Displaying items by tag: detroit institute of the arts

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes on Thursday signaled that he is viewing the value of the Detroit Institute of the Arts through the lens of the Detroit's future as the city works to emerge from Chapter 9 bankruptcy.

Rhodes asked Annmarie Erickson, executive vice president of the museum, how valuable the museum is to the education of children, to the social enjoyment of families who visit the museum, and for southeast Michigan as a whole.

From October 10, 2013 through January 13, 2014, the Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) will present Caravaggio’s Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy, one of the artist’s earliest masterpieces. The painting, which is on loan from the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, CT, will be exhibited alongside the DIA’s own painting by Caravaggio, Martha and Mary Magdalene.

Salvador Salort-Pons, the DIA’s executive director, Collections Strategies and Information, said, “Caravaggio influenced many painters from other European countries who came to Rome to learn the master’s dramatic and realistic style. Visitors will be able to explore two of the best Caravaggios in America side by side in the same gallery.” Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy is most likely the first religious scene that Caravaggio painted, a genre for which he is admired. It is also one of the artist’s few nightscapes, showcasing Caravaggio’s masterful use of light.

While Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy is one of the Italian master’s first religious paintings, Martha and Mary Magdalene is one of Caravaggio’s first known religious works staged in an interior. Side by side, the paintings will allow patrons to compare and contrast two of artist’s most spiritually and emotionally charged early works.

After filing for bankruptcy last month, the city of Detroit has hired the international auction house Christie’s to appraise a portion of its city-owned art collection, which is housed in the Detroit Institute of Arts. City officials have not yet decided if they will sell any works in an attempt to quell creditors.

Rumors about the fate of the D.I.A.’s illustrious collection circulated quickly after representatives from Christie's visited the museum this past June. The auction house confirmed on Monday, August 5, 2013 that they have been hired to appraise the D.I.A.’s holding but did not specify which portion of the collection they would be evaluating. The auction house said in a statement, “Christie’s was asked to assist due to our expertise in this area across all fine art categories and eras. We understand that a valuation of all the City’s assets (extending well beyond the art) is one of many steps that will be necessary for the legal system to reach a conclusion about the best long term solution for the citizens of Detroit.”

The office of Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr will pay for the appraisal, which will cost $200,000 and is expected to wrap up in October. Christie’s will only appraise works of art that are city-owned and are not subject to donor restrictions that could prevent a possible sale.

On June 10, 2013, Bank of America announced the recipients of its 2013 Art Conservation Project. The program provides grant funding to international nonprofit museums to conserve historically and culturally significant works of art that are in danger of deterioration.

This year, Bank of America’s Art Conservation Project will provide funding for 24 works in 16 countries. One of the most significant undertakings is the restoration of Simon Rodia’s Watts Towers in Los Angeles. Built between 1921 and 1953, the Watts Towers are an iconic part of the city and have fallen into disrepair. The towers are part of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Other projects include the restoration of Jackson Pollock’s (1912-1956) Number 1A, One, and Echo at the Museum of Modern Art; 13 mural drawings by Diego Rivera (1886-1957) at the Detroit Institute of Arts; four Tudor paintings at the National Portrait Gallery in London; a Rembrandt (1606-1669) study at the National Gallery in Prague; and a Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) photography collection at La Casa Azul in Mexico.    

Bank of America launched its Art Conservation Project in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa in 2010. It was expanded to include the Americas, Asia, and Australia in 2012. Including this year’s recipients, Bank of America will have funded the conservation of 57 projects in 25 countries.

The Dallas Museum of Art announced today that it will nullify its $10 general admission fee, effective January 21, 2013. The museum will also launch an online rewards program that could even make membership free.

In recent years, many institutions have reversed their decision to charge visitors and are now free to the public. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, Missouri, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Walters Museum of Art in Baltimore, and the Detroit Institute of the Arts have all decided that free admission will help their institutions become more widely accessible, which, in turn, will keep visitor numbers up.

While it appears that the aforementioned museums have started a trend, many institutions in major tourist destinations are not so quick to jump on the free entry bandwagon. In New York, the Museum of Modern Art charges $25 and the Guggenheim Museum charges $22. San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art, another major tourist attraction, charges $18. Other big-name museums that require visitors to pay are the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Carnegie Museum of Art.

We’ve all read media reports of internal problems at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles — exhibitions canceled, staff fired, and artist trustees resigning in protest. Reporters on the West Coast are having a field day. These problems can probably be laid in part at the door of bad management. There is no doubt the current museum director, Jeffrey Deitch, and his predecessor, Jeremy Strick, made foolish decisions: Strick spent down the museum’s endowment without attending to fund-raising, and Deitch appears to be willing to degrade the program to boost attendance.

But there are other reasons why MOCA is struggling — reasons that, it seems to me, have as much to do with the nature of museum financing in this country as they do with the limitations of the individuals managing that institution.

Andy Warhol once said, “Good business is the best art.”  And while he wasn’t referring to art museums per se, he might as well have been. These days, museums across the country are fighting to stay in the black—and now some of them are asking folks to pay more in property taxes to make up the shortfall.

Last Tuesday, voters in three Michigan suburbs agreed to a raise their property taxes to save the Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA), which has struggled mightily with its finances for the past decade. Unlike most major metropolitan museums, the DIA operates without a significant endowment and receives no financial support from the city of Detroit or the state of Michigan.

Voters approved what’s known as a millage tax, a fee assessed on the value of your home. The more your property is worth, the higher your tax. In this case, the DIA levy costs approximately $15 for every $150,000 of a home’s fair market value, and will raise around $23 million a year from Oakland, Macomb, and Wayne counties (the last of which includes Detroit).