Jared Kushner, Jay Z, and Reese Witherspoon all made headlines lately because of the publication of a brand new ProPublica database itemizing all 11.5 million loans permitted by the U.S. authorities underneath its emergency $953 million Cost Safety Program (PPP).

This system, a pandemic-era measure supposed to maintain the economic system secure amid the intense uncertainty of early lockdown, allowed enterprise homeowners with fewer than 500 workers to use for loans for use to pay their employees and different key expenditures. Reviews point out that 93 p.c of these eligible for funds truly acquired them.

As anticipated, the federal government forgave a big proportion of the loans, even for debtors with immense web worths, as long as funds went in the direction of payroll or different permitted prices.

Within the artwork world, maybe the most important title to get a serious PPP mortgage was Jeff Koons, the world’s costliest artist at public sale. He secured $1.1 million for his operation on April 27, 2020. The whole lot of the mortgage was forgiven seven months later, based on public paperwork.

However Koons wasn’t the one art-world determine to safe PPP cash. Blue-chip mega-galleries together with David Zwirner ($6.9 million), Hauser & Wirth ($4.5 million), Gagosian ($3.5 million), and Tempo ($3.Four million) every acquired loans, and every had them forgiven in full, plus any accrued curiosity.

Amongst them, solely David Zwirner and Hauser and Wirth utilized for multiple mortgage, with every securing securing 4 separate rounds of funding.

In an announcement, a consultant for Tempo stated: “Tempo participated within the Paycheck Safety Program with the intention to shield the roles of our workers within the face of the worldwide well being pandemic and the financial hardship it introduced. All the cash from the mortgage went in the direction of employees salaries.”

We reached out to each different establishment named on this article; none responded to our request for remark by publication time.

Smaller galleries additionally utilized for and acquired funding. Jack Shainman Gallery, Blum and Poe, and Kasmin every pulled in between $350,000 and $1 million and had the loans totally forgiven. Luhring Augustine and Matthew Marks additionally utilized for loans, getting $181,500 and $401,852, respectively.

Marlborough Gallery, in the meantime, acquired $602,900, however whether or not its mortgage was forgiven shouldn’t be disclosed within the ProPublica papers. Artnet additionally utilized for and acquired $2 million in three separate loans, all of which had been forgiven.

In response to a January 2022 report by the Nationwide Bureau of Financial Analysis, 75 p.c of the PPP program’s almost $800 billion in taxpayer funds benefited the highest 20 p.c incomes households. Solely a fraction of the sum went to employees who would have misplaced jobs in any other case.

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