Object Lessons: The Panza Collection Initiative Symposium Object Lessons: The Panza Collection Initiative Symposium is produced and funded by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, and the Getty Conservation Institute, Los Angeles. The Panza Collection Initiative is generously funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The Panza Collection Initiative (PCI) is a of individual works. Chief considerations long-running study project devoted to the are the object’s materials and means of technical history of Minimal, Post-Minimal, fabrication; its replication—authorized and/ and Conceptual art. Organized around a large or unauthorized—over time; the changing repository of works acquired from collectors parameters for its installation, from site to site; Giovanna and Giuseppe Panza di Biumo by and the proliferation of contracts, certificates, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum from working drawings, and other documents 1990 to 1992, the project was conceived to devised to support its authenticity through strict support a systematic collaboration between rules of ownership, fabrication, and display. the disciplines of art conservation and history. An ethical imperative frames the work It addresses questions occasioned by the rise of the PCI: to weigh the impact of these of “delegated fabrication” in art after 1960: the considerations on the legal and/or moral rights production of the art object—using materials and responsibilities of artists, collectors, and from industry and commercial manufacture—by institutions. Our goal is to apply the PCI’s assistants and professional fabricators or shops. concerns to the museum’s stewardship of art According to this practice, the artwork can be from this period. Finally, beyond application of realized multiple times and in a variety of forms. the project’s findings at the Guggenheim, our The PCI’s methodology relies on an exhaustive hope is that the dissemination of the results of investigation of the terms and conditions that the PCI will serve the art community at large. govern the production, ownership, and display Program Schedule Tuesday, April 9 9–10:15 am Coffee Reception and Self-Guided Tour of Related Art and Documents from the Panza Collection 10:15– Welcome Remarks 10:30 am Tom Learner Head of Science, Getty Conservation Institute Lena Stringari Chief Conservator and Deputy Director, Guggenheim Museum 10:30–11:30 am Introduction: Orientation and Overview Francesca Esmay Conservator, Panza Collection, Guggenheim Museum Jeffrey Weiss Independent curator and art historian, and former Senior Curator, Guggenheim Museum 11:30 am–1 pm “Works on Paper”: Certificates, Instructions, Contracts Martha Buskirk Professor of Art History and Criticism, Montserrat College of Art Christophe Cherix Robert Lehman Foundation Chief Curator of Drawings and Prints, Museum of Modern Art Carol Mancusi-Ungaro Melva Bucksbaum Associate Director of Conservation and Research, Whitney Museum of American Art Ted Mann Associate Curator, Panza Collection, Guggenheim Museum Moderated by Francesca Esmay and Jeffrey Weiss Program Schedule Tuesday, April 9 1–2:30 pm Lunch and Self-Guided Tour of Related Art and Documents from the Panza Collection 2:30–4 pm The Autonomous Object: Robert Morris Caroline A. Jones Professor of Art History in the History, Theory, and Criticism of Architecture and Art program, Massachusetts Institute of Technology James Meyer Curator of Art, 1945–75, National Gallery of Art Jill Sterrett Deputy Director for Museum Affairs and Strategic Impact, Smart Museum of Art Moderated by Francesca Esmay and Jeffrey Weiss 4–5:30 pm Preservation through Display: Doug Wheeler, PSAD Synthetic Desert III, 1971 Artist Doug Wheeler in conversation with: Francesca Esmay Raj Patel Fellow, Arup Melanie Taylor Director, Exhibition Design, Whitney Museum of American Art, and former Director, Exhibition Design, Guggenheim Museum Jeffrey Weiss 5:30–8 pm Self-Guided Tour of Related Art and Documents from the Panza Collection Program Schedule Wednesday, April 10 9–10 am Coffee Reception and Self-Guided Tour of Related Art and Documents from the Panza Collection 10–11:15 am Precedent and Site: Dan Flavin, an artificial barrier of blue, red and blue fluorescent light (to Flavin Starbuck Judd), 1968 Tiffany Bell Editor of Agnes Martin Catalogue Raisonné, and former Director, Dan Flavin Catalogue Raisonné project IJsbrand Hummelen Senior Researcher, Netherlands Institute for Cultural Heritage Moderated by Francesca Esmay and Jeffrey Weiss 11:15 am– Authority and Authenticity: Donald Judd, 12:30 pm untitled, 1974 Jamie Dearing Former studio assistant to Donald Judd Caitlin Murray Director of Marfa Programs and Archivist, Judd Foundation Ann Temkin Marie-Josée and Henry Kravis Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture, Museum of Modern Art Moderated by Francesca Esmay and Jeffrey Weiss 12:30–2 pm Lunch and Self-Guided Tour of Related Art and Documents from the Panza Collection Program Schedule Wednesday, April 10 2–3:30 pm Decommission: Rights, Responsibility, and the Status of the Work Martha Buskirk Francesca Esmay Marianna Horton Senior Associate Counsel, Mermin Guggenheim Museum Virginia Rutledge Art lawyer and art historian Jeffrey Weiss Moderated by Lena Stringari 3:30–4:30 pm Collecting Collections Michael Govan CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director, Los Angeles County Museum of Art Richard Koshalek Architecture consultant, and former Director, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (1980–99) Moderated by Nancy Spector, Artistic Director and Jennifer and David Stockman Chief Curator, Guggenheim Museum 4:30–5:30 pm Roundtable Panza Collection Initiative team: Francesca Esmay Lena Stringari Ted Mann Jeffrey Weiss Nancy Spector Moderated by Ivan Gaskell, Professor of Cultural History and Museum Studies, Bard Graduate Center Floor Plan Elevators 1 Entrance 1 2 1 Donald Judd, untitled, 1974 2 Bruce Nauman, None Sing Neon Sign, 1970 3 Robert Morris, Untitled (Door Stop), 1965 4 Dan Flavin, untitled (to Henri Matisse), 1964 *An ID badge for the symposium is required to access this display on Tower Level 7. Floor Plan 4 3 Donald Judd 1 b. 1928, Excelsior Springs, Missouri; d. 1994, New York untitled 1974 Plywood Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York Panza Collection 91.3773 1983 fabrication by Peter Ballantine, sections 3–5 1988 fabrication for Panza by Sala Luigi di Pietro, Milan (not authorized by Judd), fragment Donald Judd exhibited the first iteration of this Panza produced a third iteration of the work plywood work at Lisson Gallery, London, in in 1988 for an exhibition at the Musée Rath, 1974. Although narrower than the related object Geneva. In this case, he did not seek Judd’s on view here, it was similarly contained end-to- authorization, nor did he inform the artist of the end along one wall, its length determined by iteration’s existence or planned public display. available space. At the close of the exhibition, The object was fabricated by a firm in Milan and the object was dismantled and discarded. made to fit a hall-like space roughly 60 feet in Later that year, Judd sent Panza a group of length—far longer than prior iterations. Notably, drawings showing “possibilities for large indoor a large gap was left between the piece and the pieces,” including proposals for artworks “like wall, presumably to facilitate installation. This the two at Lisson.” Panza soon purchased the fabrication was built from a grade of plywood work, unrealized, from Leo Castelli Gallery in never used for Judd’s work, and veneers were New York, with the understanding that it could applied to all visible edges of the panels, a be produced under Judd’s direction. (See technique also unrelated to the artist’s practice. related sales agreements, correspondence, and photographs in the vitrine.) In 2016, possessing only Panza’s incorrect version, the Guggenheim reclassified the In 1983, Panza loaned the still-unrealized work work as decommissioned: inauthentic and no to the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los longer considered viable for display. Later Angeles (MOCA). There, Judd’s plywood that year, MOCA rediscovered the 1983 fabricator, Peter Ballantine, produced and fabrication, which was promptly shipped to installed a second iteration scaled to fit between New York for exhaustive inspection, and, with two walls in MOCA’s Temporary Contemporary the help of Ballantine, assembled for review by gallery. At the close of the show, the piece was Guggenheim staff and representatives from dismantled and parts were retained; over time, the Judd Foundation. With the rediscovery of however, because of a lapse in record keeping, this lifetime fabrication, the work was deemed this fabrication was presumed lost. intact and authentic—and it was reclassified once again, as a viable work in the museum’s holdings, in 2017. Bruce Nauman 2 b. 1941, Fort Wayne, Indiana None Sing Neon Sign 1970 Ruby-red and cool-white neon Edition 6/6 Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York Panza Collection 91.3825 1970 fabrication, original fabricator unknown; 2013 exhibition copy, with 2018 repair, "neon sign" (bottom section) refabricated by fabricated by Jacob Fishman Jacob Fishman, 2013 2005 exhibition copy, fabricated by Jacob Fishman All iterations were produced with the permission of the 2006 exhibition copy, fabricated by Jacob Fishman Nauman studio. The Guggenheim holds four individual museum to reexamine the accuracy of these two fabrications of this work in varying states, exhibition copies. The color and diameter of produced over a span of nearly fifty years. What their red glass tubing significantly departs from is believed to be the original 1970 fabrication the 1970 example; indeed, the red colors in the was shipped to the museum at the time of the later versions derive, in part, from a phosphor Panza Collection acquisition, in 1991. During a coating on the glass tubes’ interior. In contrast, 1999 Guggenheim exhibition, the word “neon” the 1970 fabrication utilizes a transparent and in the white section of the object was damaged, uncoated red glass, resulting in a distinctly triggering the first in a series of repairs and different appearance when illuminated.