Swiss Franc Vs Dollar Graph
Why would a smart New York investment banker pay $12 million for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock’s drip painting No. 5, 1948 sell for $140 million? Intriguing and entertaining, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark is a Freakonomics approach to the economics and psychology of the contemporary art world. Why were record prices achieved at auction for works by 131 contemporary artists in 2006 alone, with astonishing new heights reached in 2007? Don Thompson explores the money, lust, and self-aggrandizement of the art world in an try to determine what makes a peculiar work valuable while others are ignored. This book is the original to look at the economics and the syndication systems that enable the modern art market to generate such astronomical prices. Drawing on consultations with past and present executives of auction houses and art dealerships, artists, and the buyers who move the market, Thompson launches the reader on a traveling of invention through the queer world of innovative art. Surprising, passionate, gossipy, revelatory, The $12 Million Stuffed Shark reveals a great deal that even experienced auction purchasers do not know.
Review "Don Thompson has written, by far, the best book on the economics of the contemporary art market yet written."--Felix Salmon, Portfolio.com |
Most helpful client reviews 58 of 58 persons found the following review helpful.
 A shark that is not alone swimming in those waters...
By Claude Reich
Written by an economist who had access to the most necessary actors (collectors, dealers, auctioneers, curators, art reasonable organizers...) while doing his research, this book is an in-depth study of the way the contemporary art market functions, the share played by auction houses, dealers, huge collectors, museums, the now and again incestuous kinship that exists amongst all of them, how art is priced, how auctions are coordinated (on and off the scene), how gallery shows are sold (or pre-sold), the importance of art branding in creating an artist's reputation (the brand being the auction house, the gallery, the artisan himself, a museum, or even a aggregator if he is primary enough)and, most importantly, how these art brands are created. One perceptive conclusion is that the art market, and contemporary art in particular, is as much brand-driven as any other high-end lavishness market. Through case studies (the dealers Larry Gagosian or Jay Joplin, the artists Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Jeff Koons or Andy Warhol, the auction houses Sotheby's and Christie's, the gatherers Charles Saatchi or Ronald Lauder...) and broader considerations on the overall economics of art, the author manages to write a book which is at the same time well informed (with a heap of slight spelling errors though, e.g. the Portuguese aggregator Jose Berardo getting "Joe Bernardo", or the merchant Faggionato at times mistakenly spelt "Faccionato"), to the point and easy to read. Among the more than twenty books available on this topic on Amazon's, this one is the best in my opinion (and I've read rather a few...).
31 of 32 persons found the following review helpful.
Great Read
By D. Moulton
I'm more of a business and economics book reader than professed art reader and this book scratched that itch while adding something new and freshening to my standard selections that kept me reading "just a few more pages".
Thompson does a great occupation of getting behind how these Goliaths of art like Hirst and Bacon were invented and issues of valuation and branding that are easy to ignore in the "magic" of art. I found myself reading it on the subway and after work whenever I had a second and I finished it in a couple days, which is beauteous fast for me.
Thompson never loses sight of the assumed intangibility of art--the inherent subjectivity--but encases it in economics in the same way vein as Freakonomics, and I've unquestionably finished this book with a few cocktail quotes and points that I've brought up in conversations.
This is a great read that I may commend to business, economics, and art readers. Thompson walks the fine line of these areas to write a book that will engage them all. 60 of 70 humans found the following review helpful.
 A very fixed view
By Kcolorado
I can't rate this book as highly as the other reviewers.
There are parts of the book that are very good and flesh out the startling numbers we listen from auctions and sales of contemporary art. The author is an economist and he sets out to perceive both the both the economics and merchandising of art today. He looks at art as a commodity which it is to the persons he quotes and interviews. His statement,"The art trade is the least transparent and least regulated major mercantile action in the world." is dead on correct. By including a great deal of quotes from critic Jerry Saltz and now and again Dave Hickey and Robert Hughes, he does touch on the aesthetics in a very glancing way. But he totally misses the boat when he makes blanket pronouncements; "Artists who do not find mainstream gallery representation within a year or two of graduation are improbable ever to achieve high prices, or see their work appear at fairs or auctions or in art magazines." Huh, each heard of Mary Heilmann, Christo or thousands of others?
Luckily for us, most of the artists we revere today didn't follow that path. He makes other affirmations and tossed around stats that are not footnoted and accordingly hard to verify. I can't argue with the reality behind a lot of of them; that most artists will leave the art world before they are 30 and few with find representation with mainstream, much less `branded" galleries. However, Thompson allows himself to be swept away by the hype of the "branded" galleries and the auction houses and thereby appear beauteous ridiculous at times.
In fairness, I do think his book might be utile reading for art students, so at least they have a lot of understanding of the market and how difficult it is to hit the top. But if one is attempting to get an understanding of all that is going on today in art, it is diversity, energy and excitement, you only have to go beyond the `branded galleries" auction houses and take a look at the contemporary galleries and museums in your own city. Art is a commodity but fortunately for all of us, it is much more than that. See all 42 client reviews... |
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