The following two auctions just closed at Christie's a few hours ago : <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Barnett Newman's Black Fire I realized $84,165,000, doubling the <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23worldauctionrecord&src=hash">#worldauctionrecord</a> for the artist. <a href="http://t.co/YpxM99Ljj9">pic.twitter.com/YpxM99Ljj9</a></p>— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChristiesInc/statuses/466377230978154496">May 14, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> and <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Mark Rothko's Untitled, 1952 realized $66,245,000 <a href="http://t.co/dFLiEjEfhf">pic.twitter.com/dFLiEjEfhf</a></p>— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChristiesInc/statuses/466374061413920770">May 14, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
The thing you don't understand is the art market. It is a huge unregulated market that was long ago taken over by speculators. There are collectors out there who bid in every single Warhol so their huge collection doesn't nosedive in value. Art is easier to understand than the crazy modern market.
rich people dont know wtf to do with their money..i swear they just mark stuff up and trade it around
Whistler's Mother?.. I hear you breh, I can't tell which one is fake and which one is real!... ....... ....... .......
We went to see the play "Art". It starred Wayne Knight, Buck Henry and George Segal. The premise was that one of them bought a piece of art that was essentially a white canvas. An incredibly good play.
Previous owners of that artists work - bid and/or buy other works by that artist every chance they get. Why? Because the value of art is directly attributable to the demand for it. Bidding up works from the same artist, increase the value of all other works in that artist's catalog.
I hear you OP. I can understand high prices for true masterpieces like a Rembrandt or my personal favorite Caspar David Friedrich; art that took real skill to create. image hosting no sign up Art like music should "speak" to you. Should resonate and have meaning. I really dig the quiet haunted landscapes of Friedrich. How that $84 million dollar piece of crap resonates with anyone is beyond me.
coincidence or not: The first artist in the OP (Barnett Newman) made the Broken Obelisk sculpture if front of the second artist's chapel in Montrose, next to the Menil Museum. It is that building in the background that I think now needs better security systems. There's like one security guard working there during the day...guarding like 6 Rothkos. <img src="http://blogs.houstonpress.com/rocks/rothko%20broken%20obelisk.jpg" width=800>
Awesome. I studied a bit of Rothko's works last semester. Had to write a paper on one of his works, wrote a ton of BS because his work was like two different colored boxes on a canvas.
