What gives art value?

There’s a sale coming up on February 8 whose results will be eagerly watched by all those interested in Post-War and Contemporary Art. Christie’s has got together more than 60 lots, shown in a lush catalogue that’s a work of art in itself. The sale raises a number of intriguing questions, such as what gives art its value, and why is one brilliant artist’s work worth so much more than another’s?

Lucian Freud
Man in a String Chair
1988-89

Here I’m thinking specifically of Man In a String Chair (see left), a portrait of gambling tycoon Victor Chandler by his friend Lucian Freud. The sale price is estimated at £3m-4m. Once upon a quite recent time that would have seemed a lunatic, unbelievable price for a living artist. But times have changed, and how. Every day now some happy person discovers that £4m is no longer a vast sum of money - to them.

One Manhattan tale explains the consequences perfectly. A chap asks a knowledgeable friend how it was that a `Mark Rothko which changed hands for $3m three years ago was selling for $5m today. ‘Easy’, said the friend. ‘The people who could afford $3m three years ago can now afford $5m’. It’s a truism, actually. To get rich prices you need rich buyers. And then you also get rich artists, If he’s short of a bob or two, Freud only needs to paint another canvas and exchange it for millions of bobs.

His friend Francis Bacon was in the same happy position well before his death in 1992. Christie’s has two Bacons in the sale, one of which is priced ‘on application’ - just like a magnificent country house. The rising prestige of British art has generated these mighty peaks, which brine not a few Brits into upper price regions which were once only inhabited by American super-stars (and the odd Continental).

But there’s a sharp drop between these peaks and other artists of the first rank. Frank Auerbach, for example, is a highly respected painter, who like Freud and Bacon, belonged to the famous London Group. The group of three portraits in the catalogue, though, carries no estimate above £150,000. Now, an estimate is not a price, and maybe the Auerbachs will do vastly better. But they still won’t come near the Freud. Why not?

First, Freud is regarded as the greater painter, and is representational rather then abstract. Auerbach’s painterly language requires much more interpretation. Bridget Riley’s pure abstraction demands even more - and a beautiful Riley in the sale carries a top estimate of £120,000. Both Auerbach and Riley are relatively young compared to Freud, both having been born in 1931. Freud will be 84 this year - and that makes him a Grand Old Man.

GOM status means that super-rich collectors and museum curators will fall over themselves to lay their hands on a top quality Freud, like the Man in a String Chair - especially since the supply of Freuds was very limited until recent years. That’s why Charles Saatchi was smarter than smart to invest in a choice selection a few years back. But buyers with less loot than Saatchi will be watching the sale to see what prices are fetched by Mona Hatoum (1952) and Gary Hume (1962), They are well-positioned for a flight to the stars.