Wise to Art

Between the work of art and the onlooker there isn’t so much communication as there is communion. For art to be Art, merger is essential. Art is a medium and not an end, art reveals shared or kindred emotions. When a work of art not only solicits but maintains your attention, you are in fact already in communion with its author. You’re in a difficult to determine emotive discourse with a maker who, if asked, probably wouldn’t be able to articulate what he actually painted or why. The funny thing is that for your intuitive self precise meaning and appeal will be equally elusive.

Art grows on us. A painting might well be an instantaneous love affair; still it’s with time that you’ll know if the communion is worthwhile. I sometimes buy paintings impulsively, just to discover after a couple of weeks that there are false vibrations, no shared wavelength and that first impressions were false. Some pieces in my collection still stir me as they did 20 years ago. These works are as close as kins and unsupportable is the thought of separation. The paintings that become dumb I sell as quickly as I can; there is perhaps another more fit to take up the broken intercourse.

The pieces that remain, those that stay with me and settle with me, are my daily joy. They come ever closer, their meaning elucidates and their power grows. Art is life, a roaring thunder in the lame duck’s pool of actual life.

Becoming overwhelmed, aren’t we? Internet has brought us ease of access, tremendous interaction and instantaneous updating with the art world. Discovery and study are facilitated by impressive online facilities; thanks to efficient commercial services all necessary market references are immediately at hand and, finally, the overall offer has become outright staggering.

This is no small advance seen that the present financial crisis teaches us that no investment is safe and that investing in art at least benefits from a non-pecuniary gratifying dimension quite absent in stock.

A market is essentially about exchange. This suits the art collector because exchange is essential to his occupation. Work is acquired and work is passed on all along his learning path. The collector’s choice oscillates between affective and financial value and the collector’s character and purse will decide on the itinerary to be followed.

A recession has two mutually annulling effects on the market. 1. The offer becomes abundant because no one wants to buy. 2. The offer becomes scarce because no one wants to sell. Booming economic times have just the opposite effects. The result is, believe it or not, a pretty constant equilibrium in offer and demand, only pricing changes according to conjuncture!

It’s on the brink of recession that money is made. When notwithstanding an abundant offer everyone still wants to buy. Hirst timed it all so well, what can you do except admiring a natural business genius?

A recession is buying-time. And buying is by far the most pleasurable activity!

Lindström 1925-2008, ‘Groteskt ansikte’ Bukowskis, Stockholm 15-16 Dec 2009, starting USD 2,500

Unfortunately, the only really successful venue for fixed-time online auctions today is eBay. We say unfortunately because of the indifferent standpoint that eBay management takes to fraud and undisciplined sellers. In spite of announced new measures in favour of buyers, meant to secure transactions, eBay shows no discernment as to listings. Take for example the below rather sinister third rate home-made ‘Monet’ sold with full provenance and guaranteed authenticity by a zero feedback hopeful renegade. This is just one in a serious of astonishingly bad paintings that this totally new seller tries to peddle these days to a public presumed excessively moneyed and naïve to the limit of disbelief. And in spite of individual prices ranging up to 65,000 USD proposed by this newbie, eBay does not seem to raise an eyebrow.

Who cares, you may say, only a complete idiot would try to cash in on this deal. Hmmmm, I would retort, Damien Hirst November sale ‘Beautiful inside my head forever’ still fresh in mind. Bad taste and discernment IS the trademark of upstart well-offs, we may like it or not. But anyway, the market is always correcting itself, look at what’s happening right now. The Hirst and Koons collectors can best start to panic.

So while having no other choice than to bear with hilarious offers such as the one below, eBay still gives us incomparable possibilities to sell art directly and circumvent costly middlemen as galleries and auction houses. The fees are in comparison quite reasonable.

As for the prevalence of fraud and junk art, it suffices for a trained eye to be selective and to accommodate to the flittering if not flattering images of the eBay offering. Ebay offers excellent communication facilities with the seller and a couple of emails will quickly give clear indications.

When talking risk, do know as well that eBay’s obsession with PayPal isn’t altogether negative. The fact that PayPal, in questionable cases, will hold payments until buyer satisfaction is recorded, will no doubt dissuade the smarter crooks from posting their most outrageous incongruities.