"Would you like to consider letting me withdraw the collection?" O'Keeffe asks then-Fisk president Charles Johnson.
The financially struggling university had been seeking to sell at least some of the works and has been fought at each step by the Santa Fe museum.
Most recently, Davidson County Chancellor Ellen Hobbs Lyle struck down a proposal by Fisk to sell half its share in the collection for $30 million to the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Ark.
Fisk attorneys argued in opening statements that it has not "repudiated" the collection because it went to court seeking permission before it attempted to sell any works.
The works are not on display because the university is still trying to raise money to fix the Carl Van Vechten Gallery where they were being shown. "Van Vechten was closed because they were doing expensive security and fire protection work and they didn't want it to be damaged," attorney John Branham said.
In a deposition, Fisk President Hazel O'Leary testified that there was absolutely now way the university could display the artwork at this time.
Branham said the school, should it win the right to keep the artwork, will restore the Van Vechten gallery and display the collection.
He pointed out that much of the collection was not on display for 12 years starting in the 1970s while they were being restored.
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