Fisk University has a few problems. It is losing about $2 million a year, most of its buildings are mortgaged, and its students are ranked by the Princeton Review as the unhappiest in the nation. Its proposed solution? To sell off half ownership of its well-stocked art collection, which is rich in works by Cezanne, Picasso, Renoir, and others, to Wal-Mart heiress Alice Waltons fledgling Crystal Bridges Bridges Museum of American Art for $30 million. But here, again, Fisk University has a few problems.

The state of Tennessee has objected to the plan, arguing that it cuts against the wishes of the famous patrons behind the donation of the works to the school, American painter Georgia O'Keeffe and the estate of her late husband, Alfred Stieglitz, and a trial has ensued, in which the school has offered a rather novel argument about its commitment to their donors. The key quote, from one of the school’s attorneys, John Branham, was reported today by The Tenneesean. Branham told the court, of O’Keefe and Stieglitz: "Both artists are white, not black, not Southern. They have nothing to do with Fisk."

Fisk, of course, is a historically black university located in the South. Following the university’s logic, Walton would seem to be a better custodian for the art, but only marginally: she is white, suitably enough, but the location of her forthcoming museum is Arkansas. O’Keefe lived between New Mexico and New York, meaning that Arkansas doesn't seem quite right for the two artistic giants either. Also, one might ask why Fisk is even bothering to maintain a half stake in the works. Why not just sell them off entirely, since they reside outside the school's areas of interest?

There’s another wrinkle in all of this. As NPR points out, Georgia O’Keefe explicitly stated at the time of the donation, in 1949, that she wanted classic works of European and American Modernism to be available to students at the school and people in the area, who might otherwise not have access to the material. Times change.