Art and Furniture Donations

Since 2023, USModernist has accepted tax-deductible donations of modern art and midcentury furniture, then placed those pieces with buyers and collectors who actually want them. Dozens of donors. More than 400 works rehomed. About $120,000 raised, going into documentation, advocacy, and preservation of Modernist architecture.  It is, in effect, a matchmaking service with a mission attached: art leaves a house where it is no longer loved and lands in a house built for exactly that kind of art, and a valuable preservation nonprofit gets funded. USModernist has spent nearly two decades cataloging Modernist houses and the people who love them. Donors with modern art tend to live in — or have lived in — exactly those houses. So do the buyers. .

USModernist’s art initiative began with a widow who called to donate a sizable collection of modern art. Selling it privately meant the hassle becoming an art dealer for six months. Consigning it meant commissions and paperwork. Giving it to a museum meant a long wait for a polite no; museums decline the overwhelming majority of unsolicited gifts because storage, conservation, and curatorial focus all cost money. Galleries wouldn’t even call her back. Throwing it away was unthinkable.  So we said yes, picked it up, and found new caring homes for the collection.

USModernist solves a problem people are quietly stuck on, sometimes for years. The typical caller is not looking for a tax deduction. They are looking for a solution and to avoid the hassle of sorting, arranging and selling themselves. They are downsizing, executing an estate, moving to a condo, or redecorating around a collection acquired over decades. The art is good but not museum-worthy; it has value and meaning; nobody in the family wants it; selling it yourself is opaque and exhausting. USModernist takes the whole problem off the table with one phone call and a truck. 

The art goes where it is loved.  This is the emotional core. Abstract and conceptual work made for Modernist interiors goes back into Modernist interiors, placed with an audience that specifically collects it. Donors are not disposing of a collection. They are rehoming it.

It is genuinely easy.  Free pickup anywhere on the East Coast, usually within 7–14 days.  Art can be framed, mounted, rolled, or unmounted in undamaged condition.  Midcentury and modern furniture from any era; contemporary sculpture under 100 pounds.   The donor is done when the truck pulls away.

The tax treatment is real:  USModernist is a 501(c)(3) (EIN 26-3643357), so gifts of tangible personal property are deductible under the ordinary IRS rules. Donors should talk to their own advisor, and gifts valued above $5,000 generally require a qualified appraisal and Form 8283 — but for someone holding appreciated art they no longer want, the deduction may be worth more than a hurried private sale would net after commissions. 

How it works, start to finish:

• The donor emails or calls with photographs and a rough description.

• USModernist assesses what it can place, and says so honestly — not everything is a fit.

• Free pickup is scheduled, typically within 7–14 days.

• The donor receives acknowledgment for tax purposes; appraisal, where required, is the donor’s responsibility.

• A Modernist chair or painting you no longer want becomes a permanent, free, public record of American Modernist architecture.

Contact: Caroline Francis caroline@usmodernist.org
or George Smart, 919 740 8407, or george@usmodernist.org

USModernist/NCModernist® is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit educational archive (EIN 26-3643357) providing donors, volunteers, and advocates the information and organization they require to passionately document, preserve, and promote residential Modernist architecture.  We are the largest open digital archive of midcentury Modernist houses in the world, with 30,000 documented so far.  Learn more.