[CPProt.net] Veteran art-news reporter taken off the air by National Public Radio after MOMA complained about report on controversy over ownership of Schiele's Portrait of Wally

[MSN and CPProt list (Ton Cremers)]

D'ARCY OUT AT NPR AFTER MOMA COMPLAINS

Veteran art-news reporter David D'Arcy has been taken off the air by
National Public Radio (NPR) after the Museum of Modern Art complained about
his report on the long-running controversy over the ownership of Egon
Schiele's painting, Portrait of Wally. Though the painting was stolen by the
Nazis from Viennese dealer Lea Bondi in 1939, its present owner, the Leopold
Foundation in Vienna, refuses to return it to Bondi's heirs, and a
contentious court battle has raged ever since the painting turned up in a
1997 MoMA exhibition.  

A casual NPR listener (or reader of the transcript, which can be found
online) would probably see nothing unusual in D'Arcy's story, which aired on
Dec. 27, 2004. According to the transcript, none of the principals in the
case, including MoMA's attorney, would be interviewed for the report. More
than one source, however, was willing to criticize -- harshly -- the
museum's position in the case. Former museum director Tom Freudenheim
expressed puzzlement that MoMA, despite being directed and chaired by Jews,
allowed its "greed" to overcome its "sense of responsibility." Two lawyers
active in cases involving Nazi art loot were also quoted with similarly
unflattering remarks, one suggesting that museums can resort to a "war of
attrition" in such lawsuits, which often involve aged claimants.

Apparently, someone at MoMA contacted someone at NPR and demanded a
correction, which NPR currently has posted on its website: "The government,
not the museum, has custody of the artwork. The museum says it took no
position on the question of the painting's ownership. NPR failed to give the
museum a chance to answer allegations about its motivations and actions."

But D'Arcy's report doesn't address the custody of the artwork, and in
regard to ownership says only that when "MoMA has discussed the case over
the past seven years, the museum has said it's bound by its loan contract to
return the painting." As for the claim that he failed to give the museum a
chance to present its point of view, D'Arcy says he has a fax in which the
museum declines to participate in the story.

D'Arcy says adamantly that "MoMA was not able to find any inaccuracies in
the report, and the correction aired and posted by NPR does not address any
inaccuracies."

High-profile reporters and experts in Nazi-era art resitution have rallied
to D'Arcy's cause. In a letter to the NPR board, Morley Safer suggests that
the broadcaster "has caved in to intimidation by a large, wealthy and
powerful cultural institution." The lawyer and art historian Lucille Roussin
disputes MoMA's claim that it has never taken a position on the question of
the painting's ownership. "MoMA is on record, under oath, in court documents
systematically crediting the ownership claims of the Leopold Foundation and
questioning the legal foundation for the Bondi claims," she writes. "MoMA's
position in the current case also asks the court to prevent the Bondis'
ownership claim from ever coming before a US judge."

What happens now? "It's been an awful experience for him, being undermined
as a journalist by both MoMA and NPR," D'Arcy's attorney, David S. Korzenik,
told Artnet News, "and we are now deciding what action to take." D'Arcy
remains a correspondent for the Art Newspaper, a contributing editor at Art
& Auction and a regular critic on the "Front Row" program on BBC Radio.

http://www.artnet.com/