In an agreement with the IRS, the estate will donate the piece and not, that is correct not, take a charitable deduction for the donation. Although the family will not get the deduction, they will not have to pay estate taxes or penalties.
The NY Times reports (emphasis added)
Source: The NY Times
That stuffed bird is ultimately the reason “Canyon” is being donated at all. The presence of a bald eagle — a bird protected by federal laws — means that the work cannot be legally sold or traded. So when the Sonnabend children, Nina Sundell and Antonio Homem, inherited “Canyon,” five years ago, their appraisers valued it at zero. The I.R.S., however, insisted this masterwork was worth $65 million. It demanded they pay estate taxes of $29.2 million plus another $11.7 million in penalties.
As part of the settlement, the I.R.S. dropped the tax assessment; in exchange, the family was required to donate “Canyon” to a museum where it would be publicly exhibited and claim no tax deduction, Mr. Lerner said.
While both museums delivered written proposals about their plans for the gift, the Modern invited the heirs to the museum so its top officials could make a personal appeal, Mr. Lerner said.
On Tuesday, Ann Temkin, the Modern’s curator of painting and sculpture, took a break from overseeing the hanging of the work to summarize the argument she had made to the family. She told them the Modern already owned five other Rauschenberg combines, including “Bed” and “Rebus,” from the same period, as well as several works by his contemporaries and other artists like Willem de Kooning and Joseph Cornell who influenced him. Seeing an artist in context, she said, gives viewers an insight into his work that is impossible to get from seeing the work in isolation.
Mr. Lowry said, “If you were going to sit down and close your eyes and dream of an installation, you would envision ‘Rebus,’ ‘Bed’ and ‘Canyon’ in conversation with each other.”
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