Page 33 - the NOISE August 2012

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ART FOR SALE – CHEAP AS IT COMES by Tom Ogburn
There are some things that are constant in all of our lives. De- pending on the path we choose, these constancies vary, so that we are all enriched by a series of ever changing options. To an artist, one of the modern constancies is the art auction. They are every- where. No matter where I travel in America, to whichever city I visit, you can bet, just around the cor- ner, sometime this week, there is an art auction.
I am not speaking of Sotheby’s, or any of the other legendary art auction houses that have driven the vital secondary art market for decades. Those are businesses, and are run as such. Their goal is to make a profit — to provide a needed service to avid collectors around the world. Indeed, they have been the constant in main- taining the value of professional artists’ work, and can be thanked for making art collecting a very successful, if unique and risky, in- vestment potential.
No, what we have here, prolif- erating at such speed that many artists were caught unawares at this changing force in the market- place, is your friendly Community Benefit Auction (CBA). In most cities of 20,000 population and up, the CBA is no longer a rare oc- currence, but has grown to such a popular momentum as to cut deeply into the professional are- na of primary art sales and mar- keting, most often the art gallery which represents and provides for the practicing professional art- ist a retail sales outlet, and many other services if managed well, to the studio artist trying to make a living on what they love doing the most — which is making art.
I first began exhibiting my art in 1974 in various juried art exhib- its around the Carolinas. This was still the age of federal arts endow- ments to artists as makers, as well as those commercial businesses and not-for-profit institutions which largely served as the main conduit between the buying pub- lic (the collector) and the artist. It was in the early to mid 1980s when the CBA took off. After all, what is better for raising much- needed operating funds during shortfall years than to rely upon the community for support, es- pecially if for a worthwhile cause?
With the massive federal fund-
ing cuts that stripped many services, charities, community centers, cancer wards, and other highly prized institutions of much needed revenue, and the removal of what was essentially matching fund grants to these well-intentioned organizations, the rush to find alternative funding resulted in the rise of benefit auctions. Exactly when art became a major component of these auctions I can not say with certainty, but by 1988, al- most every town of 10,000 or more had at least three to ten of these events, all of which began to highly advertise that art was a major part of the auction.
Asking an artist to contribute to an auction based upon their belief in the cause is one thing, and has been done for quite a while. However, the transmog- rification of these CBA’s emerg- ing with 50 to 200 works of art at auction, all primary works, donated by the artist, took hold and the retail arts industry has never been the same. Well, ex- cept for one factor. The market value of primary art works en- tering the market has remained trapped in an 80s price vise-grip, if not actually reduced.
The reason is very simple: When art is offered, on a regu- lar basis, for sale at zero-bid to obscenely low prices compared to a market rate — and collec- tors who otherwise would have shopped at galleries have taken to trolling the CBA’s for bargains
— the result will inevitably be a ceiling of what is hung. In short, the artist who continually do- nates 3-10 works a year to these CBAs, who always have a “won- derful cause” to support, is es- sentially saturating the market in small to medium sized com- munities with their work.
For example, I have seen works normally selling at $1200 to $5000 being purchased at CBA’s for as little as $50 to $200, if there is no minimum bid. If there is a minimum bid, and let’s hope beyond hope that the artist used a 50% figure as that, then theoretically, those works would sell for $600 to $2500. Maybe. But that assumes that the managers of the arts section of the CBA has not set a minimum bid limit, or greatly discouraged the artist from set- ting a minimum bid.
One can pose the argument of course, that if a cadre of tipsy,
well-heeled arts collectors get into a competitive buying frenzy at a CBA, that a $1200 retail paint- ing may sell for five thousand dol- lars. That certainly is the hope of the organizers of the CBA, I can assure you. Except, that would take an auction that utilizes the services of an experienced auc- tioneer, who understands art, and is very good at accelerating and massaging the egos of said tipsy and competitive buyers.
But then, in the last ten years, I have twice seen auctioneers pres- ent at these CBAs. Why? Because their fees are “too expensive” for the organizers’ budget-minded managerial conscience; “After all, we are here to make money, not spend it?” Or so it goes. What has emerged as a very cost-efficient manner of conducting a large- scale art auction is the silent auc- tion, where a bid sheet is placed beside the work, and prospective art-lovers jot in what they will pay. It is often suggested the mini- mum raise is five dollars. Maybe ten.
Now: When this is used as a method of facilitating a large public art auction, guess what happens? To observe one of these type of auctions is like watching a hockey game if you don’t under- stand hockey. Chaos emerges as people bump into each other for the first twenty minutes or so, un- til they begin to see a few of their must-haves become “Oh wells.” Then, the frenzied floor jockeying slows noticeably, and everyone calms down, and about 40-60% of the art remains either unsold, or sold for figures less than $100.
And there we have the ulti- mate end game in sight of the new art collectors, who have re- linquished knowledge, grooming, understanding of the artist, their work and goals as explained by the gallery and or artist, to the ethic of hanging the work on their wall and extolling their “bargain find” to all who gaze upon that $3000 work of art as “A steal! I got it for $320 at the Hair Transplant Benefit Auction last week!” And lo, another “art collector,” who now will haunt the art auctions rather than visit a gallery, learn of the works, and compare artists’ work and views, is born.
Essentially, we are out of the realm of giving, and have moved into the realm of taking.
thenoise.us • the NOISE arts & news magazine • AUGUST 2012 • 33