That Mysterious Collection of Russian Avant Garde Art Opens Up: A group of experts raised questions about a collection on view at the SMK museum in Ghent last week. The owner claimed to have documentation but would not show it to the Telegraph when their reporter asked to see the evidence of the works’ provenance. Now The Telegraph says Igor Toporovski.

• “has now agreed to both share his confidential documents to establish provenance and allow the paintings and objects in the exhibition to be subject to scientific laboratory analysis to establish whether the dating of the works could be correct or not. The exhibition will continue to run until further notice.” …

The Winner of the First Rare Digital Art Auction’s Most Valuable Lot Was a Newbie: The Paris Review was at the Rare Digital Art Festival’s auction and spoke to the winner of the final lot, Peter Kell:

• Why had he been willing to spend so much on this Pepe? Was he an early adopter, swimming in PepeCash, a devoted memer, a crypto developer with the inside scoop? Actually, Peter told me, he works in marketing and had flown in from Florida just for the event. His friends had gotten him curious about Pepes, which he felt were a good investment opportunity. “I was like, Why are all these rich people into PepeCash?” He turned to Parker and Rosenstein and asked if the auctioneers would accept Bitcoin, as he hadn’t gotten around to buying any PepeCash yet. “This is actually my first Pepe,” he explained. “I don’t even have a Pepe Wallet.” …

Museums v Collectors: Robert Storr is quoted in Town & Country’s story on private art museums saying, “It’s hard to name a great collector who became a great museum director, even of their own museums.” It should also probably be pointed out that formula works the other way as well. No museum director has ever distinguished him or herself as a collector.