A friend interested in purchasing an expensive <objet d'art> was recently
embarrassed by being told "we don't deal with the private sector," when she
asked a museum curator (a specialist in these particular objects) if he could
help authenticate the piece.
 
Would this be a common response among major art museums?  This was not a case
of asking for an appraisal or any sort of <guarantee> that the piece was
genuine but simply for an opinion as to whether the item was genuine.  Had my
friend gone to a librarian, I am sure everything reasonably possible would have
been done to answer her question.  Are museum curators operating with a
different philosophy?
 
This is not meant to start a flame but does seem relevant to the recent
museum/library thread.  In my experience working at a natural history museum
and more recently at a state historical society, we routinely commented upon
objects (Yes, this is a Clovis point; no, this is not a trilobite, etc.) and
viewed it as part of our mission to educate, though we were very careful not to
suggest a monetary value.  And it seems to me that I see art museums
authenticating paintings all the time, whether in the "private sector" or not.
What am I missing?
 
Jim Murphy
Ohio State University Libraries
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