Because with almost all modern art a pretty much identical copy can be produced for way below these prices.
Certainly, there is a value in attractive design. But when you can get an indistinguishable copy for a hundredth of the price it is an irrational thing indeed to pay for the original*
*Of course I accept that you could be doing it for investment, but that’s basically relying on other people’s irrationality persisiting.
However I fully support the mordern art market. I see it as a way of redistributing income from boring people to creative loonies (the artists) and intelligent people (the succesful art investors), on average.
Meh. That doesn’t make it any different from buying first edition books or a hundred other parts of the economy in which value cannot be measured in purely utilitarian terms.
Well, that’s a broad statement. I would say the opposite: classical representational art is easier to create an identical copy of. (But I’m not talking minimalism here, but contemporary art in general, which spans a lot of different styles.) I’d be mighty impressed if someone can copy something like, say, Gerhardt Richters Ice 2, for instance, with all its palette scrapes, textures, etc.
Knorf’s Law:
There’s no piece of art, no movie, no book, no piece of music so beloved, that there won’t be someone on the Internet who is proud of him or herself for disparaging it.
No, it’s that guy who does the poker playing dogs. Or maybe the sad-eyed, big-eyed children. THAT’S artifying!
((Personally, I think Pollock does interesting things with his splatters that make them fun to look at. Mondrian’s useless. Minimalism is a fraud. IMHO, YMMV, etc.)
The rules of golf are completely arbitrary, and have no particular importance. There is no objective value to being skilled at hitting a ball (of a specific but arbitrary design) with a club (of a specific but arbitrary design), on a course (of a specific but arbitrary design) under rules (of a specific but arbitrary design). Why should he make any more money than a world class Curler? Is there something about the ball and club and course design that makes it inherently more important than what you find in a Curling… thingy?
The value of golf is subjective. Its value is based on how golf makes people feel, how much of their interest (and money) is spent towards golf. So too with art, some artists draw interest more than other artists, so they get more money. Some sports draw interest more than other sports, so the participants get more money.
Since I used both “conspicuous consumption” and “social pressure” in my post, I think I’m one of the people you’re addressing. But please go read my post again. It wasn’t about modern art. I didn’t claim that modern art was conspicuous consumption. I claimed that owning original art was, regardless of what the art is.
I appreciate both the Eames chair and Fallingwater. I think they’re awesome. I appreciate modern art, too, although I have my preferences like anyone else. I love Jackson Pollock’s art. I had a print of one of his paintings on my wall when I was a teenager. It cost me $6.99.
Appreciating design or aesthetics is orthogonal to overspending on something. We all have our own definition of overspending, but I’m going to go out on a limb and claim that spending millions of dollars on a painting has a lot more to do with proving that you’re an important person with a lot of money than it does with wanting to look at and experience the art. Obviously, there’s more to art than can be captured by a print. I’ll drop $20 to see a museum exhibit, too.
I do think that people hold the position I was rebutting. But as for your own position, I understand your argument better now. It has nothing at all to do with modern art since it applies equally well to the Mona Lisa. Yours is just a slightly different refutation of the OP.
I am still curious why you think the motivation for having an original is necessarily social. I think humans desire originals of things for all kinds of ineffable reasons having little to do with social status. That’s why they buy first editions of books, and collect unopened action figures, etc. And with art, arguably, the reproduction is never quite perfect.
This is the best reason to own original art. I’d pay hundreds of dollars for an original piece of really great artwork (which is why I don’t own any except stuff I’ve been given), versus a $10 print because the quality is so much better. So I understand how really rich people might spend tens of thousands on orignal art. Now, when you talk millions, you’d be able to hire someone to reproduce a fake of what you’re wanting for much cheaper, and at that point it becomes somewhat of a social status thing.
Stroke-count is an objective measure of “golfing” skills, since any arbitrary definition can be objective within it’s own community framework. But it isn’t an objective measure of entertainment value.
Similarly, hanging your painting in MOMA is an objective measure of success in art world, since (again) any arbitrary definition can be objective within it’s own community framework. That doesn’t make it an objective measure of aesthetic value.
The point has to do with money. Why does some minimalist art sell for lots of money, why does Tiger Woods earn lots of money golfing? Tiger Woods doesn’t get paid because he can use fewer strokes to complete a golf tournament. He gets paid because millions of people are fans of golf, and when he competes people are drawn to watch and spend money on golf related activities. The subjective valuation of Golf vs. Curling means Tiger has an opportunity to make a lot more money than a Curler who is by far the greatest of all time.
The fact that we can objectively measure his golf performance doesn’t validate the amount of money he makes.
We can objectively measure art too,the greatest artist of all time is… Van Gogh, for having the highest Sale Price Average, but here come Picasso who has a lower SPA, but many more AA’s (Auction Appearances). Pollack leads SFA (square foot average), but his BSP (Brush Strokes per Painting) really sucks.
You’re not ignorant, you are just thinking with your own pockets. Your perspective changes when you have hundreds of millions or billions of dollars.
These pieces generally don’t come off a printing press. The law of supply and demand forces these prices up when an artist becomes well known. Thats why prices go up when the artist dies, the supply becomes fixed.
How much would you pay for the crappiest painting by Ceczanne or Renoir? If you look at their paintings today, a lot of them don’t really look all that special but this one sold for a quarter of a BILLION dollars:
I have no appreciation for art and I don’t “get it” considering that a lot of the best stuff is in the public domain but for the people who seriously collect art, its an investment that pays dividends as long as you have sight.