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Throw the art market a curve.
The Art Market II
If my last blog seemed a bit disjointed it was because I was still reeling from an article on how the high end art market is manipulated, and how it affects the lower end of the art market. The article was first published in 2013, just two years ago but the manipulation did not start then, it has long been manipulated, and I am just as sure it continues to be be manipulated to this day, duh.Truth is I already knew a lot about what the article said but seeing it in print, reading it, and on the Internet for Petes sake! It just stunned me. Also an artist friend who read my last blog said she was concerned I was depressed about not making a true living from my art. I'm not depressed just in case others want to know.
So what about the art market, the manipulation and deceiving practices of galleries and art dealers? The article mentioned how galleries and dealers inflate prices to make an artist more desirable by the rich who want to brag how much money they spent on a particular piece of art. How many collectors are afraid to resell the work they purchased because if they do and the gallery or dealer does not get a cut they may not sell that collector any more art, plus they pass the word to other galleries and collectors. If this is true one wonders how did anyone so stupid become so rich? Ugh!
Ok so what about us poor smucks at the low end of the market?
Before I continue here I should state that low end has nothing to do with quality, only price. There is bad art out there that cost more then my house just as there is great art out there that cost less then a weeks worth of groceries for two.
Ok, so if a gallery or dealer can take an unknown artist (quality of work is not important here) and tell everyone that that artist is important and the work will sell for at least hundreds of thousands of dollars, to inflate the worth of some artist no one knew from dirt a short time ago, why can't we, the artist do the same thing?
A quick story; long ago when the Internet was still fairly new and art was just beginning to show up on the computer screen and I was still an unknown and my paintings sold for what a pair of shoes cost now, I was approached by a young man who was starting an on-line gallery with dreams of an eventual brick and mortar gallery. He was interested in my work. He gave me references of some big southwest galleries he had worked with so I checked him out and he was legit. Things were going good, he was building the website, then he was in a very bad car accident and it stopped his dreams. It was sad, for both of us but more for him then me. But before his accident when we discussed the prices I was charging for my paintings he wanted to raise my prices ten times what I was charging then. I was honored and scarred. I had heard that once you raise the price you can never go down. After checking with the other gallery I was in at the time we agreed at first to just double the prices. Then as I said the deal ended due to the young mans misfortune.
Well raising my prices actually helped me though. I started to work with a dealer in a large metropolitan area, was approached by another gallery in Savannah, Georgia, and was excepted by a gallery in Atlanta as well. But none of it lasted long. The Savannah gallery closed, the Atlanta gallery dropped me after a short time (don't know why) and luckily the dealer did sell some of my big paintings. Then the market crashed and it all went to hell. The dealer eventually retired, due to age and frustration. But I was still in a gallery even though not much sold, in fact they often complained about the lack of sales. See my market was the middle class, the middle class got scarred and stopped buying everything, except for going out to dinner that is, and they still haven't gotten back to buying art, at least not original art. But I do wonder if raising my prices helped even if it was just for a short time or was just it just the univers pulling my string? Danged univers.
So this is my point; (and remember I am no expert, because if I was I wouldn't be writing this blog, I'd be sitting on my yacht in Maine painting or in my cabin villa in Aspen Colorado) maybe raising my prices to an astronomical level will bring interest to my work, like befor but only better, greater, grander. Maybe the über rich will stand around eating h'orderves and drinking champain bragging how much they paid for one of my paintings.
'Yes, yes it cost me half a mill.'
'Really? Hmm I only paid a quarter mill for mine. I feel cheated.'
Yeah right.
Maybe! Maybe we should all, all artists, raise our prices into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, saturate the market, make all those high end dealers and galleries sweat. Crash the market so it is all worth a reasonable price. Then everyone could aford original art wether it be a Picasso or an unknown like me. Ha! Wouldn't that show them. Ya boy!
Peace.
So what about the art market, the manipulation and deceiving practices of galleries and art dealers? The article mentioned how galleries and dealers inflate prices to make an artist more desirable by the rich who want to brag how much money they spent on a particular piece of art. How many collectors are afraid to resell the work they purchased because if they do and the gallery or dealer does not get a cut they may not sell that collector any more art, plus they pass the word to other galleries and collectors. If this is true one wonders how did anyone so stupid become so rich? Ugh!
Ok so what about us poor smucks at the low end of the market?
Before I continue here I should state that low end has nothing to do with quality, only price. There is bad art out there that cost more then my house just as there is great art out there that cost less then a weeks worth of groceries for two.
Ok, so if a gallery or dealer can take an unknown artist (quality of work is not important here) and tell everyone that that artist is important and the work will sell for at least hundreds of thousands of dollars, to inflate the worth of some artist no one knew from dirt a short time ago, why can't we, the artist do the same thing?
A quick story; long ago when the Internet was still fairly new and art was just beginning to show up on the computer screen and I was still an unknown and my paintings sold for what a pair of shoes cost now, I was approached by a young man who was starting an on-line gallery with dreams of an eventual brick and mortar gallery. He was interested in my work. He gave me references of some big southwest galleries he had worked with so I checked him out and he was legit. Things were going good, he was building the website, then he was in a very bad car accident and it stopped his dreams. It was sad, for both of us but more for him then me. But before his accident when we discussed the prices I was charging for my paintings he wanted to raise my prices ten times what I was charging then. I was honored and scarred. I had heard that once you raise the price you can never go down. After checking with the other gallery I was in at the time we agreed at first to just double the prices. Then as I said the deal ended due to the young mans misfortune.
Well raising my prices actually helped me though. I started to work with a dealer in a large metropolitan area, was approached by another gallery in Savannah, Georgia, and was excepted by a gallery in Atlanta as well. But none of it lasted long. The Savannah gallery closed, the Atlanta gallery dropped me after a short time (don't know why) and luckily the dealer did sell some of my big paintings. Then the market crashed and it all went to hell. The dealer eventually retired, due to age and frustration. But I was still in a gallery even though not much sold, in fact they often complained about the lack of sales. See my market was the middle class, the middle class got scarred and stopped buying everything, except for going out to dinner that is, and they still haven't gotten back to buying art, at least not original art. But I do wonder if raising my prices helped even if it was just for a short time or was just it just the univers pulling my string? Danged univers.
So this is my point; (and remember I am no expert, because if I was I wouldn't be writing this blog, I'd be sitting on my yacht in Maine painting or in my cabin villa in Aspen Colorado) maybe raising my prices to an astronomical level will bring interest to my work, like befor but only better, greater, grander. Maybe the über rich will stand around eating h'orderves and drinking champain bragging how much they paid for one of my paintings.
'Yes, yes it cost me half a mill.'
'Really? Hmm I only paid a quarter mill for mine. I feel cheated.'
Yeah right.
Maybe! Maybe we should all, all artists, raise our prices into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, saturate the market, make all those high end dealers and galleries sweat. Crash the market so it is all worth a reasonable price. Then everyone could aford original art wether it be a Picasso or an unknown like me. Ha! Wouldn't that show them. Ya boy!
Peace.
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