Burlington,
VT ---
Connell
Gallagher has watched parts of Vermont's artistic legacy slip
beyond the state's grasp.
In 1960,
the University of Indiana's Lilly Library used endowments to
purchase the
papers of Sheffield Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Galway Kinnell.
The Library of Congress
has purchased the artful tomes of Claire Van Vliet, the Vermont
printmaker, for decades and
began acquiring her archival material in 1989.
Even
as head of special collections at the University of Vermont's
Bailey/Howe Library,
Gallagher is virtually powerless to add to the university's collection
manuscripts and
artwork by some Vermont artists.
"There are a number of places around the country that have
gig endowments and are able
to go fishing and are able to buy whatever comes along,"
Gallagher said.
"UVM is not in that position."
Neither are many other museums and libraries, and a federal tax
law enacted three decades
ago further aggravates the situation. Artists once received tax
deductions for the fair market
when they donated their work, but beginning 1969, the tax deductions
were limited to the
material cost of the work. Manuscripts became only as valuable
as the paper they were
printed on and artwork only worth the paper, ink and paint put
into them.
Two bill have been introduced into the U.S. Congress within the
last year, including one
by Sen. Patrick J. Leahy, D-Vt.,
to let donating artist deduct the fair market value of their
work.
Gallagher
can't help, but think about the ones that got away like Kinnell's
work.
"It's possible that we could have been a player in this
if we could have given him tax
writeoffs," Gallagher said. "Maybe, maybe not."
The 1969 law, enacted to stop excessive appraisals for tax purposes,
did more than
question the value of art. It changed the complexion of American's
artistic institutions and libraries.
Art collectors
still gave to museums and other institutions, but the reform
effectively
shut down donations from the artist themselves.
Leahy's office researched the issue and determined that the law
led composer Igor
Stravinsky to sell his papers to a private foundation in Switzerland
rather than donate them
to the Library of Congress.
Amory Houghton took up the cause for artist in November. The
Republican
representative from upstate New York introduced the Artist' Contribution
to American
Heritage Act of 1999.
To Houghton, a low would solve a situation where artist are being
shortchanged.
"Many times these people live on a shoestring." Houghton
said.
"It's only right and fair and balanced."
Vermont
artist and print makers Sabra Field and Margaret Lampe Kannenstine
brought
the issue to Leahy's attention earlier this year. they directed
their pleas for legislation
towards a senator as well as an old friend whose wife, Marcelle,
redecorates his Washington,
D.C. and Burlington offices each year with different works by
Vermont artist.
Leahy introduced the Artist-Museum partnership Act, a copy of
Houghton's bill.
"What I'm trying to do is encourage more donations from
artist." Leahy said. "Artist
who were able to donate art to libraries and museums and so on
aren't able to do it now
because they'll get the value of the canvas they painted it on
or the paper they wrote it on."
"They should at least get the fair market value of it."
Calculating
the materials cost is nearly impossible, according to Kannenstine.
the
Woodstock resident theorized that she would have to weight her
paint before she started to
make a print and well as keep track of the cost of every sheet
of paper."
"I don't know any artist that work that way." Kannenstine
said.
Although most art institutions are aware of the applicable tax
law, Field still gets request
from other nonprofit groups for donations of her work. Because
so many letters promise
Field a tax deduction for a gift of her art, she has composed
a form letter that reads,
"Contrary to the popular belief, and as erroneously stated
on virtually every solicitation,
THERE IS NO TAX BENEFIT TO ANY ARTIST WHO DONATES
HIS OR HER OWN ART WORK."
the letter
continues on to quote the tax law's exact chapter and verse section
170 (e) (1) (A) of the Internal Revenue code and Treasury Regulations
Section I.170A-4.
Field's
most recent student in the finer points of tax was her alma mater,
Middlebury
College. Despite the current tax law, Field has agreed to donate
a complete collection of
between 500 and 600 proof prints of her work to the college's
Museum of Art permanent
collection because she decided it would be safe, organized and
available to scholars at
Middlebury. The museum plans
an exhibit of her work in 2002, the 45th anniversary of her graduation
from the college.
"I think I'll just leave it an outright gift." Field
said., choosing not to apply the tiny tax
deduction, " because that's my college."
Richard Saunders, director of the Middlebury College Museum of
Art, knows how lucky
he is. Middlebury has had a good relationship with Field, Saunders
said, but that didn't
make the college's request any less presumptuous. Hand Field
said no, the institution's
museum would have had to build a complete collection of her work
relying on gifts from
alumni and collectors as well as acquisition funds that never
stretch nearly for enough.
Instead, the lack of a fair market deduction leaves the donation
decision
entirely with the artist.
"Certainly
it would have been easier for her or for any artist with a reputation
whose
artwork commands considerable sums to be of a charitable mind,"
Saunders said, adding that
it falls to artist to "simply be generous."
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