this is why you shouldn’t be out here selling your images for $100 because a major museum will “acquire” your art through and stage an exhibition:

“the works were initiated by artist collectives to raise funds for anti-racist initiatives, including criminal justice reform, bail funds, Black trans advocacy groups, and other mutual aid work...The Whitney acquired the works...as the projects were launched and distributed”

this is insane like wow

2020 is relentless. whew.

if you are an artist in this show what you should do is organize against it. ask the museum to not show your work or pay the market price for it. they didn’t publish an artist list, which is weird, but y’all should find each other and mobilize against this shit.

also how do you “acquire” a work without the approval of the acquisition committee? generally, that’s a months long process.

here’s the 79 person artist list: https://pastebin.com/GyxXQSBH 

i keep hearing as justification that the works were “acquired” for the “special collections” which is a part of the library/archive not the actual museum collection. the work in this way is considered “ephemera.” reader: it’s a meaningless internal distinction and loophole.