Tyler Green Modern Art Notes

I’m on my way to NYC… so posting will be quiet today. There may be some posting tonight. And I have some Getty-related catching up to do over the weekend…. For now, I think this AJ advertiser has an interesting program. And I’ve been meaning to link to this for days. Or just go laugh at the quotes about MoMA that Todd Gibson pulled out at FtF…

Finally the Post does the Corcoran story. It’s a rotten excuse for probing journalism (which isn’t exactly a stunner, of course). The Corcoran may have been keen on Barlow’s ouster? That’s just lousy reporting. Here’s the story.

MAN has received a report that the Getty IT department has been instructed to monitor outgoing emails hourly in an effort to find people emailing me. I haven’t confirmed this yet, but I wanted to get a quick post up about it just in case. Probably best to continue your (wonderful) leaking from home… Will post more as I hear more.

OK, we had our fun with the Chronicle of Philanthropy.

If the Getty and Barry Munitz really, really wanted to change the subject, here’s what the Getty would (and might?) do: Buy a $50 million Gauguin. The painting, on auction at Sotheby’s on Nov. 4, is Maternite (II) from 1899. The estimate from Sotheby’s is $40-50 million. According to the Getty website, the Getty owns only two minor Gauguins.

Gettyites: Is the Getty considering the painting?

Speaking of the Getty: KCRW’s Politics of Culture featured the Getty on their show yesterday. (NPR junkies will recognize KCRW as a Southland NPR station.) Christopher Knight was one of the guests. Listen at the link…

Because we’ve been so seriously lately — Getty this, Corcoran that — we thought it might be fun to do a completely silly, subjective, pointless post. A few months back I did a top ten list of my favorite artists, complete with a one-word reason. (Somehow I left G. Morandi off my list, thus proving that frivolous ideas often open the door to stupidity.) So today, my ten favorite museums, same rules.

1.) Museum of Modern Art Fort Worth. Elegant.

2.) The Phillips Collection. Home.

3.) St. Louis Art Museum. Focused.

4.) MOCA

UPDATE: I made a slight change to the Cattelan post below. He is an odd bird.

Barry Munitz apparently has begun to implement a strategy to fend off his critics: placing op-eds that link his previous career (that would be running the California State University system, not that S&L thing) to his current career.

I promised some thoughts on the second of this past weekend’s two Dan Flavin events…

The National Gallery’s second panel featured Dia’s Tiffany Bell, Flavin Studio head Steve Morse, and Flavin pal and artist Michael Venezia. The panel was moderated by NGA curator Jeffrey Weiss. I didn’t take extensive notes on every anecdote, but I wanted to share three things that I heard discussed during the panel but didn’t know much about before Sunday:

• I did not know that Flavin designed a project for the National Institutes of Health in suburban Washington. I’d love to see the drawings;
• Flavin worked on a program with some scientists at General Electric. I wonder what they were working on and how far they got;
• I’d love to see more of the work Flavin created with ultraviolet light, including the photo of the outdoor ultraviolet work created for the University of Rochester.

As I’ve noted here before, there are no photos or slide show of Flavin’s site-specific works in the NGA exhibit. (I’ve heard that there may be at the next venue, in Fort Worth.) I understand why that isn’t a part of the show, but after Sunday’s panel I think I’m kinda wishing that the site-specific work was represented somehow.

I’ll have another Flavin tidbit later today, this one explaining why that show’s catalog is so visually striking.

Related: A DC artist named Trish Tillman also blogged about the panel.

The Maurizio Cattelan installation at the Carnegie International, titled Now, has been removed from the International by Cattelan. Here’s the story:

For the opening weekend, Cattelan’s installation was placed in what is called the Founder’s Room, a small, dark, beautifully ornate room off of one of the entrances to the Carnegie. The Founder’s Room is not typically a space open to the public, but it was the space that was available for the work during the opening weekend.

The intent of the artist and of the museum was that Now would be moved to the Hall of Architecture after the opening — the museum needed the Hall for the gala dinner. Cattelan had twice visited the Carnegie and was adamant that Now go in the Hall. After the opening, he changed his mind and he removed Now from the exhibition.

Now is still at the Carnegie Museum of Art, just not on view. The museum is hopeful that Cattelan will return to Pittsburgh to choose another site for the piece.

Related: Calvin Tomkins wrote about Cattelan and the creation of Now for the New Yorker recently. It is not online, but the blog Book of Joe recently discussed the Tomkins profile. Excerpts from my review (for Bloomberg) are here.

Updated 10/27: An artist in Pittsburgh doesn’t like me, but that’s OK. I’ll link to her anyway.

First, sincere apologies for turning Steve Morse into Jeffrey Weiss (or vice versa) in this morning’s first post. Thanks the the sharp readers who caught it. I’d email all of you, but that would leave me no time to reply to the mountain of Getty-related email I’m happily receiving.

I promised a post about the Flavin catalog that accompanies the Dia/NGA show. As anyone who has flipped through the catalog has noticed, the colors are deep, intense and fill the entire photographic frame. How’d they do that?

They’re not exactly photographs. They’re digitally-altered compositions of photographs taken by Dia at Dia:Beacon especially for the catalog. I don’t know of other examples where art images have been digitally manipulated in this way in order to give a reader a truer picture of what it’s like to experience a work of art. But I think it works in the Flavin catalog. (That’s one of the images at left.)

Related: Excerpts from my review of Flavin, for Bloomberg.

The morning Getty updates: AJ’s Andrew Taylor on the root of the troubles at the Getty…

Speaking of the Getty, the email is still coming in. A lot of it. Basically I’m trying to communicate with some leakers about what kind of detail I’d like to have to post and they’re seeing what they can find…

If you are in a position to be able to leak legal documents (there are two in particular I want to see and if you’re at the Getty you know which two), information from the IRS’ audit of the Getty (Munitz’ benefits package is pretty… striking), and information on the severance packages paid to ex-employees, let me know. And, of course, if you’re the director of the museum and you’re about to no longer be the director, and you just happen to be a MAN reader, we’d love to hear from you in some way…

Today the LA Times did their first Getty investigative piece. (It’s in Calendar, so it’s behind the silly wall. As you might expect, I have a, er, emailable copy.) It lays the foundation for their upcoming Getty coverage. They introduced the players and hinted at where some of the future coverage will go. Think of it as part of a process that encourages more and more Gettyites to leak more and more items. 

There are no blockbusters in today’s LAT story, just some subtle… hints about the deeper problems at the Getty. There are lots of references to Munitz’ management style, etc. Jill Murphy is mentioned only in passing. (The Times did not, for example, mention whether or not there is still a photo of Murphy and Munitz sailing in Europe on Munitz’ desk. The LAT mentioned that Munitz loves Hollywood, but didn’t tell the story of how Munitz promised a Hollywood starlet that he’d have Getty staff research some specifics about society on the isle of Lesbos for her.)

Two paragraphs in particular really caught my eye:

The 13 board members live on both coasts and are not all in frequent contact with the institution. They meet four times a year.

Blenda J. Wilson, who has been a Getty trustee for 12 years, said she had no knowledge of morale problems and it wasn’t her role to get in the middle of personnel issues. “I don’t need to know until I’m told,” she said. “I don’t work at the Getty. I’m a board member.”

Barbara G. Fleischman, who joined the board in 2000, was reluctant to address specifics about tension at the Getty. “I think morale is very good there,” she said. “All I can say is that we’re very excited about all the different areas of the trust.”

Uh, Blenda, a board’s job isn’t just to believe whatever the CEO tells you or to wait until you’re told (something)…

The LAT ran a major story (in Calendar — grrr) on the Getty’s troubles this morning. I’ll have a post on it here shortly…