Everybody misplaces something sometime. But it is not easy
for the University of California, Berkeley, to explain how it lost a
22-foot-long carved panel by a celebrated African-American sculptor, or how,
three years ago, it mistakenly sold this work, valued at more than a million
dollars, for $150 plus tax. The
university’s embarrassing loss eventually enabled the Huntington Library, Art
Collections and Botanical Gardens, a large museum and research center in San
Marino, Calif., to acquire its first major work by an African-American artist. The circuitous tale of Sargent Johnson’s huge
redwood relief involves error, chance and a partnership of unlikely art-world
figures, including an art and furniture dealer who stumbled upon the panels at
the university’s surplus store; an antiques dealer who was on a first-name
basis with Michael Jackson and his chimp Bubbles; and a lawyer whose hobby is
buying lighthouses and who convinced the government that even though the art
was commissioned by the Works Progress Administration, it could still be sold
publicly…
Full article at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/21/arts/design/art-by-sargent-johnson-berkeleys-loss-is-museums-gain.html
It's only money:
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