Browser Newsweek and The Daily Beast Blake Gopnik, based on the data of economics and sociology, as well as his own erudition and common sense is trying to trace the process of pricing in the art market

heap of stools for 575 000 dollars, a glass cabinet with surgical instruments for an impressive 2.5 million - is not an excerpt from the price list of luxury furniture store, and works of art acquired by visitors recently concluded art fair Art Basel Miami Beach . Its results once again showed that, despite the fact that the world economy in crisis, the world's richest collectors continue to buy works of art in record prices.

Art columnist Newsweek and The Daily Beast Blake Gopnik (Blake Gopnik), strolling among the booths and pavilions Art Basel Miami Beach, almost physically felt the scent lingers in the air a lot of money. During the first day of Fair, among others, were committed by the following transactions: Mary Boone Gallery sold for 575,000 dollars were turned into a sculpture in the shape of the nest the old stools - the product of Ai Weiwei (Ai Weiwei); cyan polygon on a white background - work Elsvorta Kelly (Ellsworth Kelly ) - was sold to Matthew Marks Gallery for $ 1.5 million, a glass cabinet with surgical instruments - a work by Damien Hirst (Damien Hirst), put up a gallery White Cube, - went for $ 2.5 million. If the (hypothetical) to drop big names on plates affixed to the above subjects, and forget for a while on their likely value of art, any reasonable person immediately the question arises: why pay half a million dollars for the stools? What motivated by buying the product, which is in no way dilute the blue paint on the canvas, at a price three times higher? And anyway, why the hell is art so expensive?

Ai Weiwei on the background of his sculpture Source: online.wsj. com

Visitors to the fair Art Basel Miami Beach examines the work of Kelly Elsvorta Source: thedailybeast.com

This phenomenon has some lying on the surface, simple, but pretty lame explanation. First, the market is not without manipulation: veteran New York art scene gallerist Ernie Glimcher (Arne Glimcher) indicates that there is, for example, unscrupulous players who are influencing the course of trade, especially heated market of works by Andy Warhol. Simon de Pury (Simon de Pury), head of auction house Phillips de Pury, knows at least a dozen more examples. He adds to this a number of banal argument: that the big picture is always more expensive than small, will have to shell out a tidy sum to get a job that belonged to a known owner, work with the museum provenance is always more expensive. However, this only explains why a piece of art sold more than another. None of these reasons does not clarify the question of why many visitors to the art fair in Miami is ready to spend at the picture more than ordinary people willing to pay for a new apartment.

Despite all woes in the economy, the art market reigns a violent activity. In the first half year, sales of works of art around the world brought to 4.3 billion euros (5.8 billion dollars), which, according to the French resource Artprice, 34 per cent more than during the same period last year. The same portal Artprice reports that for the first 6 months of 2011 of 663 crossed the bar of one million euros, and it works 200 more than in the first half of 2008, when the record was set by the number of works over a million.

< p class = "mat1"> The appearance of record prices for works of art has little in common with the classic pricing in the economy. Noah Horowitz (Noah Horowitz), author of "The art of making" one of the most comprehensive study of contemporary art market, believes that the long-term investment in the art of paying off about as well as contributions to the bonds, however, investments in art are associated with greater risk management. However, according to a major New York collector, art is not such a bad investment option if other options are available and in any case, "on the bonds is not as nice to look at," he said. Today, when there is a percentage of the population, which, by definition, Blake Gopnik, nowhere to put the money, buying works of art - it's not a question of financial investments, but rather a reflection of our relationship to art and money. Princeton sociologist Viviana Zelizer (Viviana Zelizer) in his work "The Social Meaning of Money," argues that the 'dollar dollar strife. " According to this theory, the dollars spent on works of art in Miami - the so-called 'cultural dollars "that obey their own laws. If you follow Zelizer, we can distinguish five reasons because of which the art market is strangely ignores the overall situation in the economy.

1. Prestige factor

«If I can not sell something, I double the price for this item" - this is rumored to have used to say, the great Swiss art dealer Ernst Beyeler, (Ernst Beyeler) with the participation of which was based fair Art Basel. Some people prefer to pay more than the thing is actually worth. According to the theory Zelizer, no matter what our social status, we take a very large sum in a routine, but with much more special respect and reverence than the usual spending. "I think that quite often the price paid for the work is a kind of trophy" - believes gallerist Ernie Glimcher.

large number of people in 2006, came to New York's Neue Museum stare at the Galerie portrait by Gustav Klimt (Gustav Klimt), were not involved in a passionate love for art. Such a mass of people gathered solely from the fact that it became known the founder of the museum, the heir Ronald Lauder cosmetics empire (Ronald Lauder) to pay for work of $ 135 million.

Sociologist Mitch Abolafia (Mitch Abolafia), who devoted an entire study of the financiers of Wall Street, thinks that the money in our culture - this is a very powerful kind of self-substance. "Once a trader with a gleam in his eyes told me it can not be seen, but the money is everywhere. Money, millions and millions of dollars flying around the room - says Abolafia. - It was a generalized enthusiasm than money. Even I at some point felt it. " Such excitement we feel and when dealing with expensive works of art. One collector, fervently believes that art should buy only from a love of art, it is recognized that heated "in the hot rays of wealth" that produce the work from his collection, when the price is growing.

People who are spending record amounts on works of art, get together with them more. This is not only an aura of prestige and pleasure to contemplate the work (the last for quite a reasonable amount available for any visitor to the museum). Collectors, says Ernie Glimcher, acquire more pleasant and right to boast of their purchase and admired hear: "You bought a work by Picasso for 100 million?" Mitch Abolafia explains that the financiers, to which he devoted his research, "without hesitation" suggests how much they paid for their expensive "toys", because in their world is not so important a subject, how the price. The futility of art makes any expenditure for a particularly impressive: a very rich man to buy a yacht is like rowing a boat to buy, this is a prestigious share practical sense. However, the acquisition of the great works of Picasso can not be compared with any other purchase. Veltgeys Olav (Olav Velthuis), a Dutch sociologist who wrote a study about why people spend money on works of art, compares the behavior of the inhabitants of the vertices of the art market with the behavior of American Indians north-west coast of the Pacific Ocean during the ritual potlatch feast. The aim was to his hand or even ostentatious destruction of wealth owned by wealthy Indians, produced simply to demonstrate their abilities. On the art market, which, in essence, is the equivalent of this competition, said Abolafia, prices are rising because the collectors are fighting for their status.

2. Money is easier to calculate than the beauty

Blake Gopnik asked a well-known New York collector Agnes Gund (Agnes Gund): would have changed her attitude to her belonging to the works of art, if they fell by half. "I think for me, nothing would have changed" - Gund said, adding that most of its work is intended to museums. However, when asked about what would happen if the price has increased twice, the collector said otherwise. "Clearly, the great, the price increases" - believes Gund, since it is a confirmation of the importance of artistic works belonging to it.

< div class = "imgcenter"> Eli Broad collector and his wife Edith Source: broadeducation.org

Agnes Gund Collector Source: artnet.com

apparently thinks Blake Gopnik, the majority of collectors spend their extra millions on the arts, as really believes in the artistic value of the purchased products. "We do not consider art an investment. We get [from the possession of] spiritual satisfaction: I enjoy coming home and enjoy our walls "- explains the well-known collector from Los Angeles, Eli Broad (Eli Broad).

One of the largest New York dealer said sociologist Veltgeysu that collectors have a need to "constantly explain themselves why they are so much spent on art - sometimes up to 40 percent of their income." The most obvious way to measure the aesthetic value of the work - convert it to cents and dollars. For rich people looking for a great work of art becomes a clue to the price tag on it marked a round sum.

audience, who came to look at the 2006 lauderovskogo Klimt, apparently believed that the most expensive in paintings of the world - it is automatically the greatest thing. This is a mistake: in fact, few experts believed that Klimt - a significant figure in the history of art (in fairness, we note that European experts hold a different point of view. - AI .). As Ernie said Glimcher, "to market work, you need only two people," and he doubts that in the next 50 years, there are two more of the same passionate fan of Klimt, owing to the struggle which his work has been achieved so unbelievable prices.

< div align = "center"> < td width = "248" bgcolor = "#ffffff"> The head of auction house Phillips de Pury, Simon de Pury
Source: nymag.com < /a>

The dealer Ernie Glimcher Source: nymag.com

3. The instinct of the hunter

Making a major purchase, collectors are not only a work of art, but also great fun. An art consultant who works in the most expensive segment of the market compares with obsessive collectors: "They love to fly, especially the works of art. This desire led a very deep pulse. The instinct of hunting and gathering, not a new phenomenon ».

According to Simon de Pury, hunting is not interesting if there is no catch. That is why the market has cooled and subsided by old masters, while artists like Warhol and Picasso's stay on the crest of a wave of the market. These artists have created works of art so much in so many different styles and techniques that hunt for their work is still incredibly interesting. You can start collecting a certain period of creativity of an artist - for example, "blue", "pink" or syurrelisticheskogo Cubist Picasso, and then expand and improve its collection in some other direction. It is necessary to bring together 10 collectors, which carries such a "fun" and you're guaranteed to get prices for a particular group of works - explains de Pury.

And if the huge fairs like Art Basel Miami, not a good place to admire the art, they are quite unique as a wonderful space for shopping and entertainment. This, according to Olaf Veltgeysa may also explain why the contemporary art over the past five years has become so expensive product: it is much funnier and more curious to buy works by artists with whom you can also communicate to the parties. There is an opportunity to get in the headlines by spending a huge amount of work the young artist: a chance to become a trendsetter, not waiting until the critics say his word. Having spent a large sum for a work of art, you create a precedent for which there is clinging to your wealthy friends, and praising your taste and your vision in terms of investment.

4. Fresh blood influences the picture of the market

big money earned by immigrants from the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China. - AI .), They are spent, Blake Gopnik believes, in fact, to buy a place among the respectable people of the West. Book a place among the elite can, spreading huge sums for works of art. For example, billionaire Eli Broad says that for many new players to the art market in the money "as if all do not matter." Comes to the fact that these oligarchs to displace the art market with a moderately rich western collectors. An experienced collector from the U.S. Mid-Atlantic region said that before he could buy a work by Gerhard Richter (Gerhard Richter) for "six figures, at least - not the biggest seven-figure sum." Today, with the huge amount of fresh money that flow into the market (Russian crazy on the Richter scale, said Gopnik), will be lucky to get work, even in classic abstract 10 times more expensive. "It turns out that I can no longer afford the products that I like, but I'm not sure I like the ones I can afford" - lamenting the unnamed collector.

a collector from New York explains that today, in order to get a new job a popular artist Jeff Koons level (Jeff Koons), even most of the billionaires have to queue and dance to the tune of the dealer. But those who do not have the time, a special relationship with dealers, as well as newcomers to the market will go to auction and pay for his services. And in general: to double the rate for the work claimed by others - this is natural, says the collector, because it satisfies the "need for mammalian success in competitive conditions", "Eli Broad wants to circumvent [Francois] Pino, who want to circumvent the [Bernard] Arnault "- such is the logic of the market.

5. The title of patron of the arts is expensive

Prominent collectors of works of art are not just customers. If they handle your money wisely, it may well earn the title of "patron of the arts." You do not deserve the reverence and respect, buying a dozen cars Bentleys, but once you get some work in, say, Richard Serra (Richard Serra), and you will become a man thinking about the development of culture.