2007 in Review: Stories of the Year

2007 in Review: Stories of the Year

Damien Hirst Andy Warhol Mark Rothko Red, White, and Bored? Philippe Vergne on Directing Dia Contemporary Market Bruised but Resilient After London Sales The Week That Was (June 13 – 20, 2008) Damien Hirst to Auction Own Works at Sotheby's

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1. $144,560,000
On May 15, Mark Rothko’s White Center (Yellow, Pink and Lavender on Rose) (1950) sold for an astonishing $72,840,000 at Sotheby’s New York, breaking the record for a contemporary painting at auction and far eclipsing the artist’s previous high of $22.4 million, achieved in November 2005. The contemporary record survived the following night at Christie’s, but only barely: Andy Warhol’s Green Car Crash (Green Burning Car I) (1963) went for $71,720,000, obliterating the artist’s previous record of $17.4 million, set in November 2006.

The real story of the May auctions, however, was not the $144,560,000 these two paintings fetched, but rather that these prices, though extraordinary, were not totally unexpected outliers. The new bar set in mid-May 2007 in New York was just the latest sign that we were in the midst of the wildly bullish contemporary market. The only question was: Had the market reached a once-in-a-lifetime peak or an impressive, but ultimately routine, vista on a long steady climb?  

2. The Skull As Gaudy as the Ritz
Whether it was a bald comment on the pervasive market or the latest example that success in the art world has very little correlation with taste, Damien Hirst’s For the Love of God (2007), a diamond-encrusted human skull, wins the award for Most Notorious Artwork of 2007. The chintzy bauble was valued at $100 million. At first it was this outrageous price that made news, then the fact that it hadn’t sold, and then that it did sell … to an investment group including Hirst himself. As the work journeyed from the artist, out into the ever-expanding art world, and back to the artist, it generated article upon article, keeping Hirst in the news. An abominable artwork or a nine-digit publicity stunt? You decide.    

3. Don’t Buchel Under
With its sprawling former factory campus filled with giant display spaces; its cordial, laissez-faire treatment of commissioned artists; its intuitive, flexible approach to installation; and its artist-friendly curatorial approach, Mass MoCA is a dream institution for an artist—at least that would be the museum’s side of this story. Christoph Buchel, the Swiss artist whose installation Training Ground for Democracy (2007) sat in limbo—abandoned, incomplete, and covered by a tarp—in the museum for several months, as a legal dispute regarding its fate raged on, would tell a very different tale: of promises broken, shameful parsimony, and a clear institutional preference for expediency over aesthetics.

While some have interpreted the standoff as deliberate provocation on the part of the artist—a publicity-generating institutional critique—it more likely was just a deal gone very wrong. As the artwork languished out of view in valuable exhibition space, both sides went to court. The museum wanted Training Ground removed or open for exhibition; the artist wanted it to be completely out of view, unless he could finish it on his terms.

In the end, the judge found in favor of Mass MoCA, which promptly disassembled the work. But the real winner of the dispute is less clear. The museum suffered a blow to its reputation, while Buchel generated plenty of free publicity. Meanwhile, the largest potential casualty of the whole affair may be the sort of creative, improvisational relationship between artist and museum on which Mass MoCA prides itself. The presiding judge’s comment that "a second-year law student could have drafted a contract that would have eliminated 90 percent of the problems the parties are now arguing about" will surely be a lasting legacy. One meaning more paperwork, more contention, more lawyers, more litigation, and, one fears, less risk-taking at museums.  

4. Dirty Larry
This is another legal dispute and another story likely to result in new laws and regulations, though in this case who is at fault is not in dispute. Lawrence Salander of Salander-O’Reilly Galleries was a respected, successful Old Master and 19th- and 20th-century art dealer who had achieved every dealer’s dream: he put on museum-quality shows, and he made money. Lots of it.