director Franklin Hooper, Institute leaders reorganized as the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences and began planning the Brooklyn Museum. The museum remained a subdivision of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, along with the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and the Brooklyn Children's Museum until the 1970s when all became independent.[3]

[quote] Opened in 1897, the Brooklyn Museum building is a steel frame structure clad in masonry, designed in the neoclassical revival style by the architectural firm of McKim, Mead, and White and built by the Carlin Construction Company. The initial design for the Brooklyn Museum was four times as large as the built version; the final design reflects a compromise to the specifications of the New York City government.

In 2013 the Metropolitan Museum deaccessioned a painting they deemed to be "school of Rubens". But it was soon discovered to actually be a portrait by Rubens of his daughter, and is being included in the current catalogue raisonne of Rubens' work.

The truth is that museums are in trouble. Perhaps it is from years of attending children's museums, but young adults can't stand not being able to touch or interact with exhibits. They are not interested in much of anything that is before their time. They look for offense in everything.

On top of that, the major auction houses are being very aggressive about getting art onto the market. I would not be the least surprised if one of the auction houses threatened a lawsuit over the art that had not been on display. They have been known to challenge the tax exempt status of museums to get art on the market. (In the case of smaller museums, they use handicap access as a sledgehammer. In most cases the museum cannot afford the expensive renovations. Either they have to sell art or artifacts to fund the work, or they have to close all together. Either way the auction house wins.)

They had two Cranachs, but sold the inferior work, a "workshop of Cranach" portrait in 2013 (not a great year to sell.)

Selling off good works by important artists without demonstrably good selection criteria? And to fund some very vaguely stated conservation works? Two bad ideas.

Where the Cranachs are: Lucascranach.org

It seems to me this directrice and her board and development office should be able to budget operating expenses of this museum. The comments on NYT say she stacked the board with "losers" who do not contribute rather protect her at the head. Ah, honey, that's not how a major museum operates successfully.

How much of it was Nazi loot?

r32 I'm sure that building will make a great addition to Bezo's monopoly sized portfolio of mansions. He can do wonders with the space.

[quote] It's one of the weakest museums in NYC or even the greater metro area. I went once for the Bowie exhibit and wasn't impressed with the rest of the museum.

Not sure.. It's not the Met but it has other charms. It'd be a solid museum anywhere else in my opinion.

The Brooklyn Museum is a world class museum and has strong collections. It was the first museum in the world to collect African Art as art and not as artifacts. Its Egyptian collections are in the top three of the country. It was an early collector of Native American Art, again as art as opposed to artifacts.

As mentioned earlier the Costume Collection was a crowning jewel. The museum was set up for designers and industrial artists to be able to come and research from the materials it had. Housing and caring for the collection became prohibitive as textiles are one of the most fragile of materials. It was annexed by the Metropolitan Museum within the last decade and materials are still identified as coming from the Brooklyn Museum collection. Because of the Met Gala funding they have the resources to care for it.

The American Art collections, including Decorative Arts, are very strong including over 20 Period Rooms including one from the Rockefeller townhouse, an Art Deco room and a full Dutch Colonial residence. They also have a unique collection of architectural fragments including pieces from Penn Station. The Prints and Drawings was again an important study collection and is quite extensive. They have 12 panels of Assyrian reliefs from the Royal Palace.

If the Brooklyn Museum was anywhere else in the world it would be considered an outstanding jewel, especially as an encyclopedic museum, but being in the shadow of Manhattan it has always struggled to capture the stature, funding and audience that it deserves.

[quote] If the Brooklyn Museum was anywhere else in the world it would be considered an outstanding jewel, especially as an encyclopedic museum, but being in the shadow of Manhattan it has always struggled to capture the stature, funding and audience that it deserves.

I just checked and Wikipedia says that if NYC were broken up then Brooklyn would be the third largest city in the country. As I said upthread at R4, it is on par with SLAM--notable, but not quite worthy of a top tier city in it's present condition.

More on the paintings.

Lucas Cranach the Elder’s “Lucretia” is great. I trust the museum has the sense this loss wouldn't create a huge hole. From the Art Newspaper article if anyone doesn't want to read it: It's the only Cranach they had. The article's hinting it's a little deteriorated. And there's a better Cranach in National Gallery in London which is of course doesn't do a lot for NY museum goers. Hmmm.. The Charles-François Daubigny is a clearer sale item..presumably one of seven similar paintings they have of him doing french rivers.

Perhaps the Cranach is the bait so the sale looks like quality. And then a couple of names. And then half a dozen things no one will miss.

Perhaps they could use the sorry state of the Cranach to raise funds for their endowment to keep it, and restore all their masterpieces. This seems like lazy, easy, lousy management by the direction.

1,126,501 students in NYC public schools. Must be 1/2 in Brooklyn and Queens. Brooklyn Museum and maybe MMI in Queens should be the center pieces of arts education in those two Boroughs combined. Both institutions known for rather shitty direction.

The Museum occupies that triangle next to Prospect Park. Shared with the Public Library, Mt. Prospect Park and the Botanic Gardens. Next door are some important high schools. "Mt. Prospect Park" is pretty unused. They should have sold development rights to Mt. Prospect for a fantastic headquarters to a huge conglomerate such as Amazon, Google, Apple etc and forced them to adopt the Library, Museum and Gardens to enrich them and secure them.

This is Philanthropic Development 101.

It's a "fire sale".

So here is the aftermath of the sale, proceeds above and beyond expectations.

And here is the announcement about the next items going on the block this time at Soethbys, including this stunning Monet.

And here is an amazing modernist designed table they expect to go for 1.5 - 2 million dollars that was given by the Italian government. A present from Italy, just put up for sale.

So if things are given as gifts to a museum they can just sell them? Isn't there some sort of law that says a museum can give a gift back to the giver but it can't sell it? Like when hisassholiness Gelb wanted to sell the Chagalls to make money for the Met and he was informed that they were gifts (duh)and could not be sold.

R50 that's Giuletta Masina's ironing board, silly.

The Cranach sold about right judging by other sales of comparable works. It was estimated at $1.2 to $1.8M, but that was intentionally, maybe to focus attention on the "success" of their sale rather than the almost always questionable practice of selling off important works. It sold for $4.2M ($5.007M with fees.) The Donato de ' Bardi was estimated more typically for Old Masters which are usually estimated a bit conservatively and surely, arriving somewhat regularly at the high end of the estimate range (estimated at $80-120k, it sold for $118,750 with fees.)

Deaccession auctions I notice often have atypically low estimates on star lots and low end lots: the first to foster "good news" at the success of the sale, the second to encourage bidders who might not be regular auction goers to join in the souvenir hunt and to bid beyond the value of a thing (same as with celebrity auctions where a $150 ashtray will bring $7500.)

The image of the Cranach at R48's link shows that the fact of it having languished in storage forever had nothing to do with its high quality.

Wow, criminal executive mismanagement.

[quote] Should hard up BM sell precious collections?

OP, I'm sure that the Brooklyn Museum doesn't like being referred to as a ""BM".

Why not? It's apt as they are now shitting on their collections, mission, and founding donors.

[quote]They should be able to sell to another Museum. This is so sad if they are selling to a private rich person. It's gone. It will be lost.

If they sell it to a private rich person, it may indeed disappear for some years but the good news is that it will reappear on the market again. When someone divorces, when they need money, when they change their collecting habits, when they die...it will be back in circulation.

It was owned by the Havemeyers for 31 years before one gave it to the Brooklyn Museum where it lived in the dark, not of display for decades.

Sometimes a museum is the worst place to see a painting.

I think one of the questions is why the Brooklyn Museum isn't better managed and why would it forsake its ancient treasures to never circulate them into interesting expositions to educated the people of New York, and in particular school children. The Cranach could have been used to teach and to delight in combination with all sorts of items including those that fit the post-colonialist agendas. Lazy. Lazy. Lazy. Diamonds are NOT only for the rich! A lesson from Catholic social activist Dorothy Day. The Brooklyn Museum has treasures and the institution has a responsibility to share such treasures with the residents of NYC. They could be looking at, talkin about, contemplating and learning from such treasures. Instead they are being sold off in a fire sale because the institution is not run correctly.

sorry my franglais - interesting "exhibitions".

Sorry, but you can tell from that ridiculous addition of a new modern entry to the front of the building is all the proof anyone needs to know the Brooklyn Museum has major problems with its board and management.

That entry is ugly as shit. You are right. These people don't know what they're doing and now have to throw away their patrimony. Covid is just an excuse for incompetence.

A lot of people on museum boards are "business" people, and they look on the collection as "stock". It only takes a few idiots to take advantage of a temporary relaxation of the rules and break an institution, as witness Trump's dismantling government agencies. The Baltimore Museum is doing the same thing.

R62 It’s unbelievable that they are selling Warhol’s Last Supper, the textual layers of art, history, painting and even homosexuality make this an iconic piece whose importance will only gain over time. It’s like the Louvre deaccessioning the Mona Lisa during the 19th century because portraits aren’t in anymore.

R30 Oh Dear. [quote] Does NYC really need that place when other burrows, such as Manhattan, have fabulous museums?

A British institution contemplates selling the only Michaelangelo sculpture in GB, which would likely be taken outside the country.

What really is cheesing me off is these institutions are supported with enormous tax exemptions and public grants. They should be serving the public, making art accessible to the public. Not removing art from the public's access.

They had a traveling exhibit that landed in my city and my friend and I were so excited to go see it . We get there and what do we see / All the paintings the BM had loaned out were under 4 inches of glass. How in the hell can you appreciate a Monet,Cezanne or Picasso under 4 inches of fucking glass ???

Meh. No biggie.

I can't enjoy paintings under a protective shield. It ruined the Uffizi for me. I can see them just as well in a book.

More sales, including a painting of Trump in London??? At this point they should just throw open the doors and hold a tag sale.

How tacky

R70: The painting of "Trump Descending an Escalator" is a story unrelated to the Brooklyn Museum. It's clear when you open your own link.

Some repercussions for Baltimore Museum of Art’s deaccessioning of the three works of art that are going on the block tomorrow.

Finally, some meaningful opposition to this management bullshit.

Its the trickle down effect of the orange shit gibbon legitimizing doing whatever you want to and the hell with anyone else . That idiot let 50 million dollars walk away ,that tells me he is getting something out of the deal and has no intention of staying for any length of time.

Wait why is Cranach "problematic"?

Very interesting Art News article looking at deaccessioning over the last fifty years. The Italian mid century modern table from the Brooklyn Museum is going on the block tomorrow night at Sotheby’s. There are some nicely done images of it, such a loss to have this leaving the museum when it spent its whole life first touring in exhibition and then was gifted to the museum from the Italian government.

Well, the Baltimore three got a last minute reprieve and were pulled from the sale and are on pause, which doesn’t mean they are safe. The Brooklyn works weren’t as lucky. The beautiful one of a kind table went for almost double it’s high estimate and the three paintings did very well too. I fear truly unique design items might be raided from storerooms after the table did so well here.

If it was given as a gift by the Italian government for the pleasure of all people wouldn't they have to have the Italian government to agree to this and if not why not? As has been noted the Chagall estate forbid the Metropolitan Opera from selling its Chagall paintings when it wanted some fast cash. They treat these works as if they were ATMs.

R79 It all depends on the language used within the gifting. A gift can be made with restrictions, such as keeping them from selling it off and if they want it deaccessioned than a return, but this goes back to a time that there was very little of that language in place and it’s doubtful in this goodwill diplomatic gift they would have done that anyways. Anybody gifting a museum these days with art would have very precise language included spelling out exactly what boundaries there would be. More surprising is the Pollock sale from the small museum in upstate New York, I think that was given to them in the 1990s. Though some donors are very foresighted and gift “without restrictions” believing the institutional needs are primary focus of the gift rather than the particular object and not be bothered by the sale.

But for me this is what’s so problematic about what goes on the block, it’s these objects that fall into a sweet spot that can be sold that are vulnerable. It’s not purely curatorial like the museum choosing that they just don’t collect in a particular area anymore. Or “Yes, we have three Monet, we can live without one” so we’ll sell the least important one or the one that doesn’t fit the rest of the collection, but it is instead which one can we legally sell.

I used that Monet example, because Brooklyn sold one, but here is the one they kept. It’s obvious, even to a novice that it is a more important Monet and is the epitome of his best known style. It’s very clear they would have kept this one. But the other was so interesting because it was a different feel for him and the contrast with this one said a lot about him as an artist. But a Monet was going to be the best bang for the buck and they have others so it was a strong candidate for the sale.

Why didn't they partner with some city with lots of money and not lot a lot of "encyclopedic museum" collections of art and make a deal to keep their collection, get money, and circulate the work. OK the UAE cities have their partners, but what about Chinese cities? The Cranach and Monet could have spent 5 years in Chongqing and still be in a "public" collection.

R81 It’s still a relatively new model that hasn’t been fully embraced, I know there were some major museum collaborations with museum to bring art to Dubai, but I’m not so sure how well those outcomes were for all parties.

And who exactly buys these works? Arab and Russian billionaires? Are the buyers kept secret?

Somewhat off-topic, but perhaps of interest:

America’s Cultural Institutions Are Quietly Fueled by Russian Corruption

[quote] The second primary reasoning behind such donations relates to so-called reputation laundering. Broadly speaking, reputation laundering refers to donors positioning themselves as philanthropists, obscuring links to prior business practices and relations with sanctioned oligarchs or kleptocratic regimes. That is, oligarchs use these donations—and the willingness of institutions to accept the funds without any pushback—to soften and whitewash their own personal images. Reputation laundering can also extend to national governments as well. For instance, some of the gifts in the database appear to be in the pursuit of softening Russia’s image abroad.

They best keep their Vivian Vances.

Especially from her "sufficient" period.

Just like American robber barons and imperial colonizers.

The condition report is no longer available on the Christies site, but after reading this and viewing the Cranach in person, it was clear the picture was extensively damaged, with huge losses of original paint.

We are grateful to Thomas Art Conservation for providing the following condition report: This painting is in uneven condition, with some very nicely preserved passages despite past invasive structural intervention to the support. Portions of the paint layer are in very good condition. This includes much of the face, including tiny window-shaped catchlights in the eyes, rows of delicate eyelashes, and a glint of teeth between the lips, as well as the elaborate collar-necklace and the highlights in the hair. Retouching throughout the painting, clearly visible under ultra-violet illumination, indicates losses, both large and small, throughout. Narrow losses following the vertical wood grain, corresponding to cracks in the no-longer-extant original wood panel, have been retouched without having first been filled to level and remain visible as shallow channels in the surface. In the body, losses and wear in the glazes, clogged with mottled restoration, conspire to undermine the smooth modeling, particularly around the breast, waist and arm right of center. More precise retouching addresses craquelure traversing the face and some of the thinning in the dark brown paints used for the fur lining of the red garment. The red garment, created with a schematic application of black-on-vermilion entirely typical of Cranach and his workshop, has suffered from sizable losses, yet the remaining original portions are quite well preserved. The landscape viewed through the window is rubbed in the upper portion but appears to be better preserved towards the sill. Examination records from 1939 note the background “seemed entirely new”, however the treatment record from 1983, the most recent cleaning and restoration, makes no mention of such a large amount of repainting. While some loss and/or wear in the background certainly exists, a full reconstruction is not readily apparent. The painting is coated with a very glossy varnish that accentuates planar anomalies. The original vertically grained wood panel support was removed in 1937, leaving only the priming and paint layers, which were adhered to a Masonite support with a fabric interleaf. This intervention was undertaken in response to extensive insect damage and to warping and four splits in the panel. The transferred painting is planar and stable. This painting would benefit considerably from cleaning and a new restoration. While the current state may at first glance seem discouraging, this painting has real potential. Cleaning will reveal the aforementioned losses, however, properly filling losses and retouching wear and losses with an understanding of the artist’s technique should noticeably improve the overall appearance. While the structural state is not aesthetically ideal, it cannot be safely reversed; luckily the stability of the support is not in question. Information on past treatments/examinations according to Brooklyn Museum of Art written conservation records.

r33: The funny thing about that picture - even after its cleaning, no serious Rubens scholar believes it is by Rubens. The dealers who bought the picture at the Met deaccession sale were shopping around thefor years without success. The number of dubious Rubenses included in the new catalogue is considered a joke.

When the "Clara Serena' was offered at Christie's it bombed. It is still unsold.

The Met has made may deaccession mistakes in the past, but this isn't one of them.

The Brooklyn Museum launches a virtual fashion exhibition of costumes from Netflix’s The Crown and Queens Gambit. The same Beaux Arts court also hosted the fake costume exhibit that the one house stoled the royal clothes from in the opening episode of Pose.