This painting went from $180,000 to $10,000 in 2 years - is the Art Market Tanking?
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- čas přidán 13. 09. 2024
- The New York Times recently reported that the value of paintings by once hot young artists are falling through the floor.
Here's a look at why this happens.
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I've been following the art market , the recent articles, and the online chatter, and this is the most sober and reasonable analysis I've seen anyone put forth. Respect to you for not playing the game of hyperbole and outrage and instead just sharing the facts of how this process works. Very much appreciated!
This is so nice to hear. Thank you!
The tragedy here is not just in the financial loss, but in what it says about the value of art itself. When art becomes merely a commodity for investors and flippers, it risks losing its soul. The artist, once a creator and storyteller, is reduced to nothing more than a supplier for a market that cares more about profit than beauty. Great Video! 💗
This is all so true. The money, a necessary component, can at times make things so dirty. Thanks for watching :)
The work in question should then first qualify as Art. This is only possible if people abandon the worthless snobbery and self indulgent nonsense of modernism and postmodernism.
@@majorhughes2791 people have been making this argument about contemporary art for centuries. It’s getting a little old.
@@christopherwestpresents I agree. As soon as we can move past our need to be fawned over simply for existing we can crawl out of this dark age we currently live in. Or perhaps once abstracts can provide a mutually agreed upon cohesive set of standards based on evidence and logic, then abstract can claim to be within the playing field of Art. Naturally I am betting on the former.
@@majorhughes2791
That and idiotic garbage stops being accepted .
A retired family friend painted for years as a hobby. His wife wanted room in the garage so he tried selling some paintings at flea markets $25-$50 a pop. He got a spot at an open air street art festival and sold them for $2500 a pop.
Context matters.
Like I said before art’s value is subjective. It’s just marketing. It’s valuable because we say it is. Promotion is the key. Why are some artists famous and others are unknown.
I think the art market is a money laundering front for the most part.
It’s a lot harder than you might think. Pretty much impossible through the large auction houses.
Hard? What, money laundering? Oh sweet summer child… It’s EVERYWHERE! Art, real estate, small business startups… all means of washing money from grey or black markets. You think wealthy people come by their wealth completely honestly? Please. Art is and always has been, a way to wash money, right out in the open.
@@mesasavage What do you think JP Morgan and the like are? They ARE money laundering organizations.
@@christopherwestpresents auction houses have a lot of incentive to keep prices up!
Yes, and you can move art between countries much easier than the equivalent $1m cash
Love Art. Hate and despise the Art Market.
This is a popular opinion.
As an art school graduate I found this information very informative. Often I ask myself what did I get out of art school. It would have been nice if at least something this clear had been discussed. Thank you.
Wow. What a nice comment. Thank you and I’m glad it was helpful.
Right? But I got 4 solid years of painting in a studio of my own. I waited tables too cause I needed too but it’s the painting 7 days a week that I recall!
Art school forgot a critical element. If you become a professional artist, it is a business, not a hobby, and you have to run it like a business.
I went to art school as well and feel really let down, cheated. They did not teach me how to paint a tree, or art as business. Almost criminal@@studio107bgallery4
The second piece, Sisters in Pink by Emmanuel Taku, is giving $14.99 at Target. 🎯
Those were exactly my thoughts.
I agree, it definitely looks like what we’d call “commercial license fodder” or “pop decor” - and I mean no offense to the artist, it’s just a type of work that is over-represented in decor right now
What I love about the art world is that we call all only love about 10% of what we see - but that 10% is different for everyone.
I was gonna say, maybe these examples were "hot" because of BLM, but now they're actually seen for what they are - just some random trashy decor pieces. I see these selling at Ikea for 30-200eu depending on size and printing materials.
@@christopherwestpresents : And we see trends in art where there are variations on a theme. I believe I can safely say that about both pieces.
As a ‘successful’ artist and coming from a background where I grew up in the gallery world too, the current price volatility has to do with one thing; Promotion! My family was out of the gallery business, when I began painting professionally, so I did not benefit from such promotion. But the outrageous prices in recent decades are the result of gallery owners promoting unknown artists as the next ‘thing’ and stupid collectors paying whatever the gallery says something is worth, as well as simple greed and desire for huge profits, on both sides of the sales receipt. And, note, my family did not have that kind of gallery. It was a ‘conservative/traditional’ gallery where the artist set the price and prices usually increased gradually over the years as artists became more and more well known based upon a consistent body of work over time.
That is the way it used to be done for sure - slow and steady.
even with the drop I find them still overprized at 10,000.
That’s the beauty of art. We can all like different things!
@@christopherwestpresents I am not talking about likeing but prize and objective value. And in some cases as those displayed (and many many more) the artistic quality and value is shockingly and obviously artificially inflated.
Thrift store. Buy it for $10 and paint over it
@@christopherwestpresents no there's obviously no correlation between liking things and value. The art market is fully decoupled from any fundamental value, making demand fully hype driven, even for old artworks.
If your monthly treat is say a blouse from a thrift store then that’s what you’d spend on art. If your treat is a blouse from Channel then that’s what you’d spend on art. If you make art that appeals to the Channel set then you can make a living. 😂Is the art edible? Does it keep you warm and dry? Then its value isn’t material. Speculation bubbles happen in all directions.
Wondering how much trends factor into this. Both examples that open the video feature African-American subjects. I can see works with such subjects being more in demand when black issues/BLM/etc featured heavily in the American zeitgeist but once the mainstream culture moves on, art like that seems more niche and would therefore fetch lower prices as the trendy bidders/buyers are focused elsewhere.
Trends are a huge factor. I’ve got another video coming soon where i talk about a similar thing happening around 10 years ago.
In short: pricing in the art market is propped up by galleries who act like gatekeepers, constricting supply so as to inflate prices, and only selling to buyers who won’t resell quickly (so the galleries can keep the game going as long as possible). Once the gallery loses its ability to constrict supply the game is up, and all the prices, hype and prestige come tumbling down.
Happens in a lot of luxury markets actually.
I’ve seen this happen so many times. It even happens to established artists. I used to work for McKee Gallery who represented artists like Philip Guston , Martin Puryear and Vija Celmins and we were always on the lookout for speculators. Good to see Vito Acconci featured here, he was a teacher of mine at SVA. Thanks for the video, it’s so hard sometimes to explain to people how artists make it and sustain a market, this was clear, concise , and digestible for the general public.
So nice to hear. Thank you for the comment. And yes even the powerhouses you mentioned had slow markets for a time. Glad you like Vito - he’s a fav of mine :)
The art in question is........... questionable.
Obviously somewhat subjective.
@@christopherwestpresents very subjective, I like it :) Wouldn't buy it though lol
In every market field, there are rules according to which things work. And if you happen to be in the market, I think itˋs useful to know the rules.
@@mr.metamovies2419 we are in period where "certain" art is prioritized as part of an agenda. Problem is, said prioritized art is terrible. And you will be penalized for pointing that out. This charade will just continue until we get tired of it. (You can just expand this out to cover western civilization in general)
Imagine how easy it would be to start a new movement if you could know in advance what future tastemakers would recommend. It seems to me that this is the reason a lot of work seems questionable. It can't conform to existing standards, or it risks being outdated. It can't make too hard of a left turn or it will alienate the people that determine its commercial success.
Best then, that the artist yields only to the spirit and form of their ideas, and dies on that hill rather than any other.
The best cases for the artist are either where they guess the coming trends accurately, their natural inclinations are in line with the coming trends, the charisma associated with promoting the work convinces buyers, or some combination of elements outside of the domain of the art market influences purchasing behavior.
The art market is a con mans game. Its just pump and dump but done with artwork rather than stocks. The dealers/galleries conspire to hype an artist and then dump their stock. A lot of the stuff they do would result in criminal charges if they did it with stocks.
Dealers do pump artists but of course that’s their job. It’s really hard for a dealer to manipulate markets, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen!
Yeah, first bidding on your own lots at auction through strawmen to drive the price up, then donating one piece to a museum to get a tax credit ... sounds all totally legit!
That's totally false. I have never met a single gallerist who is looking to pump and dump their artists' inventory. There are unscrupulous dealers, typically on the secondary market; but most small to midsize galleries aim for a slow, steady, sustainable increase in the primary market value of an artist's work.
@@michaelrusso8466Thank you for this everyone else seems to be thinking in extremes.
@@meltdown6165 how would they get an auction before it had any value?
I know nothing about art, but I really liked your channel.
So nice of you to say. Thank you!
Glad to see someone covering the article and going over it in more depth. A tragic situation, but also a learning opportunity for many.
I really appreciate the comment. Thanks so much for watching!
@@MomeGnome While your taste in their work is subjective, we feel the situation itself is tragic. Everyone is entitled to their opinion
I learn more about art from your videos than any other channel. Thank you. (And, as I’m sure you know, the DMAC is actually a pretty good place for a city the size of Des Moines.)
It’s so good! I hope I didn’t sound like I was totally making fun of it!
Wonderful and very comprehensive video on an incredibly important topic. Chapeau! Wishing you and your channel the very best!
Wow thank you! I so enjoy your channel. This means a lot.
Art valuation is fairly arbitrary. Something is only valuable because an "expert" says it is. And, those experts have a stake in declaring items valuable. Also who ever "lost" money on those pieces almost wrote it off their taxes!
There’s some truth here.
@christopherwestpresents And, FINALLY, a thing is "worth" ONLY what someone is willing to pay for it. GREATER FOOL THEORY anyone??
Because I am an artist, I cannot do what the dealer does. I do not know how to cultivate a demand or even how to set a price. A dealer earns his money by helping and advising the artist.
An artist must gather skill in a common accepted medium or a unique and original medium in establishing a recognizable style or identity. This takes time and experimentation. You may work for years and abandon the medium for another. This is why being an artist takes courage.
In preparation for a one artist show, it helps to employ some elementary merchandising techniques. A small body of work needs to have a sense of continuity. Medium used, size and maybe pallet common to all pieces. The public feels comfortable with vague repetition, not duplication. If it has an intellectual message people may want a piece of your work. There are no hard and fast rules but one time on West Broadway, there were these guys selling abstract expressionist Motherwell type, swauls on NYC subway maps and doing a brisk business.
This is all really solid advice. Thank you for sharing.
Art school? It can't hurt but with its 5 and 6 figure cost, is it worth it? Unfortunately many art school grads end up doing paste-up for soul-less corporations. A lot of artists succeed without any artist education at all or they might study a medium on their own. I have the unpopular notion that a pastoral painting of a beautiful cottage is a craft and not really earth shaking. In a way, an artist is like a criminal because they explore the unconventional and like a criminal, they often fail. Being a recognized artist is the result of passion, expression and a unique view of life.... things that you do not get in art school. There are those who are born with a genius and others that it takes a lifetime to achieve.
You said Damien Hirst? Oh.
As someone who deals in 19th centiry paintings and gravures Im in a different "world" and my market is doing just fine. I have to wonder if "modern art" will stand the test of time based on its quality and message? It's all a matter of personal prefernce and maybe? Tastes are changing and people are being safer in their "investments".
I agree - historical material, even from the latter half of the 20th century, is doing pretty well.
As an artist trying to chart a career path I am torn between painting in a 19th C style and something more modern. I want to sell now and long term.
Thanks God i wouldn’t give 10 dollars for it
Fair enough.
A piece like that has negative value - I wouldn't even want to take it for free and have to store it somewhere.
Hi, just FYI, the background music is distracting and makes it difficult to understand for people with hearing problems (like me). You have good content, there's no need to put bells and whistles on top of it. Best
Thanks for the input. I’ll try and tone it down.
first two paintings were over-priced from the start. just like houses and flats in most cities.
Things have gotten expensive.
Criminally overpriced!
a house can be valued based on what it would rent for and/or replacement value. Art not so much.
@@ebbyjones3177
Why do collectors treat paintings as investments then?
I never realized that if I just walked into a prestigious gallery with a bucket of money that they might not be willing to sell to me!
It’s a strange, strange world Ricky!
What would you do?
@@DzanarAbbasZade you need to buy their less in demand artists and build a relationship. It’s much like buying a Rolex or Ferrari.
It depends on the gallery, but generally, most of them would be happy to sell. This video pretends like galleries actually care about their artists, while in real life, the con game already starts when you get accepted by a gallery. There are just a few that will respect and raise you as a full-fledged pro, but those galleries are established as being "the good guys", so they get oversaturated easily. They basically force you to go rogue or join a con gallery and that's how stuff like selling at 200k and then reselling at 10k just a few years later happens. Your work gets misrepresented by these galleries for a quick profit, which might cost your career.
Thank you. It's trickier than I knew.
Thanks for the comment. And for watching!
The only thing I took from this is that it's always in the artists best interest to get pimped out by a dealer or else they're playing the game wrong
A dealer can help.
@@christopherwestpresentsand a pimp?
Huge difference between art as a thing and the markets that move art as a commodity. Begin by studying at the best art schools in the world, obtain at least a Masters degree in painting, sculpture or some other specific skill, work day and night, know your work’s place in the lineage of art history and find a patron with good connections. You are then on your possible way to having your work commodified. Chances of success after that 1 in a million probably. You have to be exceptional, wealthy and very well connected to keep going making good work that no one is buying.
This is all true. I just really wish the part of having to spend thousands upon thousands at art school wasn’t.
Wow I went to art school (I studied design, thankfully!) and this was never discussed!
Sadly it seems most art schools seem to ignore the business side of things. Thanks for the comment!
Art schools are for art. Finances are never even thought of.
I also think the market is crazy about fresh paint without considering the long-term value of the work! The art being created is popular now but might not have that timeless effect!!
The most speculation always occurs with the newest art.
It boggles the mind how much the "Art" world deteriorated. Horrendous patches of paint for very confused collectors. I am speechless!
People have loved to criticize contemporary art for centuries.
There was a study on artists in the UK and they said like 93% of contemporary British artists are from the upper eschelon of society now. That's why it's so vapid I suppose. Probably a similar number in the USA
As a 20+ year Art Collector, Researcher, and Critic. I think the Art world is so over-inflated and unscrupulous Etc... and not always at the top. Like the stock market, some would say bye and hold and go long even then there is no guarantee, there has been more than one Well-known renowned art collector interviewed on CZcams who said or eluded to the fact that they have spent more money on more paintings that never produced profit than the few others that they have or had that did in the long term. For the Art that did not, as many Million / Billionaires will not tell you there are many ways to skin a CAT ! Deals they made with Galleries, Action Houses, Art Brokers, Tax Rightoffs, Donations to Museums and Public spaces, Back door trades Etc... I think that in the not-too-distant future, the Fine Art and Collectibles Luxury market bubble will not burst but will have a steep downturn but not crash for a period of time.
There’s a lot of truth in this, but it’s also become a luxury category. Maybe too many big players involved to let it fail. Also - at some level - there will always be a demand for art.
The beauty of Art is definitely in the eye of the beholder who has the ability to buy it.
This is true.
What do you mean no one wants to pay top dollar for overpriced pretentious garbage!?
🤷🏻♂️
The person with a furry looking pfp calling other types of art garbage is *chef's kiss*
@@kahdijamurray3361 You want spend this kind of money on stuff like this expecting to make bank you go on right ahead.
What is the saying, a fool and his money are soon parted?
Such an interesting video! The only thing I thought I knew was to not undersell gallery prices when selling on your own. I had no idea that the art market was this corrupt!
Thanks! And I don’t think the art market is corrupt - but as with anything where money is involved, just be on the lookout for the shady players.
Hi Christopher, a precautionary tale well told. ❤
Thank you so much!
Back in the sixties/seventies my grandparents bought a lot of art from unknown artists, they got what they liked and all of them are on the walls. I don’t like the idea of inflating prices like this because it makes it harder for normal people to hang art on their walls.
There are lots of reasons to collect. If you love what’s on your walls that’s awesome!
It amazes me what passes for ART today. It's not art, it's just a fad.
People have been saying that same thing about contemporary art for centuries.
As a painter, this was such a fun video
Thanks!
As an autodidact starting artist working outside of the market, this is facinating. I am very happy when people buy my paintings made with love as they "buy a part of me". At least I am sure they are not seeing it as an investment, they buy it because they genuinely like it. Next october I will be studying fine arts for the first time in a quite fancy art school. I'm curious where this will bring me. I saw that some of the teachers own galeries themselves. The money sounds nice but I don't want to be part of an investment/market scheme.
Sounds like you’re on the right path!
And stay vigilant!
@@christopherwestpresents thanks :)
Be prepared to be old and poor.
I love art, and i can't think of a reason i should care about this.
lol alot of useless information
This video is not for everyone. But thanks for watching!
@@christopherwestpresents let me ask you something...I'm an artist.. I have my Instagram page and TikTok page producing art content related to the work I do consistently.. I have a pretty loyal fanbase that enjoy the work and the videos I produce... You really think some guy flipping my artwork for a profit is gonna affect me in any form or fashion? You think I need to give an art gallery fifty percent of my earnings because they know few art collectors and people on boards of museums? You stuck in the last century.. This is a new age... Content is king...
Many artists are doing online galleries. Less overhead, more money for both parties!
But that doesn’t get you into the Venice Biennale.
What if I am retired and do art work to pass the time and want to try and make a little extra cash on the side?
How would I do it?
I sell at outdoor art festivals. There is bother more rewarding when someone connects emotionally to my work. I have seen people cry while looking at it.
These are the people I want buying my work. They are buying it because they connect with it. There is no thought of a monetary investment or what it will sell for in the future. And this is how it should be.
So glad you’re able to sell your work and found happiness. I wish this for every artist!
DEI in the art world is real. I have worked within the art community for years and this is a great example of why San Francisco's art market is totally bogus. Artists of color were pushed hard during and after the Obama era. It turned out the art they were pushing wasn't that good. I'd largeley blame Kanye West and other celebrities of colors that complained they were shut out of the art and fashion world but then proved that they had no actual talent. Truly talented artists with wide appeal have stabilized.
Paintings often sell at a discount to the buyer that the public does not see. Further the gallerist may hold onto the painting until the buyer has paid off the purchase. In some cases, both the gallerist and the buyer may speculate on a short term trend and "sell" at an inflated price, with the expectation that they will be able to settle the details in the future. There may be something similar going on even when wee are told that a painting "sold at auction".
There’s some truth here, but the gallerist wouldn’t want to hyper-inflate the price and risk tanking the artist’s market. That just doesn’t make sense.
Artists and gallery owners just need straw purchasers to get a sales history for an artist. Easier to sell when you can say his last two pieces sold for {x} dollars.
There’s some truth to this - but it’s a little tougher than it seems.
I’d be interested to know how much this happens. I don’t think it happens this way exactly, more like they have collectors they rely on to “scratch their back” by overpaying for a new artist in exchange for access to an established one
I learned something from your podcast. Please put out more in the future. Thanks
I really appreciate this. Thank you.
Talk about a vague comment. I see them everywhere on social media.
@@MomeGnome Exactly!
Excellent discussion, thank you!
So glad you liked it. And thanks for the comment!
Galleries are market manipulation organizations that artists and investors benefit from. Ferrari cars are now sold this way- allocations, limited production… DeBeers diamonds as well. Bubbles can last quite a long time if well managed.
Yep, high end car companies have gone the way of the limited-edition collectible. Sad.
Don’t forget Rolex and Patek Philippe.
A name, just as in fashionable accessories, is what is being marketed.
The art world is also like the auto market... you have demand for high end vehicles that are high end prices, they cool off for a few years, then they sometimes become classics and are desirable again with high end prices.
This is so true. It’s the same thing with watches as well.
Superb ... if you were never sure how this could happen... this excellent explanation tells you !
Wow! Thank you so much!
Artnet’s 2024 Intelligence Report on the African art market : Between 2013 and 2023, total sales increased by a whopping 46 per cent with 2021 marking the best year for the African art market - $101.3 million worth of work by African-born artists were sold in that year.
Interesting.
As I always have said, art market is another name of a legal scam involving lots of accomplices. Clarify how to set prices for art pieces.
This isnt an indicator or signal of market trends, it is a feature. It should be a red flag for anyone venturing into this world. The primary and even most of the secondary market at the elite end of the contemporary art world is a potemkin village designed for money laundering. If you dont want to get burned as a collector or an artist...pay more attention to what OTHER artists, professors, and alternative spaces are collecting...not the greedy and/or gullible gatekeepers and tastemakers
There’s a lot of good advice here - I would say the money laundering thing is harder than most people realize.
@@christopherwestpresents I know more than you buddy, but keep telling yourself that
@@christopherwestpresents Sorry I apologize for coming off as rude. I can tell you are a well meaning art lover but there are some things you need to understand about the art world post 2008 financial crisis: at the upper echelons the relationship between galleries, state depts., NGO's, and the auction houses has changed dramatically. A very fruitful bit of research on that topic would be a great video by the way . The doc "The Great Contemporary Art Bubble" gives a good peak into the mis-en-scene of what the art world has become and explains A LOT about the painting in your video. This economic bulimia has been happening for decades: personal friends of mine are in saatchi collection one decade and their work is little more than a small insurance write off the next. It's by design, its not an organic trend. Approaching the art world post 2008 through the lense of classical economics is like being a referee in a game between the Harlem Globetrotters and the Washington Generals...you are officiating nothing. The more new collectors and emerging artists know about the current situation the better. Keep at it though! Your channel is great! :)
There has never in the history of the artworld, been an artist who's work has gotten picked up by a gallery as a result of being seen in a coffee shop! Not in the real world does that ever happen! 😂
Haha - it’s certainly a rare occasion!
I had some work on display at starbucks and somebody splashed a little hot chocolate on one painting. no sales just a lot of praise....
The original price seems ridiculous. Maybe that’s why.
This is a section of the art market that exploits arts and leaves them high and dry. Galleries are leaches. Artist are always better off dealing directly with their collectors. This “market” is dead. Art “dealers” are Sheratons. I’ve never met one that was legitimate. This description of the market is a Hollywood fiction that has been propagated far too long. The most successful artist i personally know (and i know hundreds of the from doing art festivals for over 20 years) do it themselves 100%. I’m just sick of people that know nothing about the real art businesses telling us how it works.
Sorry to offend you!
Can you tell me how I can find out more about this? I made some photographs I'm really proud of and I'm curious how to best approach the market. I've been nominated for some legit photo awards in the past (lensculture and chromatic awards) just so you know I actually make decent stuff. But I have no idea about the art market.
The only gallery person I know is the kingpin of photography in my country but all his artists left him some years ago because he turned out to misrepresent the prizes to both the artists and collectors, putting the difference in his own pocket. He's now slowly rebuilding his empire with new artists. Great guy in terms of taste and business savvy but I'm scared to deal with him.
Wow! I retired a few years ago and started painting and I just realized I have a bunch of masterpieces laying around my house! Anyone interested in buying a gen u whine masterpiece?
Do it!
me too....if i am not a genuine genius then i am the next best thing
To sip on cheap wine, and snack on stale crackers….😂 I’ve been a professional artist for 46 years. I’ve decided to become a comedian, and relay all the outrageous stories that have happened during this time, that are, quite frankly, tragic and hysterical.. perfect material for comedy. The best part is knowing that my artwork is in collections throughout the world, and that it gives the buyers great happiness. My artwork ranges in price from $20 on up, depending on the time that I have spent creating the piece.
That’s awesome! I admire any artist that can make a living off of their art. That’s an amazing accomplishment.
@@christopherwestpresents it’s been an interesting life but there’s no retirement money
I wonder if predictive modelling would help determing the future auction prices of an artist's work. For example, you mention that there was only one person willing to pay $200,000 for that work. So what were the next closest bids? Was it a tight race? Were the next ten closest bids over $100,000? Plot them all on a graph, then do this with their other works, so that the x-axis represents time (when subsequent works were sold), and the y-axis is the amount they were sold for. Then apply this analysis to other artists' works. You'll start to see a pattern, and you can develop an algorythm for it. Other variables might include whether the artist was still alive at the time of sale, how long they had been creating and selling art, and even the average prices sold with pakrticular galleries. You'd need to enlist the help of a math and statistics professional, but it could be done. Then you'd have an objective model to help guide you towards certain works and artists, and those to stay away from. Remember the movie "Moneyball", and how stats were used there for sports? Or the guys who figured out a pattern on the Price is Right and won? Galleries, artists, auctioneers, collectors and investors may or may not be manipulative, but data is never manipulative unless you let it.
You’re def right about some of these factors. The most volatility seems to happen with younger living artists. Once an artist has passed and the supply is fixed, it does seem easier to chart.
I wouldn't even spend a penny on that Sisters in Pink painting, so surprised it sold for $10,000. Shows just how phony the art market is.
Because your tastes don’t align with something makes it phony? That’s quite the arrogant position to take.
@@christopherwestpresents Oh, ok. I'm hardly the first person that has made that comment. I know good art. You don't know the slightest about me to make the assumption that I'm being arrogant.
Art is also used for political means, which is why many "modern art" celeb artists from Pollack onward were sponsored by the CIA to socially freak out other countries. As for the "only one wanted that painting" gambit, no - only a last bidder got the art being offered, but the other bidders wanted it too. Otherwise, all the crappy Photochop-looking messes shown in this video would be priced at their true worth - 10 bucks.
Only one wanted it at 200k, another one wanted it at 190k, and another one even less.
We have that same Ed Ruscha “Actual Size” print !
Obviously you have great taste!
@@christopherwestpresents well, obviously! 😂
The gallery is the artist's sales team. Once I had galleries, I never sold out of my studio.
If you are working with a good gallery where you feel comfortable, I think this is smart.
When you walk around any public collection or any blue chip commercial gallery, you can instantly see there is nothing to differentiate a million dollar painting from hundreds and possibly thousands of painting with no market value at all. It's like pop music, a hummable catchy tune that drives you mad can earn millions and does, ask Taylor Swift but a serious musician/composer whose music is interesting and deeply emotional could be living on bread and water. A whole lot of factors come into it and quality os only a small part of that.
I think history will sort everything out.
When you let a piece become commercial and sold as prints to the masses the original also degrades in value. No one wants something in everyone elses house.
I like prints that are made as specific pieces of art. Not those that simply copy paintings.
Good insights, but there is another factor in the examples you cited that went unmentioned (and perhaps intentionally so): Lewis, Davis and Taku are all black. There was a vogue for black artists in the early 2020s that inflated their market values well beyond what they would otherwise have been. After that vogue wore-off the market corrected, and their work's values returned to approximately the same levels as their non-black peers. So the phenomenon I find more interesting is that their work's values became so highly inflated in the first place, not that they are now seen as being worth in the $10K range.
(No, this is NOT in any way a criticism of their work, nor of people who highly value it. It's just an observation of how fads cause spikes in perceived values.)
Also, Davis had just died (at age 32) before his painting sold for nearly a million. My sense is that this was some of the FOMO that hits collectors, when they think someone might turn out to be the next Basquiat.
Hype does certainly factor into this. But this has been actually happening for decades. I have another video coming out soon about a similar situation from about 15 years ago.
Very enlightening!
Thanks as always!
This proves what Gunnarry Seargant Heartman said , "you're so ugly, you could be modern art masterpiece"
Great thorough video, got a new subscriber 🎉
I really appreciate it. Thank you!
Art has many functions, but in the art market, it functions as a financial tool.
When you have large sums of money, you need a place to store that value. Keeping it in cash will only devalue over time due to inflation.
In order to deal with this issue, the financial industry manufactures a variety of products with which investors can store their wealth.
There are things like stocks, bonds, real estate, and luxury goods.
In this context, a $1M painting is really just a $1M bill that's meant to appreciate rather than depreciate, and an artist is just an individual that the market has elected to mint the $1M bill.
There’s lots of truth to that. That’s why so much art sits crated away in freeports across the globe.
@christopherwestpresents Exactly! I watched a documentary titled "The Black Box of the Art Business" a few years ago. I thought it was pretty enlightening.
Apparently, the French title translates to:
"Geneva Free Ports: Investigation into the world's most secret safe"
fantastic video!!
So nice of you to say. Thanks for watching!
if the Art is poster-ity fashionable, then it won’t hold value.
It might become iconic collectable LATER, but it won’t hold value as a piece until then
I think the best art is visually interesting while also having a deeper meaning.
You didn't touch on promotion. Without promotion you will just fade away, in that sense the gallery owner helps with this aspect by guiding the work to the right people and promoting the works in other ways, many times though the many connections they have. I have seen gallery owners get prominent people to show up at an opening which can then attract people to the show and don't forget the invite only shows.
Yes marketing is very important.
there were two people interested in that painting that went for $200k otherwise the auction wouldn't have gotten so high. I get the video and thanks for doing this....makes a lot of sense how one purchase can snowball into higher prices
There was one person interested at 200k, the other was only interested at 190k :)
@@christopherwestpresents semantics
but OK
Arts value is imaged. There is no quantifiable reason for one item to have more value than another. It’s completely subjective, it’s completely made up. All a marketing ploy. Something like art is only valuable if you can find someone who likes it enough.
It’s only worth what someone is willing to pay.
Great content, but the show mix is problematic. The music is distracting both with its level and choice.
Everyone is leveraged to the gills! That's what's happening.
Brilliant video.
Thank you so much! And for taking the time to comment :)
Great fun thank you
I really appreciate it. Thank you!
Saatchi dumped a few successful artists, Chia and Scully amongst them, who felt betrayed. I laughed. That is the art world!
Could be said Saatchi started this trend.
As an artist I find this misses one point, quality. Ive worked for several blue chip artists and their work is good work. The two examples you showed are not. a Martin Puryear is going to hold up better than the work in your example. That being said art is a bad investment in terms of the return on money invested, it is the dividend of living with the work that makes art worth owning. One gentleman I worked for has work at Storm King and the Hirshhorn, but the price of his work at auction has gone down considerably since his death (I have been trying to pick one up, but have not found the right piece at the right price) his work is starting to recover but will not fully recover its cash value for many years. The trough of death is very real, I have been following the value of Susan Rothenberg (an old teacher of mine) and her work is selling at auction for a very depressed price.
I agree with you that a high market for an artist does not always equate to quality. And I love Puryear, but he’s had the benefit of working for decades
Very interesting look into the market, especially shows how such bad and mediocre art gets propped up. The cutting edge of art are not at these galleries and modern art institutions, they're in online artists circles with amazing artists these curators and collectors would've never heard off.
Those artists blow these pretentious hacks out of the water because they rise from being excellent and recognized by other artists and people who like art and not appeasing the political whims in this redundant dinosaur system. I hope it collapses or gets torn down, society has no benefit from it.
I’m sure there are plenty of great artists operating outside of the ‘system’.
$180,000 down to $10,000? And no reserve price? What's going on there?
That’s what I attempt to explain.
@@christopherwestpresents I listened closely as I could all the way through, and I read the New York Times article afterwards. But I still don't get why anyone would sell something in that price range with no reserve.
When I look down artists' auction prices on the art websites it's quite common to see stuff going unsold, so I'm still baffled why anyone would willingly take such a huge loss.
The article mentions needing money for redecorating a house... or something. Not sure that excuse makes sense.. I loved the video though, thanks for posting it... but the "no reserve" issue still baffles me. I'm going to try watching again!
Art market..even the term market says it all....With rich young people having everything why not buying art pieces, collectible cars with price going through the roof..Behind this corrupted and greedy gallery owners (closing fast now) sales organization working on commissions, money laundering and so on....Artists thinking they will make a living on their art are here for a rough landing and are back to driving a taxi, teaching,...
As Marcel Duchamp, the great dynamiter of modern art, so aptly put it. It's easy to be an artist, you just have to wait 75 years.
What galleries are closing?
I generally don't "get" art.
That’s ok - as long as you’re open to looking!
what IS art anyway? Is a dead shark art?
@@stevenmccarthy112 a construction that communicates a message, I think, but it's hard to tell. seems like a "you know it when you see it."
Good video but wish you would have highlighted the nuance of pricing and value that black artists experience vs white artists bc that is a big factor into things
Thank you! And I’ve done a number of videos on work by black artists where their work is extremely undervalued.
Never heard of them so…..
Fair enough.
Probably 0.2% or so of all artists will ever get into those realms
That’s probably true.
I call it 'the lottery model', a tiny percentage get to play the insane-price money laundering game, and everybody else can just fuck off and be lucky if they ever break 1,000 bucks on a sale. At this price point, the owners never even look at it and couldn't give the slightest shit about it, other than checking to see if the price goes up while it's in the vault. It is pure vulgarity.
Adam Conover covered this in Adam Ruins Everything, which is more about the evil money aspects tainting the whole system.
Sorry! 🤷🏻♂️
@@christopherwestpresents No need to apologize. I should have worded my reply better, as your perspective was interesting. It was more that I wanted to bring the Adam Ruins Everything episode on the arts market to your attention.
Lots of good art being made out there, and most of it has nothing to do with the gallery/auction system.
@@christopherwestpresents Fixed the wording of my original comment.
How can there be only ONE bidder who wants to pay such a large amount for an estimated $10 000 piece of art? Surely he/she has to be bidding against someone for the price to reach a high target? Unless they are buying it to flush away some cash for some (likely illegal) reason?
Only one wanted it at 200k, another was interested at 180k, and those might have been the only two bidders. So maybe a third was only interested at 30k?
Well it’s got to be good to start
🤷🏻♂️
This is your best video!
Wow. Thank you!
I wouldn't even pay ten dollars for those, cmon what art is that
A buyer willing to sell at such a great loss in such a short time can only be a tax write off or money laundering scam.
Tax write off more likely than money laundering.
Thank you for nailing this! Hopefully more people will see this video and receive clarity.
Wow thanks so much! I hope so too. I appreciate you watching and leaving a comment!
For those interested the book "Boom" by Michael Shnayerson is worth reading. This video would have been better without the loud background music. Very annoying.
I’ll check it out!
In the part where it could destroy an artist’s career and the matter of time if the artist could bounce back, are you suggesting the artist should only sell works from the gallery and not to direct sell to one person collector?
If the artist is at the point where galleries in major art centers are interested in their work, then I believe yes.
Those first paintings you displayed are pure crap to begin with.
Slightly subjective.