It’s an art world family feud as the niece of legendary artist Helen Frankenthaler accuses the relative of “bootleg expressionism” in a new lawsuit that also slams a cousin’s work as “unusual”.
The director of a $1 billion foundation that aims to promote artists’ work engages in “pay-to-play” transactions to boost their performance. own work — and “destroyed” the abstract expressionist’s legacy as one of the most important American painters of the last century, according to the lawsuit, filed Wednesday in New York State Supreme Court.
The dispute found Frankenthaler’s nephew, Frederick Iseman — a member of the board of directors of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation Inc. who was removed — is suing his artist cousin Clifford Ross, as well as Lise Motherwell, who is the late painter’s stepdaughter.
Both are on the board.
“They have acted as if they were members of a small private group, using their roles as directors of the foundation’s board to promote their own careers and prestige, not to mention trading the foundation’s assets for their personal gain,” the court said. the document said.
Cleverly, the lawsuit accuses the plaintiffs of “engaging in a kind of ‘bootleg expressionism’ that effectively destroys Frankenthaler’s legacy.”
Helen Frankenthaler established her foundation in 1984 to promote her work in major institutions around the world. Getty Images
It also claims that Iseman, 71, was removed from the board by other members who “secretly plotted” to remove him earlier this year.
Michael Hecht, a New York-based accountant and board member, is named as a defendant but not a family member.
A representative for the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation had no comment.
The lawsuit refers to Ross’ “struggling artistic career” and notes that while he “may have experienced a level of success at one point in his career … those days are long gone.”
Financier Frederick Iseman — Frankenthaler’s nephew — was removed from the board of directors of the Helen Frankenthaler Foundation earlier this year. He is now suing other board members, including his cousin.Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
The suit doesn’t hold back in describing Ross, 71, who is the board’s president.
It alleges that the professional artist, and son of Frankenthaler’s older sister, Gloria, engaged in “pay-to-play” transactions for his own benefit — and took away his talent.
Ross allegedly traded $1.8 million in foundation grants between 2013 and 2021 in exchange for exhibitions of “his own unusual artwork and to generate publicity for his own career,” court documents said.
The suit accuses Ross of “self-dealing” and using the foundation’s influence and funds to get his own work seen — providing “him with a platform on which he cannot promote himself,” the court filing said. It claims that he used foundation funds to make donations to small non-profit magazines, such as Bomb and Brooklyn Rail, in exchange for promoting his work in their articles.
Helen Frankenthaler is considered a pioneer among the New York City abstract expressionist painters of the 1950s. AFP via Getty Images
In 2021, the foundation donated $75,000 to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, where Frankenthaler’s seminal painting “Mountains and Seas” is on long-term loan.
A year later, Ross offered to donate one of his own works to the gallery for its permanent collection, which the gallery accepted but did not put on public view.
When the gift was accepted, the legal papers said, he promoted himself even more: ordering the foundation to update his biography on its website to acknowledge that his work was in the National Gallery’s collection, according to the legal papers.
According to the lawsuit, once Ross took over as president from Iseman, he “even had the chutzpah” to “immediately” update his own Wikipedia page to reflect that, under the pseudonym Brooklynartlover.
Painter Helen Frankenthaler receives a National Endowment for the Arts medal from former President George W. Bush in 2002.AP
For his part, Hecht engaged two of his own accounting firms to do work for the foundation — a conflict of interest for board members, the lawsuit said.
“Hecht never requested an external audit of the foundation’s finances, despite the foundation’s high net worth,” the lawsuit said.
He also used the foundation’s cash to donate to institutions where he served as a board member — including, the lawsuit alleges, $5 million to the liberal arts college Bennington College in Vermont where Frankenthaler attended and where Hecht is a trustee.
Motherwell, 68, who has been president of the board of the Provincetown Association of Arts and Museums (PAAM) in Provincetown, Mass., since 2017 — “a position he got because of his family name, his family connections and his position on the board. the foundation” — used his influence as a board member to arrange a 2018 showing of Frankenthaler’s work at the small museum, despite having no curatorial experience, the lawsuit said.
Artist Clifford Ross, seen here with Martha Stewart, is among the Frankenthaler family members named as defendants in the lawsuit.Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
It added that he also convinced the foundation’s board to donate five Frankenthaler watercolors worth $1.4 million to the museum.
“The donation enhanced his reputation and strengthened PAAM’s debt to him,” the lawsuit said, adding that Motherwell also asked the foundation to pay him $180 an hour for his work on the board.
Frankenthaler, who died in 2011, started the eponymous foundation in 1984 to protect his legacy and promote his work around the world, according to the nonprofit’s mission statement.
According to court papers, he personally named Iseman, a philanthropist and founder of private equity firm CI Capital Partners, to the board of directors.
Lise Motherwell is the president of the Provincetown Art and Museum Association and the stepdaughter of Helen Frankenthaler. The lawsuit accuses him of getting the job because of his family connections.Florida International University
Iseman had a “uniquely close relationship” with his aunt “and served on the board without financial interest” until she was fired, according to the lawsuit.
Born in 1928, Frankenthaler’s artistic genius was noted at a young age when, at the age of nine, he won an honorable mention in a drawing competition sponsored by Saks Fifth Avenue.
After graduating from Bennington, he returned to New York and began his art career influenced by contemporary artist Jackson Pollock, among others.
She married artist Robert Motherwell in 1958 but divorced him in 1971.
The foundation was the primary beneficiary of Frankenthaler’s work, according to his 2004 will, court documents said.
Several of the artist’s works, which have sold for millions of dollars and are displayed in the Museum of Modern Art and other important places around the world, will be auctioned this week by Christie’s in New York.
The works are not owned by the foundation, according to the auction house’s catalog, which has set an estimate as high as $1 million.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
