Bilbao Guggenheim Criticized for Botched Serra Sale

By ARTINFO

Published: January 15, 2008

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BILBAO, Spain—Bilbao's Guggenheim Museum is being criticized for losing $8.87 million of public money in the purchase of a Richard Serra sculpture, the Independent reports. The Guggenheim Foundation and the Tenedora Museum of Modern of Contemporary Art paid for the work in dollars, instead of Euros, losing the sum because of a poor exchange rate.

Serra's 1,034-ton The Matter of Time is now on view at the Guggenheim along with his older work Snake, which together cost $30.36 million in 2005. After questions were asked in the Basque regional parliament, the Basque Tribunal of Public Spending launched a legal investigation, reporting yesterday that the transactions were "legal." Basque culture minister Miren Azkarate has refused to resign over the snafu, saying the purchase was "correct and perfectly legal, but mistaken."