Hasta La Ideas

While the debate continues over whether or not the Orange County Museum of Art handled themselves properly with their recent sale of a batch of paintings, the deaccessioning conversation has flared up again on the other coast, finding New York-based museums attempting to fight back a bill making its way through the state government that would regulate art sales used to help make ends meet. The passing of the bill would make it much more difficult sell off pieces of collections to anyone other than other museums or organizations who would keep the art available to the public. Museums in the state, like everywhere else across the county, are suffering from decreased endowments and massive cost-cutting efforts including the Guggenheim‘s layoffs and the Met‘s recent announcement that they’ve just finished their latest round of pink slips and closures, and they aren’t keen to see one of their options to keep the doors open getting more difficult and are thus scrambling to keep the bill at bay while trying to avoid coming across as having a lack of concern for the public good. We’ll keep you up to date of the bill’s progress as it moves forward.