“As he lay battling for his life, after testing positive for Covid-19 this spring, the board used his condition for their own advantage, and voted while he was incapacitated to permanently close the New York gallery.”
One cannot say that the past few months have lacked drama in the art market, despite the cancellations, closures and shut-downs across its entire landscape. For word has now filtered out that the venerable Marlborough Gallery, which opened in London in 1946 and has enjoyed decades of prominence and power, has now shuttered its rooms on West 57th Street in New York.
One could blame Covid-19, of course, as it has wreaked havoc everywhere in the art world. But it seems the real reason is family drama, as expressed in the lurid headline above from ARTnews. The two ownership branches of the Marlborough family, the Lloyds and the Levais, apparently drew swords in a battle over control, with money stirring a dark undercurrent of intrigue and revenge. The London branch of the family seems to have won the battle in what has been described as a “ruthless coup.”
This fascinating news led me straight to the Marlborough Gallery website. And what a story it tells in old photographs, newspaper clippings, exhibition catalogue covers and a stirring, almost heroic year-by-year timeline of triumphs.
Marlborough certainly played a leading role in developing the Post-War and Contemporary art market as we know it today. And they were ahead of their time in commanding and creating publicity. One faded newspaper clipping of May 1961 on the Marlborough site shows Jackson Pollock in front of one of his drip paintings, wearing a t-shirt and scowling for the camera. “Dribbling Jack Comes to Town,” is the catchy headline.
Of course, there was scandal as well, notably that unpleasantness that unfolded after Mark Rothko’s suicide in 1970. In legal proceedings that lasted years and involved armies of lawyers, Marlborough was accused of defrauding Rothko and his estate through byzantine methods of self-dealing that involved hundreds of Rothko’s paintings, murky offshore bank dealings, massive sale commissions and other forms of greed and deceit that shocked even the judges. Careers were ruined, including that of Marlborough’s charismatic founder Frank Lloyd.
And so this glamorous and iconic gallery has now closed its doors in New York. The timing seems ironic, as the art market is just now coming out of his long pause and resuming activity. The major sales that were postponed in May are taking place in the coming weeks. Galleries are stirring, museums are slowly reopening, and the virtual art market that has existed for many weeks is now hoping to become real again.
We will continue to follow these developments as they unfold. But for now, it is time for a summer break.
Peace to all.