EPTTruths behind the mask of art industry.
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If you just care to be a small timer artist in this gallery route, not an issue. This mostly applies at the top and doesn't apply to real stuff like original monet etc. But sometimes you'll hear on the news (most time u don't), some art by someone you never heard of sold for some insane amount, that's where possibility of what I'm describing happens. ok, one example and you'll get the idea.
first, Art Market is one of the most unregulated, and corrupt market in the world. Due to its subjective nature and human greed / ego.
1. What makes a piece of art valuable? Prominent art appraisals, famous gallery owners and decision makers, famous art publication editors, and prominent collectors via provenance (this just means who owns, or owned the art at one point). So it's mostly subjective.
Ok, in our scenario we just need 2 characters: we have
A) a rich, well connected guy named FatZealot, We'll call him or her FatZ for short. He is very wealthy and he owes IRS 5million dollars. He doesn't want to pay IRS 5 million dollars.
B) a poor starving artist (who may or may not have talent, but unique style is usually a requirement). Lets call this artist Glider.
This is what happens in chronological order.
1. FatZ found Glider, says I'll buy 10 of your ORINGINAL paintings at $100 dollar each. Glider, being an no name starving artist, gladly sells it. For accounting sake keep track of money, fatZ negative -$5,001,000 (5 million owed to IRS and 1000 spent on Glider)
2. FatZ goes to his art friends, who are composed of all such influencers I mentioned above. They work together (often not all, maybe the publication editor is not in on it, or the famous art collector has no idea, but most are in on it) to hype Glider up. The appraser/s write hype pieces, galleries displays glider's work, publications start to market him. But they don't do this for free, FatZ give each a lot of money, so lets say he spends 1million dollars to do this (300k to 3 art appresers, 200k to a gallery owner etc, sometimes they don't take a straight sum, but a % but u get the idea)
FatZ negative -$6,001,000
3. Some time later, now Glider is a more famous artist, especially if connection is at international level, now his original work is worth 1 million dollar each.
FatZ now DONATES 5 as charity, for example to a large public NY museum. Because each painting is worth 1 million dollars, he donated 5 million dollars of asset, which can write off against his debt to IRS, now he owes IRS nothing.
Effectively because FatZ owns 10 originals. he went from -$6,001,000 to positive $3,999,000 (this is after he paid off IRS via charity, why charity and not straight up pay IRS? cuz this way make him look very philanthropic, increases his influence, more ppl want to be friends with him etc)
So there, FatZ got Fatter, Glider has no problem with this cuz now he got rich too. (infact most artist has no idea and just think they finally caught the break) What's wrong with this picture? at no point there is anything to do with actual value or beauty of art, or very little. This is not a sculpture of thinker, this is not discovering the next monet. This is the crappy stuff u see on the news that sold for 2million. Simple, effective, and most people think it's only EGO, nah, it's money, it's always money. Rich ppl are not stupid.
FYI. When Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe, tried to buy a piece of art at an auction, he was told he wasn't prominent / influential enough and denied the purchase. Because him owning the art doesn't increase the artist's value enough. Just to give you an idea...
Thank you for reading. Now check out this thread: Almost free art for you, foreverrrr Cuz I don't want to work for FatZ
