''I don't like having my own work in the house.''

This was the same story, in the The Art Newspaper. Why does this whole thing make me feel vaguely nauseated?

Guggenheim opens Prince house to public
The New York museum will display works by the artist Richard Prince in his own house in upstate New York
By Jason Edward Kaufman

NEW YORK. The Guggenheim Museum has acquired a dilapidated, single-storey house in upstate New York from the artist Richard Prince, who spent three years turning its four rooms and garage into an installation entitled Second house. It includes 11 sculptures fashioned from painted car hoods and other pop/junk objects, such as plastic key chains given away at gas stations, a painted T-shirt, a photograph of punk rocker Sid Vicious, and a necklace made of pieces of bread. Now owned by the Guggenheim, Second house opens to the public this month.

Mr Prince, 56, moved upstate from Manhattan about eight years ago with his wife and two children, and in 2001 bought the disused house on the top of a hill, a former hunting shelter clad only in silver foil-covered insulation.

It is located near the artist’s home and studio in the Catskills town of Rensselaerville, an impoverished rural area of Albany County west of the Hudson River about three hours north of Manhattan (over an hour north of Dia:Beacon).

According to Guggenheim deputy director and chief curator Lisa Dennison, last summer Mr Prince’s dealer Barbara Gladstone approached the museum to see if it would like to acquire the building and its contents and open it to the public. “We thought it sounded like an interesting opportunity and way to collect”, says Ms Dennison, who recalls that the museum owned a single “joke” painting by the artist, despite the increasing demand for his canvases, two of which sold for more than $650,000 each at auction last year.

Together she and Ms Gladstone devised a structure whereby a consortium of five Guggenheim trustees and five collectors of Prince’s work agreed to pay equal sums, and that each would purchase a car hood through the gallery, donating a percentage to the Guggenheim and promising the remainder over the next decade. The artist donated the house, the other works of art it contains (besides the 10 gifted car hoods, Prince is donating a hood himself), and the surrounding 80 acres. The 10 patrons, whose names have not been disclosed, also provided funding to upgrade and operate the house as a public venue five months a year. Because the building is unheated, it will remain closed for the winter, during which time the patrons may take their newly acquired works of art home.

“For these collectors it’s not so much about having a work by the artist, but supporting Richard’s vision”, says Ms Dennison, who notes that much of Prince’s work in recent years has been inspired by upstate New York, including a photographic series completed in the 1990s. “It’s not unlike Marfa”, she says, referring to the Texas town where Donald Judd created a tightly controlled display of his art.

“In Richard’s mind it’s the perfect environment for looking at this art, and that’s what we’re trying to preserve.” The house will be open Saturdays and at other times by appointment, and if there is more demand, the museum will increase the opening hours, says Ms Dennison. She also states that the Guggenheim will operate it exactly as conceived by Mr Prince, as a work of installation art for at least 10 years, after which a decision will be made in consultation with the artist as to whether the house should be sold and the works of art incorporated into the Guggenheim’s collection.

Ms Dennison describes Prince as “one of the most innovative and influential artists of our times”. She says his car hoods hover between painting and sculpture and have to do with youth, speed and danger, as well as the community of upstate New York. “They’re archetypes of Americana, like the macho cowboy men in the re-photographed Marlboro ads”, she says.

those car hood paintings have been around a long time. well before his move upstate. it sounds more like "the art of the deal" than any thing else.
- bill 7-04-2005 7:49 pm [add a comment]

It's just hard to imagine that being that deeply in bed with all those donors he could ever again do anything remotely "edgy." The comparisons to Marfa are a major stretch.

- tom moody 7-04-2005 8:16 pm [add a comment]

btw, notice the pk dick book stack in the slide show?
- bill 7-04-2005 9:55 pm [add a comment]

I forgot to do the slide show, so I went back. Yeah, it puts my similar PKD stack to shame. I have the same titles but he has mostly hardbacks, including a couple of the super-nice Gregg Press editions from '80s (the green spines). The main difference between his collection and mine, though, is a consortium of Guggenheim trustees didn't buy mine. Maybe if I had looked more diligently for the hardbacks...
- tom moody 7-04-2005 10:10 pm [add a comment]

thought it might be of interest to gary indiana in case he goes ego surfing in the wee hours again.


- bill 7-04-2005 10:36 pm [add a comment]

No matter how many artists or cool French writers like Dick, Indiana will always have the superior wisdom on the subject. Also, for the record, nothing wrong with self-searches--how else would you know if someone picked up the thread of a conversation you started? Go to the library?
- tom moody 7-04-2005 11:04 pm [add a comment]

Also, I wonder if Prince would own up to liking Dick, or if he would say it's more of that lowbrow culture he collects?
- tom moody 7-04-2005 11:06 pm [add a comment]

wwad (what would andy do?)
- bill 7-04-2005 11:12 pm [add a comment]