. This dynamic puts businesses in every U.S. industry, including the arts, into a philosophical bind: Should I safeguard my public image by refusing to play the lobbying game? Or should I accept the dissonant realities of the system I’m a part of by spending to protect my interests on Capitol Hill?
At bottom, lobbyists act as a strategic conduit between a client and the officials tied tightest to the specific policy issue that client cares about. A lobbyist can only influence the development of a policy in a desired direction if they intimately understand the current state of play on Capitol Hill, as well as the current concerns of the people they represent.
In select cases, however, organizations serve as their own registered lobbyists. In fact, the third-biggest spender on the art-industry list I compiled last week has been taking the DIY approach for years: the Association of Art Museum Directors , which paid an estimated $320,000 worth of lobbying-related fees from 2018 through 2021.
Visitors browse the gala preview of the ADAA Art Show’s 2020 edition. © BFA. Photography by Jocko Graves / BFA.com. Courtesy of the Art Dealers Association of America.As a refresher, the ADAA paid an estimated $450,000 in lobbying fees to the Washington-headquartered law firm WilmerHale from April 2019 through December 2021. Its total bill for those services eclipsed that of all other art-business entities except Sotheby’s since 2018.
Bray elaborated on this concept through the lens of one of the ADAA’s chief lobbying concerns, the potential for sweeping reforms to the Bank Secrecy Act and Anti-Money Laundering Act that could have placed stringent new regulatory requirements on art dealers. The strategy demanded walking a series of political tightropes, starting with the one between red and blue legislators. “Staff on both sides of the aisle talk to each other,” Yarowsky said. If the ADAA were primarily meeting with Democrats, their Republican counterparts would inevitably find outADAA executive director Maureen Bray. Photo: Victor A. Mirontschuk, courtesy of the ADAA.