Sight Scene: Binstock Bids Corcoran Goodbye

ORIGINALLY ARRIVING IN D.C. by way of Philadelphia, curator Jonathan Binstock has taken off for a new home — New York. The longtime curator of contemporary art at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Binstock has left the museum to join the Art Advisory Service at Citi, where he will serve as senior vice president.

Citi (neé Citibank) acts as an art consultant to its most-valued customers. According to Mark Costiglio at Citi, art-advisory senior vice presidents have two primary roles: Advisory and finance. Inexperienced and veteran collectors alike, so long as they are private banking clients of Citi (or Smith Barney, Citi's brokerage firm), can look to Binstock et al. for advice on developing a collection, navigating the auction circuit, and so forth. The "finance" aspect of the job involves working with clients who hope to borrow using their art as collateral. Apparently, Citi's art advisory service includes in-house staff who take care of collector-clients' every need (framing, shipping, appraisal and what have you).

Ostensibly, Binstock's work for the Corcoran was blind to the market reality — and his decision to take a walk on the private side will have his critics arguing that he's cashed out. Most recently, Binstock curated retrospectives of Jim Sanborn and Sam Gilliam as well as "Primary Properties: Mary Judge, Joseph Dumbacher, John Dumbacher" — not to mention his co-curating credits for the 48th and 49th Corcoran Biennials. (That practice seems to have been discontinued.)

Truth be told, this writer wonders what this move signals about the market. Are bankers and firms, incredulous at the ludicrously lofty market — which shows no signs of slowing — hoping to cash in? Are banks headhunting at institutions that are bleeding staff? (The Corc has had phenomenal turnover in the last year; in sports terms, the new director, Paul Greenhalgh, has exploded the team and entered a rebuilding phase.) Or do banks believe that having national museum experience on a consultant's resume is worth the marginal cost to pay more?

Photo by Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post