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Chapter Twenty

Th e Grand
Acquisitor

nts and birds do it. So do dogs, various rodents, some species of crabs, and so does homo sapiens. What all these creatures share is an impulse to gather and put aside material
things that are not essential to their survival. Studies have confirmed that
among humans this impulse may be hereditary and that a child often
exhibits the instinctive actions of a collector from its earliest years. It
clings to bits of material, dolls and lead soldiers, writes Maurice Rheims,
once a leading French auctioneer but also an art theorist, objects are its
playthings, offering security as the only tangible matter in its universe.
As a childs taste develops, he goes on, so does its spirit of competition as
it learns to discern the quality of material objects. This growing aptitude
is the childs first occasion of measuring up to adults. The collecting
instinct can also nurture rebellious rejection, sibling acrimony, and scarring memories that endure for a lifetime (as in the loss of a childhood
sled called Rosebud in Orson Welless Citizen Kane, a film inspired by
the career of William Randolph Hearst, himself an insatiable collector).
Strangely, or maybe not so strangely, the deeper roots of the collecting instinct and its obsessive manifestations still elude comprehensive analysis and explanation. Sigmund Freud, a collector of antiquities,
traced the compulsion to unresolved conflicts related to toilet training;
his colleague/rival Carl Gustav Jung stressed its link to the collective unconscious. Hence it is the more regrettable that Dr. Arthur M. Sackler,
whose collecting career we now examine, did not reflect analytically on

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Arthur M. Sackler, psychiatrist and pharmaceutical millionaire, who preferred buying in


bulk, here puts his best pieces forward.

the sources of his own collecting instinct. Not only was he a psychiatrist
himself, but so were his brothers Mortimer and Raymond. Moreover, in
foraging for Chinese art treasures, Arthur Sackler teamed up with Dr.
Paul Singer, a Hungarian-born, Vienna-bred psychiatrist, and also a selftaught connoisseur of Oriental art. The Sackler and Singer collections
today form the core of the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, which is twinned
with the Freer Gallery of Art on the National Mall in Washingtona
conspicuous tribute to two licensed explorers of the subconscious.
Indeed, Dr. Sacklers career established an important subsidiary
variant to the collecting instinct. Not only can the proud possessor gain
personal satisfaction in perusing and displaying his precious hoard, but
its existence can serve as leverage for obtaining cost-saving storage arrangementsand through the contacts it encourages, lead to brokering

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retroactive tax deductions in deals with major museums. Finally and not
least, through dexterous financial donations to universities and libraries, as well as museums, the collector can give his family name global
resonance.
All this Dr. Sackler achieved; he himself is immortalized on the
National Mall, while there is also (among others) the Arthur M. Sackler Museum of Art at Harvards Fogg Museum; the Princeton Art Museum Sackler Gallery of Asian Art; the Sackler School of Medicine in Tel
Aviv; the Arthur M. Sackler Museum of Art and Archaeology at Beijing
University; the Arthur M. Sackler Science Center at Clark University in
Worcester, Massachusetts; and, at the Metropolitan Museum, not just
the Sackler Gallery of Asian Art but also a supersize Sackler Wing enclosing the Egyptian Temple of Dendur, with its adjoining pool, which he
and his two brothers helped underwrite.
Still, Arthur M. Sackler was more than a vanity-obsessed self-
promoter. Granted, as a collector of artworks, his enthusiasm exceeded
his discernment. Princetons Wen Fong, while serving as a consultant to
the Metropolitan Museum, expressed a common complaint in a 1966 letter to Berkeleys James Cahill. He termed Sackler difficult to manage and
excessively ambitious, adding that he failed to spend sufficient time on research. Yet Sackler himself was aware of his deficiencies, which is why he
preferred to buy in bulk. I collect as a biologist, he once explained. To
really understand a civilization, a society, you must have a large enough
corpus of data. You cant know twentieth-century art by looking only at
Picassos and Henry Moores.
Creditably, Sackler acknowledged the superior learning of other collectors, to the extent of generously subsidizing the purchases of Dr. Paul
Singer, whom he first met at an auction in 1957. His fellow psychiatrist
was a micro rather than a macro buyer, a self-taught connoisseur who
targeted smaller, eccentric objects passed over by others, which he then
squirreled away in his cramped two-bedroom apartment in Summit,
New Jersey. Sackler conditioned his subsidy on the understanding that
the Singer trove would end up in a Sackler-named institution. And following Singers death in 1997, more than six thousand objects valued at
$60 million did pass to the Sackler Gallery, more than doubling the size
of its then-existing collection. Much of the added hoard consisted of archaeological objects whose interest and rarity were confirmed after careful scrutiny, sustaining their donors judgment. Why did Singer collect?
When I see something I like, I feel a visceral excitement, he explained to
Lee Rosenbaum, author of The Complete Guide to Collecting Art. In fact,

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Dr. Paul Singer in his object-crammed New Jersey apartment. As Sacklers collecting
partner, he donated more than 6,000 pieces to the Sackler Gallery.

Dr. Singer, speaking as a psychiatrist, confided to her that collecting is


a highly erotic act, totally akin to lovemaking.... Any dealer worth his
salt knows there should be no interruption while a collector looks at an
object: it is a moment of great intimacy.
Besides securing the Singer bequest, Arthur M. Sacklers other lessthan-obvious merit lay in the subsidiary benefits of his own gift. For
decades, as James Cahill sharply remarked, Sackler was famous for dangling his holdings and his money in the faces of great institutions, then
shifting his benevolence elsewhere. For some time, there was a Sackler Enclave within the storage space of the Far East Department at the
Met[ropolitan], presided over by his [Sacklers] curator; even Met curators needed her permission to get ina situation unheard of in the history of great museums. The Met ended up with nothing.
Two comments seem relevant. First, the Metropolitan Museum of
Art has no shortage of works suitable for its showcases. Second, and more
consequential, since its opening in 1923 as the first federally funded fine
arts museum, the Freer Gallery of Art was hamstrung by its donors severe conditions: it could neither lend nor borrow. In effect, like Miss
Havishams mansion in Great Expectations, the Freer was frozen in time.
Had not a second crucial donation been made by Arthur Sackler, commented the canny reporter Souren Melikian, leading to the opening of

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the Sackler Gallery on the same patch along the National Mallunderground, to respect building restrictionsthe Freer would have remained a static academic establishment. Instead, in December 2002, a
gala celebration in Washington marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of
the Sackler, presided over by the donors British-born widow, Dame Jillian Sackler. Its director, Julian Raby, had this to say about the unusual
institutional marriage: You have two very different buildings with very
different characters. One is almost a temple of calm: the Sackler needs
to be much more lively, innovative, risky. What I want is a contrast, as
opposed to some undifferentiated style. One million dollars was raised
at the gala, and the twinned museums may yet become, in Melikians
phrase, the Western worlds capital of Asian art integrated into [a] living
culture.
All of which leads to three unaddressed questions: How did
Dr. Arthur M. Sackler acquire the wealth essential to accumulating his
collection? Why did he turn to the elusive arts of China, and for what
purpose? And are American taxpayers getting fair value from federal support of the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery of Art?
As to the first question, Arthur Sackler, like his younger brothers
Mortimer and Raymond, benefited generously from, and contributed to,
the dramatic surge in American spending on health care owing to new
discoveries, an aging population, public and private health plans, and
saturation advertising, especially on television. It is commonly reckoned
that America, by a huge margin, leads the world in both per capita and
overall expenditure on health care. Additionally, beginning in the 1960s,
pharmaceuticals were seen as effective medication for depression and
other mental disorders. As investors in the health care industry, the Sackler brothers rode the crest of both the overall and the secondary surge,
and in Arthurs case, a combative spirit helped propel their rise.
All three Sackler boys were born in Brooklyn, New York, where their
father, Isaac, had migrated from what is now Ukraine; their mother, Sophie, was born in Poland. Isaac managed a grocery store. Arthur Sackler financed his medical studies at New York University by working at
a pharmaceutical advertising agency, later becoming its proprietor. His
brothers independently followed his career path.
Sackler by then had honed his bargaining and promotional skills
through years of practice in the pharmaceutical trade. He published journals and financed research, and in 1952, when all three were working at
Creedmoor, a state psychiatric hospital, the brothers together acquired

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control of a floundering Greenwich Villagebased drug manufacturer,


the Purdue Frederick Company. What then evolved into Purdue Pharma
produced laxatives (Senokot), eardrops (Cerumenex), antiseptics (Betadine), and after Arthurs death, a controversial narcotic painkiller,
Oxycontin. In his prime, Dr. Arthur Sackler was known positively as an
inventive pioneer in biological psychiatry. Along with his brothers as well
as other collaborators, he published 140 research papers, primarily dealing with how bodily functions can affect mental illness. This and much
else on the affirmative side was noted in Sacklers 1987 obituary in The
New York Times by the veteran arts reporter Grace Glueck. Moreover, as
she also writes, He was the first to use ultrasound for medical diagnosis,
and among other pioneering activities, identified histamine as a hormone
and called attention to the importance of receptor sites, important in
medical theory today.
All worthy of note, but Dr. Arthur Sacklers most remarkable nonmedical achievement was then passed over in one short paragraph. At a
critical juncture in his collecting career, he managed to outfox the Metropolitan Museum of Arts directors, senior administrators, curators, and
attorneys. In this exacting competition, he holds the winning cup. First,
the context. What set Arthur apart from his brothers was his intense
focus on Chinese artworks. After studying art history at NYU and New
Yorks (until recently) tuition-free Cooper Union, Sackler began collecting in the 1940s, his interests ranging from pre-Renaissance and Postimpressionist works to contemporary American art. As Sackler later related,
he then happened upon an elegantly designed Ming dynasty table and
other stunningly sophisticated objects in a cabinetmakers shop. One
wonderful day in 1950, I came upon some Chinese ceramics and Ming
furniture. My life has not been the same since. I came to realize that here
was an aesthetic not commonly appreciated or understood.
Within a decade, Dr. Sackler met and teamed up with Dr. Singer,
whose expertise he respected and whose art purchases he helped fund
from the 1960s onward. Singers eye for small, out-of-fashion, but significant works complemented Sacklers more orthodox taste.
Where Dr. Singers instincts proved most prescient was in his purchase of early bronzes and smaller archaeological findsin his words,
the things that looters leave behind. High on the list of his prize finds
is an array of fifty bronze bells, dating to the early Shang dynasty, around
1200 BCE. They are important not only in their workmanship but also
in the sounds they produce, an audible clue to ancient Chinese music.
As of our writing, so we learned from J. Keith Wilson, the curator of

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ancient art at the Sackler, an exhibition featuring the bronze bells is in


the planning stage. In any case, the combined collections have beyond
doubt raised the global profile of the Freer/Sackler galleries. During the
twenty-fifth anniversary in 2012 of the Sacklers founding, its curators
tallied this box score of contributions: Freer, 3,270 pieces; Sackler, 812
pieces; Singer, about 5,000 pieces. The total includes archaeological specimens, Edo-period Japanese prints, and Persian and Indian paintings, all
of which found a worthy home in Washington, amounting to a tenfold
increase in the holdings of the Sackler Gallery of Art.
No whispering gallery spreads news more promiscuously
than the gossip among collectors, dealers, and curators as to who is buying what. Early on, Dr. Arthur Sacklers resources and purchases came
to the attention of the Metropolitan Museum of Arts director, James
J. Rorimer. At the time, he was seeking donations to rehabilitate and
air-condition the Mets galleries, not a popular project among would-be
name-brand donors. On being approached in 1960, Sackler came up with
an ingenious prescription: he promised $150,000 for the renovation of
the majestic Great Hall on the second floor, thereafter to be named the
Sackler Gallery. Once remodeled, it would display a massive wall painting and monumental sculptures already in the museums collection.
In exchange, Sackler sought what the Mets chief administrator, Joseph Veach Noble, called nasty conditions. As recounted by Thomas P.
F. Hoving (Rorimers successor) in his mischievous 1993 memoir, Making
the Mummies Dance, Sackler would buy the works in questionall masterpiecesat the prices the Met had acquired them back in the twenties,
only to give them back to the museum under his name to be designated
Gifts of Arthur Sackler. The doctor would then take a tax deduction
based upon their current values. But that wasnt the only demand. He
asked for a large storeroom inside the museum to house his private collections, an enclaverent-freeto which only he and his personal curator would have access. Sackler had figured that he would actually make
money on the tax loophole he had discoveredhis deduction would be
far more than the costs of the works, and his donation.
It was all legal but in Nobles view shifty, and moreover, as Hoving
now learned, none of the Chinese art crammed into Sacklers rent-free
enclave was promised to the museum. Under the arrangement he reached
with the museum, Sackler obtained a cavernous space for his collection,
with the Met paying the costs of insurance, fire protection, and security
guards. Sackler chose, and paid the salary of, his collections caretaker,

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Lois Katz, formerly an associate curator at the Brooklyn Museum; he


also managed to obtain part-time curatorial privileges for his partner
in collecting, Dr. Paul Singer. Very soon the irrepressible Tom Hoving
came to like the equally irrepressible Arthur Sackler. In an effort to determine whether the doctor would donate his collection to the Metropolitan, Hoving invited Sackler for a little chat. We thus have this timeless
snapshot of their encounter:
Within a few minutes after he sat down at the roundtable [I] could tell he
liked me and knew also that I could work with him. He was touchy, eccentric,
arbitraryand vulnerable, which made the game much more fascinating.
Sacklers accent was cultivated, clearly manufactured. He seemed to parade
his voice as a clear sign of his achievements, but his tone wasnt phony or affected. He was proud of the way he talked. I liked that. His first words were,
I used to spend marvelous hours here with Jim [Rorimer]. Hed put his army
boots up on the desk, and wed talk for hours of pure scholarship and connoisseurship. Like two ancient Chinese gentlemen-scholars.

In the days ahead, Tom Hoving did persuade Arthur Sackler to


contribute $3.5 million (with the help of his two brothers) for the construction of the enormous new wing that would enclose the Temple of
Dendur, which had been rescued from the rising waters of the new Aswan
High Dam. But Dr. Sackler would make no promises regarding the eventual destiny of his collection. Meantime, the existence of the collectors
unusual private enclave was for years known only to the museums senior
officials. In 1978, Professor Sol Channeles, a specialist in criminal law,
made public the existence of the Sackler enclave. A muckraking account
by Lee Rosenbaum in ARTnews then reported that the New York State
attorney generals office had initiated an inquiry to determine whether
the enclave constituted an improper use of the Metropolitans space and
funds (from the museums origins in the 1870s, the Met has relied heavily on New York City for tax benefits and help with housekeeping costs).
When asked to comment by Ms. Rosenbaum, then director Philippe de
Montebello, President William Macomber, and Board Chairman Douglas Dillon referred all inquiries to the associate counsel, Penelope Bardel,
who elliptically said, Its not appropriate for people being investigated to
talk about the subject of the investigation.
Very much to the relief of the above-named personages, the state
attorney generals office chided the Metropolitan for its secret deal but
proposed no legal action. At the time, the museums officers were coping

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with barbed and angry criticism from Sackler, who was not happy with
the presentation and use of the costly Sackler Wing, and he had other
grievances. These were itemized by Michael Gross in a gossipy study of
the Metropolitan, Rogues Gallery (2009). According to the author, Sackler offered a litany of complaints to Tom Hoving. He believed that Ashton Hawkins, then the museums legal counselor, had kept him off the
Metropolitans board, and he was furious over the way the museum was
using the sacred Dendur enclosure for parties, calling a recent private
dinner for the fashion designer Valentino disgusting; and he thought
a photo of Montebello in a fashion magazine denigrated the museum.
In 1982, Arthur Sackler announced that he was giving $4 million
and the best of his collection to the Smithsonian Institution, which in
turn agreed to create the Sackler Gallery of Art on the National Mall.
In the end, as earlier noted, the nation indeed benefited, and the Freer/
Sackler are today priority destinations for tourists and area residents alike
(admission gratis).
And what possessed Dr. Arthur Sackler? As the French aphorist La
Bruyre said of collecting, It is not a pastime but a passion, and often
so violent that it is inferior to love and ambition only in the pettiness of
its aims. Or adds the British connoisseur Kenneth Clark: Why do men
and women collect? As well as ask why they fall in love: the reasons are irrational, the motives as mixed. In the end, however elusive the source of
these out-of-body affairs, museums all over the world are filled with their
progeny. Who or what has the superior moral claim to their possession is
a matter we discuss in our epilogue.

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