Neither the Musée de l’Elysée in Lausanne nor the Maison Européenne de la Photographie in Paris purchased the works deposited with them by Polaroid in the ’90s. Nor did Polaroid do so with the proviso that the institutions then needed to go find funds with which to acquire them. This adds to the accumulating evidence that, in the ’90s, Polaroid sought to find appropriate repositories for chunks of the collections as donations. […]
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If a “fight against the sale of the Polaroid collection” does take place, it will do so because, and only because, plaintiffs with standing — photographers with work in the collection — file either a Motion for Rehearing of the August 27 court decision or an appeal thereof. In relation to that fight, should it ensue, I will function as a cultural journalist commenting on it. What I do lead presently, have led since July ’09, and intend to lead until this situation plays itself out and culminates, is the effort to inform the photography/art audience — including those with work in the collection — of what’s happening in regard to this auction, and how we got to this sorry point. This is a journalistic project, not a legal one, and should be understood as such. […] As a belated Christmas gift, George H. Singer, Esq., of the Minneapolis law firm Lindqvist & Vennum, legal counsel to John R. Stoebner, the court-appointed Chapter 7 Trustee in the PBE Corporation bankruptcy proceeding, sent me a “Notice and Demand” letter dated December 30, 2009, indicating his unhappiness, and his client’s, with some of the reportage and commentary posted here. I responded, and he replied, and I replied in turn, in a full and frank exchange of views. You’ll find our collected correspondence here. […] Sometime between January 2003 and April 2009, somewhere between 6000-8000 works vanished from the Polaroid Collection. And no one seems to care — not the Minnesota Bankruptcy Court, which in August ’09 authorized the sale of the remainder of the collection at auction; not Sotheby’s, designated as the auction house of choice for the procedure; not the art/photo press, which to date has shown no interest in any aspect of the dissolution of this great collection; and not even the current possessors of the collection. . . . […] |
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Polaroid Collection: Update 16
Even assuming the auction by Sotheby’s goes through as planned, it includes only 1260 works out of an inventoried total of 15,936. That leaves 14,676 still in the hands of the court-appointed trustee, John R. Stoebner, for disposition. So we need to turn some of our attention to alerting suitable repositories to the desirability and ongoing availability of the bulk of the collection, which remains a unique anthology of twentieth-century visual culture. In short, we need to help the trustee find this collection — complete as is, or minus the auction selection but otherwise intact — a good new home. […]