In the News: Navigating the Complexities of Donating Art

We were very honored to be featured in a recent Financial Times article about the complexities of donating art and new solutions that have emerged in response. The author, Kathryn Tully, interviewed various stakeholders representing the network of players involved in any art donation—including museum curators and directors, collectors, and agents such as Museum Exchange, as well as art advisors and financial advisors. Appraisers were not mentioned but, of course, play an important role as well. 

The article describes how it is no easy task to donate art to a museum these days, as institutions are facing ever tighter budgets, smaller staffs, and diminishing storage space. With all of the costs associated with caring for a collection, even “free art” is not free and cash gifts accompanying art donations are becoming more common. In one recent standout example, Los Angeles collectors and philanthropists Jarl and Pamela Mohn included fiscal support in perpetuity for the storage and conservation of the more than 300 artworks that they gifted jointly to a triumvirate of LA museums that includes the Museum of Contemporary Art, Hammer Museum, and Los Angeles County Museum of Art. This enlightened gift signals a new paradigm that recognizes the very real challenges that museums face as custodians of cultural objects. 

Michael Darling in front of artwork by Peppi Bottrop © Kevin Serna for the FT

I just returned from a conference of contemporary art curators where stories of increased selectivity and storage woes were the norm. In the United States, selectively deaccessioning works from museum collections is considered a healthy practice amongst professionals, but is widely misunderstood by the public and has often proven controversial, as detailed by ARTnews. Works that were perhaps collected in prior years without consideration for a collection strategy now take up valuable space and may never see the light of day since they do not align with the museum’s mission. Parting with such items, which is usually done through a rigorous process that includes sale at a public auction to ensure transparency, is important to make room for new works that better advance a museum’s goals. We at Museum Exchange have been having frequent discussions with museums about this topic and have been exploring the idea of museums donating such works to other museums who might be a more appropriate steward of those works. 

These are just two recent developments in an evolving giving landscape. I encourage you to learn more in the Financial Times article.