The (hot) summer of 2010 is upon us in New York City, but telling the temperature in the art and antiques business is a bit more problematic. After the universal effects of “The Great Recession”, are things improving, getting worse, or still evolving from its traumatic consequences? Change in this industry is more than necessary; its best days will be when the total public, not just collectors, interior designer, or museums appreciate more than just the aesthetic qualities or the financial cost, but the total value of the asset investment. To figure out how the art and antiques industry will evolve, its past offers no roadmap. However, going back into…
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Are The Decorative Arts Losing Their Appeal?
It seems that the art world has experienced a roller coaster period of demand and price fluctuation. Some areas seem to be recovering quite nicely, as Picasso and Giacometti works can attest too. With the decorative arts, the rebound can be characterized as not happening. Demand is not even static, but appears to be still sliding or stalled at best. Is this trend reversible or more systemic with the nature of these items? Shelter magazines have stamped their approval on showcasing residences with a minimum use of antiques and furniture in general. White walls and scattered rugs on plain wood floors are the template for as little as possible in…
A Legal Indictment Against the Duopoly
My faith in the legal process may yet be tested. My son, a law student, sent me an article in the New York State Bar Association’s Entertainment, Art, and Sports Journal-Spring 2010 edition titled: The House Always Wins: A Call to Reform Art Auction House Regulations. It was submitted and written by a 3rd year law student Jacqueline Tate, who also had interned at Christie’s. Her case starts on page 32 of the Journal https://mail.google.com/mail/?attid=0.1&th=128cf5b4d5a6aa7a&disp=vah&view=att For as long as I have been in this business, nothing has disturb me more than how the industry has allowed the Sotheby’s/Christie’s duopoly to instill an acceptance of deception and fraud…
Millennium Modern, the Style of Contemporary
I have always tried to slice and dice a piece of furniture or decorative arts by associating a style and sub-style with the item. I find it’s a way to understand where the design was coming from and what influences made it adaptable. Chinese Chippendale seems as incongruous a combination of designs as faux-bamboo. Today’s designs have evolved from somewhere, and I like the term Millennium Modern as identifying late 20th Century to the present. The interior designer Geoffrey Bradfield coined the term. I believe he was trying to put a name on a style that just was classified as “contemporary”, but lacked a style period name. Art Nouveau isn’t…
Prices and Pricing of Antiques, of Anything
I have always been a strong advocate of disclosed prices in the art and antiques industry. The fear of disclosing an asking price is nothing less than a secret reserve price. It creates a setting for being deceived and manipulated before you even make an inquiry about the item. As a method that has become an accepted format for doing business, a minimum (auction reserve price) or maximum (dealer asking price) that is not disclosed creates an artificial wall to the consumer. I love how the famous Sotheby’s/Christie’s catalogue notation “estimate on request” attempts to add a mystique to the item; it also sets up further blockage to the reserve…
Is Business In The Trade Going to Come Back Now?
While I absolutely love macro-economic theory, I deal in a micro-economic business. The decorative arts industry has only recently, with the effects of the recent “Great Recession”, experienced a significant financial shock from this general economic condition. Perhaps the Great Depression is the only measure of a true economic cataclysm, but the awareness of this present downturn should offer exceptional opportunities. FYI, the New York Stock Exchange S&P 500 Index is now up over 92% in the last year. When a macro-economic event occurs, we in the trade have historically experienced the effect of the change in a delayed manner. Like any commodity, pricing and more so demand are…
NYS Auction Legislation; Not Good Enough
Presently before the NYS Senate is a bill, passed by the Assembly that is attempting to define how public auctions should operate. This law needs clearer and more direct disclosure of the potentially deceptive and collusive actions presently allowed. Codified with this bill, the new rules will avail auctioneers to continue these abuses. Below, is a link to the legislation and my comments on specific sections of the bill: http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?default_fld=&bn=A01730%09%09&Summary=Y&Text=Y Section 1 (S29) Requirements For Auction state it is the responsibility of the auctioneer for the truth in any statement relating to the auction. Comment: The auctioneer should also be responsible for disclosing any relevant information that he knows regarding…
Auction Draught; Dealers Rummage Around
As bad as antiques dealers have fallen, so has the entire auction part of the trade. As I looked over at my group of upcoming Sotheby’s and Christie’s decorative arts sales catalogues, I had to pause at the thin volume and quality of inventory coming onto the market. I have three current (thin) catalogues from the Duopoly, and that includes Europe! Well, maybe like many forms of market manipulation, these auctioneers’ methods are experiencing a bubble that is price sensitive. It also has been built on a policy to expand, which it has done by incorporating conflict of interest, double dealing, and deceptive bidding practices. The last time the auction…
Hoping For the Best, Antique Furniture
In the commercial world of decorative and fine arts, the present economic environment has been tough on many areas of the industry, but especially hard on furniture. Is it price, design, or is it not minimalist enough? As one esteemed dealer at the Winter Antiques show lamented to me, was this “English furniture’s Waterloo”? In my mind, perhaps classic French and Italian or even Art Nouveau has seen much better days of demand and appreciation, but not as much as an iphone. Antique furniture is the most underappreciated, least know areas of the art world. Most design schools give very short and cursory coverage of these basic function forms. The…
The State of the (Winter) Antiques Show
I started writing this blog when the antiques business was pre “Great Recession” in January of 2007. It was when the venerated New York Winter Antiques Show was on its last legs as an event with past glories. At that time the selection of dealer inventory styles was expanding. The extent that the show has now evolved has made it a shell of its former level of quality and cache as well as a barometer of the present state of antique furniture. Americana was the historical theme of the Winter Show. Years of diversification of styles have taken its toll on the home made wares. The place now to see…