The besieged financier Leon Black had discussions with the administrators of the Museum of Modern Art about his future with the museum, in light of the disturbing details about his connections with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, The Post found out.
A number of MoMA administrators have addressed Black – co-founder and CEO of Apollo Global Management – about resigning as president of the museum when his term ends on July 1, according to two sources with knowledge of the talks.
Complicated issues, the sources said, are whether Black will remain on the board if he resigns as president. The billionaire owner of precious works of art such as Edvard Munch’s “Scream” has been a member of MoMA’s board of directors since 1997.
If the museum severed ties with Black, who was elected president in 2018, it could jeopardize his access to his unique collection, including Raphael’s drawing “The Head of a Young Apostle,” which Black bought for $ 47.9 million. dollars in 2013, said a source.
“Remember, if MoMA gives up Black, they lose their chance at their personal art collection,” she said.
Another source denied that Black, a philanthropist and art lover, would deprive the historical museum of his collection even if he were no longer a member of his council of more than 50 people.
Remember, if MoMA gives up Black, they lose their chance at their personal art collection, says a source.
The talks take place as the museum is destroyed by prominent artists such as Ai Weiwei and photographer Nan Goldin, after it emerged in January that Black had paid Epstein $ 158 million for tax and estate planning advice following Epstein’s guilty plea. since 2008 for soliciting prostitution from a teenager.
Goldin told The Post that he will not show his work at MoMA even if he is looking for a place in New York for a retrospective that began at the National Portrait Gallery in London before traveling through Europe.
“I told the museum director that he can’t give my MoMA show as long as Leon Black is there,” said Goldin, who has played a role in pressuring other prominent art organizations, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Guggenheim and the Tate. London to cut ties with the Sackler family behind the OxyContin painkiller.
“I’d love to show up at MoMA, but you have to stick to your ethics,” she said. “How can MoMA stay with Leon Black, a man aligned with Jeffrey Epstein who was responsible for the sex trafficking of teenage girls?”
Epstein committed suicide in prison a month after being arrested a second time in 2019 and accused of conducting a sex trafficking operation involving dozens of underage girls, some as young as 14 years old.
Black was not charged with any wrongdoing. But his attractive payments to a convicted sex offender seem to have hastened his decision to hand over the role of Apollo CEO to co-founder Marc Rowan in July. Black will remain president.
When the payments were revealed in January by an Apollo law firm hired under investor pressure, Black sent the MoMA board of directors a letter of apology he wrote to Apollo investors. He concluded the letter by saying, “I look forward to seeing you at our February board meeting,” according to the New York Times.
A source close to the MoMA council tells The Post that the note “rubbed people wrong”, given the gravity of the situation. “After all, he had to step down as CEO of Apollo.”
Since then, the museum of modern art has twice rejected its meeting scheduled for February – first until mid-March and then until the end of March, sources said. The MoMA confirmed the delays, but insisted the repeated rescheduling had nothing to do with Black.
“The council rescheduled the February-March meeting to allow its finance committees more time to address some important issues before presenting them to the plenary for consideration,” said spokeswoman Amanda Hicks. She declined to comment on whether board members negotiated with Black about his future there.
Sources say that a decision, if taken, could be announced immediately after the next meeting.
Of course, Black is not the only MoMA administrator who has ties to Black. Administrator Glenn Dubin and his wife, Eva, had a personal relationship with Epstein before and after the 2008 conviction, and MoMA named a gallery after them. Artists, including the Guerrilla girls, also demanded that Dubin resign.
Black declined to comment. Dubin, who previously denied any wrongdoing, also declined to comment.
A MoMA administrator who is not involved in the current talks personally supports keeping Black as president, saying he helped run the museum through a tough financial patch.
“We are going through very difficult times from a financial point of view and he succeeded brilliantly,” said the administrator. “Leon was extremely good with the museum and takes his work seriously. I hope he goes through this. ”
The administrator also rejected the protests of artists such as Goldin and Ai as “extremely political”.
“I really believe that MoMA is not an institution of social change, it is a museum,” said the administrator. “No one has sent him to the gallows yet, and I hope he doesn’t go to the gallows.”
As previously reported by The Post, Black promised not to cause problems when he took over in 2018 the role of Jerry Speyer, who had held the role of president for 11 years.
“And you know when Leon is in charge, you know he’s going to keep us from disaster, because this guy keeps up with all the modern masters,” Black sang in front of his art friends at the Renaissance-style four-story palace he owns. in the Upper East Side, a former art gallery.