This is the second part of a two-part series.
We attend an art exhibition with little or no thought given as to how it was gathered for the show. The registrar gathers, therefore she is. Work is borrowed from “lenders,� packed, shipped, insured. You could build a house with the wood used to crate one Picasso for shipment. Worth millions in the early years, billions in current value. The registrar meets with and arranges the shipping, gathering, meeting and getting along with (socially) some of the wealthiest folks on the planet.
In Venice, Italy, my friend, Cheri, who was the registrar for the Guggenheim Museum, was among the last people to meet the legendary Peggy Guggenheim and they got along famously; that’s where the idea to start a bidding war for Cheri’s services began. Two giants of the art museum world entered into a bidding war for the services of the actress kinfolk of Col.Albert Jennings Fountain.
It probably began when the director of the Guggenheim said, “I’d never before met anyone like Cheri, she’s well-liked by everyone.� So when the Museum of Modern Art was planning a massive exhibition of Picasso’s art they needed her talent and personality to gather the work.
They sent word of offers to get her away from the Guggenheim, doubled her money, something like that, bye bye Guggenheim, hello MOMA. She came, she arranged the Picasso exhibit, it was a successful exhibition and the Guggenheim got antsy again.
Under the secret pretext of hand carrying art to the Modern, curators slipped into her office with offers asking her to return to the Guggenheim with the title of “Chief Registrar.� OK, it worked briefly. She returned but not for long. Now a lifestyle change was in order.
So who could argue with the beautiful Pacific oceanfront town of Santa Barbara, California and The Santa Barbara Museum of Art. Cheri’s now their “Chief Registrar,� offering occasional lectures and consultation to other areas of the art world. A consulting situation at the University of Utah was a pleasant return to theater; she received a V.I.P. tour of the Sundance Film Festival.
I can’t help but wonder what Col. Fountain would’ve thought about art museums fighting over the services of his kinfolk. He seemed like a good guy in the Old West, representing an underdog the likes of William Bonney, accused of murder.
“Billy the Kid� was found guilty but he broke out of jail and was eventually gunned down by Sheriff Pat Garrett. Sad, true, legendary old western story. Cheri’s mother had dated Pat Garrett Jr., he supposedly gave her the gun that shot Billy. “That’s a fortune under the gavel at Sotheby’s,� I said.
“Where’s that gun now?� I asked. Cheri didn’t know, didn’t care, it was a gun that killed someone. The big bucks potential meant nothing to her. In a world of Wall Street felons that’d pluck the fillings from their dead grannies’ teeth she had no interest in the weapon that killed Billy the Kid. Ya really gotta love a lady like that. Character inherited from Colonel Albert Jennings Fountain.
Post Script: Recently the Las Cruces, N.M., Police Department contacted members of Col. Fountain’s family for DNA samples to match some bones that were found near a ranch located east of the Organ Mountains. If these are the bones of the colonel and his son Henry it will be a great historical moment of celebration statewide.
Also Note: After Pat Garrett killed Billy the Kid he wired the state governor’s office to receive the $500 reward. The governor was out of state. He was in New York plugging his book. Gov. Lew Wallace wrote “Ben Hur.�
New Mexico, remarkable place ....
Bill Lee lives in New York City and Sharon, and has been a professional cartoonist for decades.
