The Barnes Brouhaha

October 19th, 2007
By Callen Bair
Conde Nast

Earlier this morning, the Friends of the Barnes Foundation were disappointed — once again. Judge Ott decided to entertain preliminary objections that claim the Friends, the party petitioning him to reconsider a 2004 decision allowing the Barnes to move from its idiosyncratic home in suburban Pennsylvania to the center of the art scene in Philadelphia, don't have standing to do so. The Barnes Foundation and the Pennsylvania Attorney General filed the objections.

"We'll spend the next couple months doing legal argument about issues other than the substance," said Mark Schwartz, the Friends' lawyer, just back from court. "The upsetting thing to me is — let's get to the issues here."

If there's an upside to all this back and forth, it's that the publicity the case has received is probably drawing more people to the museum than would otherwise go — Albert Barnes wish "to promote the advancement of education and the appreciation of the fine arts" ironically fulfilled.