Good info for budding and seasoned art buyers alike!

Basic Rules

Rule #1- Never Buy only for the sake of making an Investment.

You must love your art and allow it to give you pleasure every day. If dollar signs are all you think about when you look at it, it’s not good for your soul or for the art. In the very unlikely case your art happens in increase in value, consider yourself lucky that you did not have to pay more for the same pleasure.

• 99% of all artwork never goes up in value: Most pictures decline 50% in value the minute you walk out of the gallery. Dealers typically take 40-50%.

• The art market fluctuates the same as every other market: For example, big collectors who paid top dollar for art in the late 80’s were left with unwanted inventory in the early 90’s when the Japanese stopped buying art and Wall Street tanked.

• Art is not liquid. Typically, a dealer who sold you something, will not not take it back five years later. She has new work to sell by the artist, and does not want to deal with older works. Unless, the artist has substantially appreciated in value.

Rule #2 – Do Your Homework

Learning about art takes time and effort just like learning about anything else.

• Look
  at art constantly and develop your eye, so that you learn what you like and why. The more you look, the more you’ll come to understand the difference between what is good and what is not. This might not change the kind of art you like, but will help you distinguish between the good (of what you like) from the bad.
  .
• Note the “Isn’t it amazing” picture and how many there are….
  For the uninitiated, a realistic oil that looks like a photo can be an amazing - How did the artist do that? Well, it’s actually quite simple. Anyone can learn if they have time and patience.
• Note cliches.
  The more you look, the more you see that there are thousands of artists working in an “isn’t it amazing?” style. The more you look the more you become aware of the cliche of using thrilling technique as the basis for artistic merit. An image must resonate beyond technique. There are also hundreds of competent artists who are good illustrators. The work is fine, butyou cannot tell one from another and there is no true originality or unique way of viewing the world. Furthermore, this competent illustrative art becomes more obvious as a cliche the more you see it.

Rule #3 – Trust Your Own Taste

At the end of the day, after looking and looking, you must trust your own taste. Good art comes with many different syles and subjects. The style and subject matter that really speak to you depends on how well your personality converges with that of the artist. You might have an eclectic sensibility and appreciate many kinds of good art, you might like the romantic landscape, colorful expressionistic painting, or Zen-like minimalism. No matter what kind of art really grabs you, do not be afraid to mix different things in one space. In the end your general taste will connect them all.

Rule #4 – Look for VALUE

Although you are NOT thinking “investment potential” (you’re not, are you?), you should be thinking VALUE.

You do not want to be ripped off, and in the art world, it’s easy to spend lots of money on junk. Again, you must go through the learning process. If you’re spending under $700 for an original work on paper or under $2000 for a good – sized painting, don’t worry. Use these numbers as general guidelines for buying artwork, and remember buy anything that pleases you and is cheap. Remember, artists have to make money too. A typical artist who makes one watercolor a week and sells it directly for $500 each, makes $24,000 a year. Furthermore, she probably has an expensive Masters of Fine Arts degree, plus the costs of postcards, supplies, paper, rent, and framing. Most likely, she has a day job and is caught in the classic artist-bind: the artist has to make enough to live, and at the same time, find time to paint. It’s a hard life, so give her a break and don’t complain about her trying to sell an original work of art for more than $300. Pay her gladly.

Rule #5 – Buy from reputable dealers – But how can you tell?

When you are purchasing art, for more than $700 for an original work on paper or $2000 for a painting, it is a good idea to work with a reputable dealer. That’s easy to say, but how can you – the uninitiated – tell a reputable dealer from a sleaze?

• Avoid any dealer with who sells Salvador Dali, or Norman Rockwell. Other artists to avoid are Tarkay, Erte, Earle, Jiang, Chagall (late), Max, Neiman, and Agam. They are all overpriced.

• Avoid - like the plague – the “Limited Edition Print” and any dealer who sells them. They are nothing but overpriced, signed posters.

• Avoid the dealer who talks investment and offers a “Certificate of Authenticity”. Certificates of authenticity are usually phony. They lead you to believe that you have an original piece of work when in reality you may not.

• Avoid galleries located in shopping malls, tourist areas, and airports. For some reason, which I have yet to figure out, the average person only thinks about buying art on vacation. Although I’m sure there are exceptions, many galleries take advantage of that.

• Avoid buying art from the framer in your local shopping mall. Again, I’m sure there are exceptions, but she’s probably not the best person with whom you should spend any serious amount of money. Typically, she knows little about the realities of the broader art market.

Jackson Pollock was born in Cody, Wyoming (1912-1956)

Jackson Pollock began to study painting in 1929 at the Art Students’ League, New York, under the Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton. During the 1930s he worked in the manner of the Regionalists, being influenced also by the Mexican muralist painters (Orozco, Rivera, Siqueiros) and by certain aspects of Surrealism.

From 1938 to 1942 he worked for the Federal Art Project. By the mid 1940s he was painting in a completely abstract manner, and the `drip and splash’ style for which he is best known emerged with some abruptness in 1947. Instead of using the traditional easel he affixed his canvas to the floor or the wall and poured and dripped his paint from a can; instead of using brushes he manipulated it with `sticks, trowels or knives’ (to use his own words), sometimes obtaining a heavy impasto by an admixture of `sand, broken glass or other foreign matter’. This manner of Action painting had in common with Surrealist theories of automatism that it was supposed by artists and critics alike to result in a direct expression or revelation of the unconscious moods of the artist.

Pollock’s name is also associated with the introduction of the All-over style of painting which avoids any points of emphasis or identifiable parts within the whole canvas and therefore abandons the traditional idea of composition in terms of relations among parts. The design of his painting had no relation to the shape or size of the canvas — indeed in the finished work the canvas was sometimes docked or trimmed to suit the image. All these characteristics were important for the new American painting which matured in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

During the 1950s Pollock continued to produce figurative or quasi-figurative black and white works and delicately modulated paintings in rich impasto as well as the paintings in the new all-over style. He was strongly supported by advanced critics, but was also subject to much abuse and sarcasm as the leader of a still little comprehended style; in 1956 Time magazine called him `Jack the Dripper’.

By the 1960s, however, he was generally recognized as the most important figure in the most important movement of this century in American painting, but a movement from which artists were already in reaction (Post-Painterly Abstraction). His unhappy personal life (he was an alcoholic) and his premature death in a car crash contributed to his legendary status. In 1944 Pollock married Lee Krasner (1911-84), who was an Abstract Expressionist painter of some distinction, although it was only after her husband’s death that she received serious critical recognition.

To learn more about Jason pollock, shop for books and film about, or to talk with others about Jason Pollock, check out the Jason Pollock website.

Fake art is sold on many sites, including Ebay, but Ebay seems to be the dominant force when you type in a major artist like Picasso or Neiman into a search engine. The problem is that many, or most art buyers, are not connoisseurs and therefore know little about what the artwork dealer should be telling them. It’s like those brand-name knockoffs that abound around the world. The rule of thumb is that if it has a very low price, it’s probably a fake. There are a few easy things to look for, even if you are a novice.

The biggest culprit is the fake or fraudulent signature. Because a genuine Picasso signature pushes the price of a piece ten-fold or more, that becomes the easiest thing to forge. If you want to make a nice fake, you buy an oversized book of his etchings and spend a few days attempting to copy his signature. When you think you’ve mastered it fairly well, you then grab a crayon or pencil and sign his name at the bottom. You then post it on Ebay for a hundred dollars and make a tidy profit. When that’s done, there are a few ways to cover yourself in the web posting and not appear to be pulling a fast one.

You start at the main title. By saying “Hand-Signed Picasso Print” you are stating a fact. The fact that the signature was not signed by Picasso is something left to the imagination. It is a print, albeit taken from a book. Now here is a sample description:

“This is a stunning full-color print of an etching by Picasso done in 1965. It was discovered recently in a private collection and the signature is in red crayon and hand-signed. It is in prefect condition and comes with a letter of authenticity from my gallery. I personally supervised the transfer of the print into our gallery. It would be a valuable asset to any collection. There is no reserve price as I would like to make it affordable to anyone interested. Shipping and insurance is $25. Good luck and good bidding.”

Did he mention he has 50 of these prints he signed himself? No wonder he can afford to give them away. If he only got ten bucks plus shipping, what’s his profit on the worthless pieces of paper? Say $30 times 50 which comes out to $1500. Then he does the same for a Miro and Chagall and, if he sells them out in a month, is making a fair living bilking the public. Is this really possible, you may be asking? It is and is happening as I speak. One person is selling these pieces right at this moment. He states that each of the pieces is crayon signed. If you pull up the Picassos, they are all singed in red crayon. The Miro’s are in blue crayon and the Chagall’s in green crayon. Did he save the black crayons for the Neimans?

Let’s go back to my general description of the Picasso. Where was the lie? His letter that you receive will say that the artwork is a “genuine print by Picasso of a limited edition that is hand-signed in crayon from a private collection.” Of course it was not hand-signed by the artist and it comes from his private collection of “art books” but that’s just a technicality. I imagine that he gets lots of positive feedback because the price is right and he delivers the art quickly. Everyone is happy, until they try to sell it later on.

There are 1000’s of these type of listings on Ebay and other websites. If you are a serious collector, you will have to spend more than a few dollars to get a signed print. If you don’t care whether it’s real or not, then buy the cheapest print offered. Heck you can just buy a poster print and even sign the artist’s name yourself. Then you cut out the middleman altogether. I’ve been an art collector for 30 years and know all the tricks. Do your homework and watch out for the obvious signs. Spotting the fakes is an art unto itself.

Godspeed