Bruce Nauman’s new work is getting a lot of press for the unique way it has been acquired by both Francois Pinault and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art:

LACMA said Thursday that Pinault has purchased the artwork and has given half ownership of it to the museum. The somewhat unusual deal means that Pinault still retains the work, but has given LACMA a master disc of it, according to a spokeswoman for the museum. “We wouldn’t have been able to acquire it ourselves,” said Miranda Carroll, the spokeswoman. She declined to disclose monetary figures of the acquisition, which was made from the Sperone Westwater gallery in New York. “For Beginners” is a two-channel video with sound that depicts two pairs of hands whose digits open and close in various permutations. There was great interest in the 2010 work from art institutions around the world, but the artist wanted it to reside in an American museum, according to LACMA.

LACMA acquires Bruce Nauman’s ‘For Beginners,’ with help from Francois Pinault (Bloomberg)