Huntington Wins Super Bowl Bet (as LACMA Sits Out)

Robert Henri, Patience Serious, 1915. Cincinnati Art Museum

The Rams' victory secured the loan of a Robert Henri painting from the Cincinnati Art Museum. Patience Serious, a 1915 child portrait made in Ogunquit, Maine, will be shown at the Huntington at dates to be determined.

Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes conceived museum Super Bowl art bets in 2010. Museums in the competing teams' home cities would "wager" loans of art from their collections, with the art going temporarily to the winning city's museum. In this case the Huntington staked a 1927 Henri, Irish Girl, that would have gone to Cincinnati, had the Bengals won.

Mainly the bets are a cost-effective way of generating publicity for art and museums. The tradition lapsed in 2017, when the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the High Museum of Art declined to participate. This is the first Super Bowl art bet since then. It's fair to assume that LACMA opted out, as all the other participants have been the largest civic art museums in their cities. The Huntington is in San Marino.

For what it's worth, LACMA's Interscope Records show did have artistic responses to all five Super Bowl LVI halftime performers.

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