Many say an art dealer running a museum is a 'conflict of interest.' But maybe the art world has lived an artificial or unintentional lie all of these years when it comes to conflicts of interest.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I would draw a really big distinction between competition, or potential competition, and a conflict of interest. A conflict of interest implies wrongdoing, whereas competition is really healthy.
Art is an investigation.
I don't like conflicts of interest; they should be eliminated or disclosed. I believe in transparency: that people have to really not just know but understand what they're buying and selling.
Of course art world ethics are important. But museums are no purer than any other institution or business. Academics aren't necessarily more high-minded than gallerists.
Art dealing is when you're doing it as a business.
Art is not an investment. Art is something you buy because you are financially solvent enough to give yourself a pleasure of living with great works rather than having to just see them in museums. People who are buying art at the top of the market as an investment are foolish.
Art is a liaison between some sort of deranged mentality and others who are not going through it.
Conflicts of interest' arise when you're not - when you're sneaky about it, when you're shady about it, when you're not transparent about it. If you tell everyone, 'Here's what's going on. Here's the process; here are the people that are playing a role' - that's being transparent.
And you know, art as commerce, doesn't really make too much sense, they don't go together.
If you don't work yourself up into a fever of greed and covetousness in an art museum, you're just not doing the job.