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Wednesday, December 19, 2007
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Taking the First Step
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Many of Ugallery’s customers are new art buyers, so I am constantly on the lookout for helpful information that I can pass along to them on beginning a collection. Today ARTINFO posted an article Seven Tips for Beginning Collectors. It’s the main points from a panel held last week at the Aperture Foundation’s gallery in New York on creating a photography collection. There is some good general advice here. By far, the best guide I’ve found for beginning buyers is Lisa Hunter’s book The Intrepid Art Collector. It is a must read for anyone getting into collecting art. She also writes a fantastic blog on the same topic. Lisa really knows her stuff and presents it in a way that is fun and easy to understand. Whether you are looking to collect contemporary art or vintage movie posters or student work or you’re not even sure where to start, she’s got you covered.Labels: art, artinfo, intrepid art collector, lisa hunter
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Monday, December 17, 2007
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A Vote for Arts and Crafts
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For the holidays, online arts and crafts retailer Etsy.com has set up buyhandmade.org. The site is a simple page where anyone can pledge to buy handmade items. The top of the page reads, “I pledge to buy handmade this holiday season, and request that others do the same for me.â€
Over 10,000 people have taken the pledge so far. When you submit your pledge, you have the option to include your location, a link, and a quote. It seems that most pledges are from artists who have also included a link to their site. It’s a fun way to discover work you would never see otherwise. Like Etsy, most of the art seems very craft oriented. I clicked through several pages and didn’t really find much fine art, but it could be a great way to find a sweet, last minute gift for the holidays.Labels: arts and crafts, buyhandmade.org
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Sunday, December 16, 2007
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Sticker Shock
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Yesterday there was an article in the New York Times Business section about beginning an emerging art collection. The piece is a first person account of venturing through the Chelsea gallery district with an art consultant in search of the next big artists. The writer, Harry Hurt III, does an excellent job of conveying the excitement of the hunt while highlighting how even the supposedly reasonable priced emerging art market often leaves the average collector behind.
Hurt writes about visiting five galleries and two artists’ studios. Among the artwork he is shown are $2,500 photographs, a set chimes made of metal fence post caps for $12,000, and $5,000 DVDs of decomposing and recomposing words made of alphabet soup. After visiting the first gallery he says, “I suffered serious sticker shock.†At the end of the day, he purchases an $800 postcard by Louise Fishman while visiting her studio.
…I left Louise’s studio en route to a late lunch at Bottino restaurant. The sticker shock I’d suffered all day paled in comparison to the sinking sensation I felt in my stomach. “I just paid $800 for a postcard,†I moaned. “What was I thinking?â€
Louise must have been reading my mind. Shortly after Simon and I ordered a round of adult beverages, she arrived at Bottino with the second postcard I had seen on her worktable, a predominantly blue and yellow abstraction with an enticing three dimensionality. She insisted on giving it to me, declaring, “Your postcard should have its mate.â€
My buyer’s remorse all but evaporated. Louise had just doubled the size of my holdings, and halved my average acquisition cost to $400 a postcard, which suddenly seemed like a bargain.
“Congratulations!†Simon exclaimed as the three of us raised our glasses in a toast. “Now you’re a real contemporary art collector!â€
I can relate to Hurt’s experience in searching for art as a novice collector. Today’s gallery scene, especially in the hot spots like Chelsea, can be exhilarating and frustrating at the same time. I mean, $12,000 for a chime? I’m not making any judgments about the quality of the art, just its accessibility to the average buyer. Moreover, I feel as though much of the work available just doesn’t fit into most people’s lives. One of the works Hurt enjoyed on his search was titled Short Environment, “which was basically a body-size condom made of yellow vegetable fiber.†You really have to be interested in art or the artist to shell out for that sort of thing.
Thanks to Harry Hurt III for sharing his experience.Labels: art, new york times, sticker shock a hazard even when the artists are only potential stars
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Wednesday, December 12, 2007
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1001 Opinions of Art You Should See
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Several months ago I read a fairly scathing review of the book “1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die†in the Wall Street Journal. Then, recently, I was given a copy of the book. After first paging through it, I thought the review had been a little severe. I attempted to find the article on wsj.com, but it seems that it has been too long since it was printed to view it without a subscription. The main critiques that I remember are: the book’s contributors do not have impressive titles, the book is dominated by western art, and the images are too small. I believe there were more complaints but I don’t remember all of them.
After looking through the book more, my overall impression is that the reviewer may have mistaken a lighthearted coffee table book for an art history textbook. In the introduction, the editor Stephen Farthing writes that the concept for the book came about from playing the game, “if you could own any five works of art, which would you choose?†I think the WSJ writer instead looked at the book as an incomplete and poorly researched comprehensive collection of what is considered to be the world’s best artwork. In the end, it seems that Farthing is just saying, “these are my favorite paintings, and I believe you will enjoy them too.†I really like the concept.
However, there is one glaring flaw in all of this; Farthing, who is also a painter, has included two of his own works in the book. Even if you are just sharing your opinion of your favorite art, I think it is a little self-important to list two of your own works next to the likes of Michelangelo, Monet, and Picasso.
That said, overall, I like the book. It encourages people who aren’t art experts to seek out some wonderful paintings and to learn a little more about art history. And unlike art history texts which all seem to focus on the same star artists, Farthing does venture off of the beaten path a bit to show people artists that they may have overlooked, like for example, Stephen Farthing.Labels: 1001 paintings you should see before you die, art
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Read weekly art segments featuring Ugallery artists and news about the art world at large. We hope you enjoy this insight into the inner workings of our gallery and invite you to take part in the discussion as well.
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