2023-04-28 18:20:11
3 minutes to read
Exhibited for 20 years at MAM-SP, the work arrives in the United States to be sold by Sotheby’s NY
The iconic work “Maman”, the giant spider by French-American artist Louise Bourgeois arrived in the United States to be auctioned next month by Sotheby’s New York. The work, belonging to the Fundação Itaú collection, is expected to fetch between US$ 30 million and US$ 40 million – approximately R$ 152 million to R$ 202 million.
The reason disclosed for the sale is the funding of the operations of Itaú Cultural – the cultural arm of Itaú Unibanco – and the strengthening of the institution’s structure and perpetuity.
Acquired in 1996 by the collector and co-founder of the Itaú bank, Olavo Setúbal, following being shown at the 23rd Bienal de São Paulo, the piece was loaned to the Museum of Modern Art of São Paulo and displayed on the institution’s marquee in 1997 and 2017, forming part of the landscape in the minds of Ibirapuera Park visitors.
In recent years, the 3-metre-high work has toured Brazilian cities, visiting institutions such as the Inhotim Institute in Minas Gerais, the Iberê Camargo Foundation in Rio Grande do Sul, the Oscar Niemeyer Museum in Curitiba and the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro. January.
This spider is the first of a series of six bronze spiders made in the 1990s and the only one present in Latin America, the others are on display in museums across Europe and the United States.
The sale of this work recalls the negotiation of a canvas “No. 16” (1950) by the artist Jackson Pollock by the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro – the only work by the artist present in a Latin American collection – sold for around US$ 13 million, around R$ 47.6 million, in 2019 .
These negotiations generate conflicts of opinion in the arts circuit, which raise the discussion regarding “alienation”, that is, the practice of selling works of art from museum collections, which can only be done by purchasing other works for the collection. Controlled by the American Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD), the practice aims to improve museums by acquiring pieces that promote greater alignment with the curatorial focus of the collection. During the pandemic, the AAMD authorized institutions to sell works for two years to balance the internal budget.
Jorge Coli, art history professor at Unicamp, is one of the critics of this type of sale. In 2018, he referred to Pollock’s sale as a “debacle”, suggesting that a sale of work to pay off debts is unacceptable, as this need is the result of mismanagement.
Another perspective of criticism stems from the understanding that museum collections are alive and can transform and adapt to time and to the different prioritized cuts. Fundação Itaú’s collection is dedicated to Brazilian art and artists.
Victoria Louise is a journalist, graduated in Art Criticism and Curation at PUC-SP.
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