Art Market Monitor

Global Coverage ~ Unique Analysis

  • AMMpro
  • AMM Fantasy Collecting Game
  • Podcast
  • Contact Us

History Behind the Hammer

October 22, 2009 by Marion Maneker

Suzanne Muchnic’s well-done profile of UCLA’s Hammer Museum director Ann Philbin contains this short history of the Hammer’s birth and funding problems. It shows that two recent themes, collectors opting for private museums over donating to existing institutions and de-accessioning to raise operating funds, in the museum world are hardly new themes. In the Hammer’s case, they were granted an exemption from AAMD rules. In other words, if you ask first, you can get an exemption:

In its early days, the museum was run by the Armand Hammer Foundation with Stephen Garrett as director, but talks with university officials began in 1991. Negotiations ended with an agreement in 1994, putting UCLA in charge of management and programming without committing new funds. Operating money came from a bond portfolio, UCLA’s existing art budgets, private donations and revenue from the museum.

Henry T. Hopkins, a veteran museum administrator and UCLA professor who died recently, directed the museum from 1994 to 1998. He presided over a period when the museum gained respect mainly as a venue for traveling exhibitions but got harsh criticism for selling a major asset, a scientific manuscript by Leonardo da Vinci known as the Codex Leicester, to establish a reserve fund for potential legal challenges to Hammer’s estate. Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft Corp., bought the Codex at auction for $30.8 million.

The money was released to the museum in 2002 as a new endowment, but a controversy raged about how the interest should be used — strictly for art acquisitions, in keeping with the prevailing ethical code, or also to pay for other museum needs? Philbin took the matter to the Assn. of Art Museum Directors, which granted an exemption to the usual restrictions, partly because of the museum’s tumultuous beginnings. The museum now uses half the interest — about $1 million a year — to buy art and the other half for exhibitions and programs.

Philbin faced a much thornier problem that came to light in 2007, when the museum and the Armand Hammer Foundation announced they would part company and divide the $305-million art collection amassed by Hammer and owned by the foundation.

The founder’s grandson, Michael A. Hammer, had raised questions about changes in the museum’s original name and nonconformance to requirements for displaying Armand Hammer’s collection. The breaches made the museum vulnerable to a “reversionary clause” that allowed the foundation to reclaim the collection and some endowment funds.

The new agreement revoked the ominous clause and gave the museum 103 works valued at $250 million — including trademark paintings by Rembrandt, Vincent van Gogh and John Singer Sargent — and a separate collection of 7,500 works by 19th century French satirist Honoré Daumier and his contemporaries valued at $8 million. The foundation got 92 paintings valued at $55 million, which are available as loans to museums.

The Hammer Museum’s Striking Rise (Los Angeles Times)

More from Art Market Monitor

  • Sotheby's Debt Gets a Better OutlookSotheby's Debt Gets a Better Outlook
  • Hong Kong Draws New Mainland Buyers as Market Matures in Big SalesHong Kong Draws New Mainland Buyers as Market Matures in Big Sales
  • A Quick Trip to ARCOA Quick Trip to ARCO
  • Warhol Big Electric Chair Coming to Sotheby’s in May at $18-25mWarhol Big Electric Chair Coming to Sotheby’s in May at $18-25m
  • Mei Moses: Art Beat S&P 500 in 2010Mei Moses: Art Beat S&P 500 in 2010
  • Irving Blum’s Son Is Changing HollywoodIrving Blum’s Son Is Changing Hollywood

Filed Under: Museums

About Marion Maneker

Want to get Art Market Monitor‘s posts sent to you in our email? Sign up below by clicking on the Subscribe button.

Top Posts

  • After Pandemic’s Rapid Change, Sotheby’s Has 8 Predictions for 2021
  • Keith Haring’s 1989 Retrospect Comes to Sotheby’s London Prints Sale
  • A Season of Improvisation: Fall 2020 New York Modern and Contemporary Art Auction Analysis
  • Tony Podesta's Secret Art Buying
  • Four of Picasso's Women Valued at $28m Come to Christie's from Rose-Walters Collection
  • Norman Rockwell's Not Gay. But Is He a Great Artist?
  • Roy Lichtenstein’s Top Ten Auction Prices
  • How to Chant Like an Auctioneer
  • Christie's Announces $70m Picasso Self Portrait
  • Basquiat's Last Girlfriend
  • About Us/ Contact
  • Podcast
  • AMMpro
  • Newsletter
  • FAQ

twitterfacebooksoundcloud
Privacy Policy
Terms & Conditions
California Privacy Rights
Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Advertise on Art Market Monitor