"Wal-Mart Heiress Is High Bidder for a Durand Painting Sold by the New York Public Library," New York Times, May 13, 2005
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Kindred Spirits by Asher Durand sold at Sothebys for NYPL for $35 million
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Alice L. Walton, the Wal-Mart heiress and one of the richest people in the world, bought an Asher B. Durand painting yesterday from the New York Public Library for what is said to be more than $35 million. She plans to exhibit it in a museum being built by her family's foundation that is scheduled to open in May 2009 in Bentonville, Ark., where her father, Sam Walton, opened his first retail store in 1951. The sale ended suspense over whether the painting, the 1849 Hudson River School landscape "Kindred Spirits," would remain in New York. When the library, citing a need to increase its endowment, offered the work for sale last month, it indicated that it would give New York institutions preferential purchase terms. Sotheby's acted as the library's agent for the sale, holding a silent auction for which interested parties were asked to submit sealed bids. Although the auction house declined to confirm the exact purchase price, it said the price far eclipsed the previous auction record for an American painting, which was set in 1999 when Bill Gates bought George Bellows's "Polo Crowd" for $27.5 million. A dealer in American painting and someone familiar with the transaction, both speaking on condition of anonymity, said the cost exceeded $35 million. The price was also substantially higher than a sealed bid made jointly by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, according to Harold Holzer, the Met's spokesman. He said yesterday that the two institutions had "bid collaboratively in an effort to share the financial burden and the public opportunity of owning and displaying the picture." Mr. Holzer added, "We're disappointed that the painting is leaving New York." Paul LeClerc, the president of the New York Public Library, said he was "delighted that it didn't leave the country and that it will be in an American museum," and added, "The fact that it will be on public display means a lot to me."
Over the last two or three years Ms. Walton has been a major buyer of American paintings at Sotheby's and Christie's, snapping up works by Winslow Homer, Martin Johnson Meade, Edward Hopper and other artists. But the Durand is expected to be a cornerstone of the new museum's collection. The painting, which depicts the painter Thomas Cole and the poet William Cullen Bryant standing on a rocky ledge overlooking the Catskills, is titled after a phrase in a Keats sonnet and has long been considered one of the finest examples of Hudson River School painting. It was commissioned by Jonathan Sturges, one of Durand's most important patrons, as a gift for Bryant, and it remained in the Bryant family until his daughter, Julia, donated it to the New York Public Library early in the 20th century.
The Walton Family Foundation's museum, to be called Crystal Bridges, takes its name from an inspired glass-and-wood design that traverses a local spring-fed stream. Designed by the Boston-based architect Moshe Safdie, the museum will "present perspectives on the flow of America's history and heritage through the eyes of the nation's most influential artists," according to a statement released yesterday by the Walton Family Foundation. In the statement, Ms. Walton described the painting as a "national treasure," and said she intended to lend it to major national museums around the country. She said she hoped to work with museums in New York to "ensure that it continues to be shown there in the future."
According to the latest Forbes magazine ranking of the world's wealthiest people, released in March, Ms. Walton and her mother, Helen - the Wal-Mart founder's widow - tie at No. 13. Each is listed as having roughly $18 billion in assets, making them the richest women in the world. The Durand painting was put up for sale with two seminal portraits of George Washington by Gilbert Stuart as well as 12 other paintings and 4 busts. Until recently it had been on view in the Edna Barnes Salomon Room on the third floor of the main library at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. The library said last month that it was selling the works so it could bolster its endowment and use the investment income for acquisitions of important books and collections. After reaching a high of $530 million in 2000, the library's endowment dropped to $426 million by the end of 2002. The endowment has recouped those losses, but Mr. LeClerc has said that the library missed out on many acquisitions during that period. Sotheby's intends to sell the other American artworks at an auction in December.
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art by Moshe Safdie & Associates adn landscape design by Peter Walker & Partners
