Hype, Dali, dealers and (buying) Early Is Best

My last art blog covered the art market in general, and in particular the interesting nexus between artist Chris Ofili, his dealer Victoria Miro, and the Tate. I used this as an illustration of the way higher and higher prices have been driven by greed and then drive that powerful force to greater and greater excess. My remarks attracted a wise comment from Mike von Joel. Among many distinctions, Mike edits State of Art - the new free monthly newspaper, which is enormously intelligent, informative and entertaining; that judgement has nothing to do with the facts that I’m a contributor and that State of Art is sponsored by the Angela Flowers Gallery. Anyway, here’s Mike’s wise comment:

‘Art is a small word for the amount and variety of intellectual gymnastics it describes. The Miro/Ofili waltz is no different from the Duveen/Berenson manoeuvres in the dark continent of America, or more mundanely and recently the Michael Werner/Mary Boone manipulations of collections in the 80s-90s. Who cares? The real interest might lie with why individuals make “art” and when this activity results in recognition and financial security, how it affects what they do. What happens when attention seekers get the attention they seek?’

A very early Salvador Dali (he was just 15):
Self-Portrait in the Studio, 1919.
Salvador Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida.
Image from Salvador Dali Art Gallery

Well, they seek still more. That’s a different form of greed, though it has a close relationship with the monetary variety. High hype and high prices go hand-in-hand. It’s an old, old story - as Mike says. The classic case is Salvador Dali, whose waxed moustaches, flamboyant clothing and extravagant behaviour make Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin seem like shy, retiring pixies. One difference is that Dali was a significantly better artist: his work has lasted, a test which the Young British Artists (as they once were) have yet to take, let alone pass.

A superb craftsman, Dali made an indelible contribution to Surrealism, which in turn has visibly influenced the avant garde of today. But to return to Mike’s question, wealth and fame and hype do have an effect on artists, and not always a good one: their work often deteriorates in quality, even as their fame and fortune stretch into the future. That certainly happened to Dali, whose imagination faltered as his painterly craft faded. But Dali still has some 3 million Google entries - half those of the Surrealist giant, Max Ernst, but getting on for double the score for Marcel Duchamp. That genius is venerated by today’s stars, many of whom walk too obviously in his footsteps. Their hype has nothing to do with art - although the subject matter of Pop Art did famously merge making art with making money through mass marketing.

In sum, quality lasts even though fads and fashions change. And there’s a case for buying earlier work, rather than later, because very often EIB applies - Early Is Best. By the time the big reputation has been made, you’re at the mercy of the dealers, as in one recent case, where a well-heeled collector just couldn’t get a dealer to sell him a painting by a certain hot artist. Then, out of the blue, the dealer rang to say that a picture which the would-be buyer had never seen had become available. ‘Great’, said the collector. ‘When can I see it?’. ‘You can’t', replied the dealer. ‘It’s now, over the phone, or never’.