Why Isn't the Art (like that in the Detroit Institute of Art) in the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit Up For Auction?

With the the largest bankruptcy in American history, the 83 percent black city of Detroit (100 years ago, Detroit was 98 percent white) is looking for any way to pay back its multitude of creditors.

We already know the Detroit Institute of Art [If Obama Had A City, It Would Look Like Detroit—But Without An Art Museum, Which Will Have Been Looted By The Rich, VDare.com, 9-29-13] is being considered as a possible stop-gap in supplying some form of monetary compensation to creditors.

The Detroit Institute of Art: an oasis of civility floating aimlessly in a sea of decay

Housing some of the most fantastic works of art ever created by the European mind, the Detroit Institute of Art's holdings have now been successfully appraised by Christie's auction house out of New York City.

The fair market value of the art, collected by the Detroit Institute of Art when the city boasted a population capable of helping it earn the title "Paris of the West," is a reflection of the incredible individual talent the European gene pool can create.

Built for $38 million, the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit houses nothing of value (or else Christie's auction house would have evaluated its holdings like it did the Detroit Institute of Art

Many attack those white people who take credit for their races achievements, but it is only from the collective white community that individual genius has arisen; much of this is now being considered as a possible asset in paying off the liability of having a majority black population try and maintain a civilization they didn't (and couldn't) create/maintain/sustain. [What's DIA artwork worth? New Christie's report has the numbers, Detroit Free Press, 12-19-2013]:

Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s iconic 16th-Century painting “The Wedding Dance” has a fair market value of between $100 million and $200 million. Van Gogh’s self-portrait is worth as much as $150 million, while Rembrandt’s “The Visitation” might fetch $90 million.

These revered masterpieces are the three most valuable paintings housed at the Detroit Institute of Arts that were bought directly with city funds, according to a highly anticipated final report prepared by the New York-based Christie’s auction house and obtained by the Free Press. Detroit emergency manager Keyvn Orr hired Christie’s to appraise city-bought art at the DIA as part of his efforts to evaluate city assets in bankruptcy.

The report, which Orr’s office intends to release today, lists itemized appraisals for nearly 1,750 works with an estimated worth more than $50,000 and aggregate values for others. In all, 2,773 works were appraised, 5% of the roughly 66,000 works owned by the museum and including some of the museum’s signature works. Sixty-five works in the report, from post-impressionist masterpieces by Degas and Matisse to Roman and Chinese antiquities, carried high estimates of more than $1 million.

Now here's the question: why is the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit (built for $38 million) not capable of producing works of art by individual representative of the black community worthy of fetching high value on the open market? Why can't this museum produce works capable of paying off creditors? [Detroit Institutions Are Entangled in the Politics of Race, Class and Labor, NY Times, 6-28-1997]:

The Detroit Institute of Arts, the nation's fifth-largest art museum, is crumbling because of financial problems. Strong fences have been built around much of its base because of the imminent risk that sections of the outer walls will fall away from the building's corroded steel frame. Employees place sponges and mop heads just below gallery windows in the museum during snowstorms to catch the condensation dribbling down the single panes of thin glass.

A block away, the same city government that owns the art museum has just finished building the nation's largest museum of black history and culture. The double-paned glass dome over the rotunda at the new Museum of African-American History is specially designed to admit light while keeping the building at a steady temperature and humidity. The museum's outside doors are bronze, and many of the inside doors are mahogany. The towering decorative masks over the main entrances are partly plated with 14-carat gold.

The visible contrast between the museums partly reflects the difficulty of raising money to maintain old cultural institutions and the relative ease of fund-raising for new buildings. But behind the contrast also lies a remarkable example of how race, class, labor unions and big-city politics can affect cultural institutions. These issues have echoes in cultural battles in other cities, although seldom are the fights as nasty or as public as they have been in Detroit lately.

But some of the same issues of race and class have helped the black history museum win broad public support. Voters here have approved two bond issues to cover most of the $38.4 million in construction costs.

The ample budget has produced a breathtaking museum, with a core exhibition designed by Ralph Appelbaum, the exhibition expert who also designed the Holocaust Museum in Washington. Like the Holocaust Museum, the black history museum derives its emotional power from photographs, videos and clearly worded explanatory panels.

Yet the black history museum is relatively weak in actual artifacts. Indeed, many of the traditional African masks are on loan from the art museum.

So what might the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit (the world's largest institution dedicated to the African American experience) display within its walls? Let's just call it the largest collection of Civil Rights Porn in the world. [Art Prices Are Rising, and So Are the Risks, NY Times, 12-31-2006]:

For more than two decades, Gregory J. Reed, an entertainment lawyer in Detroit, has been collecting materials that document African-American history. His ultimate goal, he says, is to put the materials to work in educational exhibits. 

But an early foray into lending his collection turned litigious last month when his foundation sued the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit, accusing it of damaging 15 sheets from unpublished portions of Alex Haley’s original manuscript of “The Autobiography of Malcolm X.”

The documents, which were on display at the museum for about five years starting in 1997, went from white to brownish-yellow, and have a white stripe from the band holding them down, Mr. Reed said. He wants the museum to reimburse him $168,000 for loss in value to the documents, which were appraised at $285,000 before the loan.

The museum disputes its responsibility for the damage, said Mark Shreve, a lawyer for the museum. But, he said, if a payment is to be made, the documents should be restored first and then a determination made on whether there is any loss in value.
Mr. Reed said: “The lesson is, you take greater precautions. More people are lending out art, he said, and they “need to know the ins and outs from a business side.”

 No, they need to know that Civil Rights Porn isn't worth that much on the open market, save to black people hoping to continue garnering guilt from the white community when this 'art' is on display. Photographs... that's it. Images from a past, which juxtaposed with the ruins of a formerly magnificent white city just outside its doors helps explain why white people once held such honest views about black intellectual capabilities (not to mention the criminal impulse).

There is nothing of any fair market value housed within the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit. This simple fact should tell you all you need to know about the idea of racial equality.