05/10/2026
PROVENANCE ISN'T ALWAYS A
STRAIGHT LINE
by Mirri Leven
Recently, a number of artworks have found their way back through our doors, sometimes many years after I last saw them. Unwrapping these works again, remembering where they have been and the people who have lived with them, has had me reflecting on the life of an artwork and the many lives it becomes part of along the way.
I believe that we are never really the owners of an artwork. For a time, we simply have the privilege of living with it, caring for it and becoming part of its story.
An artwork has a life that extends far beyond any one person who might live with it. It carries the story given to it by the artist, but as it moves through the world it gathers its own history as well. It lives in different homes, hangs on different walls, witnesses families grow and change, is talked about over dinner tables, packed carefully into crates, moved across cities and countries, inherited, gifted, sold and loved again.
We become part of its story, rather than it becoming simply part of our property.
Each work carries Country, culture, history and stories that existed long before any of us encountered the painting and will continue long after it leaves our hands. The idea that we could ever truly "own" them has never felt quite right to me. For a time, we have the privilege of caring for them.
At the gallery, the time a work spends in our care can sometimes be relatively short, but it is incredibly intimate.
read full essay:
https://artleven.com/provenance-isnt-always-a-straight-line/?mc_cid=7f017fa063&mc_eid=b9e206c720
