What To Do With All That Art

Although the question of what should be done with an art collection one has built, either before or after one has expired is something I have written about before, recent examples bring me to it again. In personal terms Penelope and I have given quite a bit of art to institutions as our circumstances and tastes changed and yes, we have sold some. The closets still have a lot of what we have no more room to hang or install. We are basically taking the lazy way out … let the kids deal with it.

Everyone looks at their treasures differently. The outstanding art collection of Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, went to auction after he died, and it brought world record prices. Some said he should have given his collection to the Metropolitan Museum. That museum did not need it and Allen’s aim was to fund his and his wife’s foundation that supported organizations dealing with issues like climate change but with an emphasis on the arts and culture.

Aso Tavitian (1940-2020) though not a household name like Paul Alllen, was a computer technology developer who built a major collection of European paintings and sculpture. Born in Bulgaria of Armenian descent, he lived for a time in Lebanon before immigrating to the United States where he received a scholarship to Columbia University. In 1975 he co-founded SyncSort, Inc. an early software development company. He established a foundation to provide scholarships for students of Armenian and Bulgarian origin as well as projects for the Republic of Armenia. He served on several boards including that of the Clark Art Institute where he developed plans for the future of his collection.

Located in the Berkshire mountains the Clark is a relatively small museum with research and academic programs, including a major art history library. It has become a leading international center for research and discussion on the nature of art and art history with programs that bring together scholars from around the world.

Last month the Clark announced that the technology pioneer, through his foundation, had left 331 works of art and $45 million to endow a curatorial position to oversee the collection and take care of it in addition to funding an Aso. O. Tavitian Wing at the Museum. We so often read about museums receiving “transformative” gifts, and in this case, it is certainly true.

I will illustrate 3 works that give the sense of quality of the Tavitian collection.

The star of the show is “The Madonna of the Fountain” by Jan van Eyck (Netherlandish, c. 1390–1441) and his workshop ...

A bronze of a model that I have always loved by Giovanni Francesco Susini (Italian, 1585–1653), “The Abduction of a Sabine Woman” ...

And these remarkable works in wax ...

I love collectors who study a field of art that interests them and learn a lot more by actually collecting and becoming experts in their own right. A Boston lawyer is one such person. George S. Abrams (1932-), and his late wife Maida, had been collecting Northern European art since 1960. He has been Knighted by The Kingdom of the Netherlands for his contribution to the study of Dutch art, especially in the area of drawings. In 2017, he gave 330 Dutch, Flemish, and Netherlandish drawings to the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, his alma mater. Starting in the 1990s, he and his wife had already given 140 drawings before this larger gift.

Here is one of 9 Rembrandt drawings in the Abrams gift. It is of a farm possibly on the Amsteldijk.

Another Abrams gift is one of 4 studies of the tulips for which Holland is famous by another 17th-century Dutch artist, Jacob Marrel.

The “largest gift in its 170-year history” was recently reported by the British Museum. Sir Percival David (1892-1964) was a Bombay-born British financier who, over his lifetime, built a collection of Chinese ceramics. He established the Sir Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art in 1952 and was so passionate about China that he even studied the language “to a very high level.” Though his collection had been on public view at the British Museum since 2009, as they say, “it ain’t over til it's over," and almost exactly one year ago, his 1700 Chinese works of art, mostly ceramics, were formally given to the museum through the Foundation.

I found this pair of Funerary Urns with Celadon Glaze exciting.

Of particular significance is this Falangcai Bowl with Peonies. Falangcai refers to porcelain painted with enamels in the imperial workshops of the Forbidden City in Beijing, China.

I will be presumptuous enough to say that collections are formed by people who are passionate in their interests, and often, these include art. For various reasons, we want others to appreciate the works, and yes, our egos make us believe that our collections are important enough to be shared. Should the museums accept these donations is another question entirely. Both the Fogg and the Clark are already on the art map for scholars: not so much for the general public. These gifts give another reason for making them a destination. Whether a museum that already has one and a half million objects needs 1700 more is open to debate, but clearly stellar collections, like these above, enhance the institutions.

The display of the Tavitan donation will attract more visitors to the Clark. The Abrams gift makes the Fogg a must-go to for the study of Northern European drawing, for, it is now the largest collection outside of Europe. Similarly, the David collection makes the British Museum a permanent center for the study of Chinese art.