Polaroid photos by Lucas Samaras, Chuck Close and Andy Warhol
LONDON. A group led by a former US magistrate judge has launched an 11th hour campaign to prevent the auction of photographs from the Polaroid collection. Judge Sam Joyner and others are working towards filing a motion for a rehearing at the Minnesota bankruptcy court that awarded sale rights to Sotheby’s last August.
The once-mighty Polaroid Corporation (famed for its invention of instant, negative-free photographs, but since eclipsed by digital photography) filed for bankruptcy twice in the past decade—most recently in 2008 in connection with a $3.65bn Ponzi (investment fraud) scheme at parent company Petters Group Worldwide. The Polaroid name and assets—barring the photography collection—were acquired by private equity firm Hilco Consumer Capital and liquidator Gordon Brothers Group, for $88m in 2009. The collection remained behind with the defunct Polaroid Corporation, renamed PBE, and is in the hands of PBE’s liquidators.
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