Tuesday, September 6, 2011
The Art Market is the Best Judge of Good Art. Debate at Saatchi Gallery, October 7, 2011
The Art Market is the Best Judge of Good Art. Debate at Saatchi Gallery, October 7, 2011; Position: Against.
We can end this before we start. The best judge of good art is simple and unequivocal: experience, education, scholarship, and passion. The market, and namely money which is what we are talking about, is a snapshot of current whims, fashions and fads. Oftentimes, the crowd leading the auction scene is not the culturally brightest bunch at the brunch. Not to mention the rampant manipulation, speculation and deceit that is part and parcel of the auction process, with all due respect to members of the respective houses. But that’s why we love the art market, the last unregulated multi-billion dollar business.
What is the best judge of good art? Art is a lifelong learning curve and the market is no substitute for putting eyeballs directly on it—smelling it, tasting it and touching it. You need to lift it, hang it, insure it, frame it, pack it, ship it, live with it, damage it, hate it and idolize it. And read it like a book, day in and day out. That is the best judge of art: experience and tactility. Honing your eyes is of paramount importance; people always refer in art to having a good eye, but I say one is not enough.
All markets are by nature, inefficient, at least at moments. When the stock market goes up, the good, bad and ugly follow suit, same when it goes down; and, it’s the same with art. Auctions die because of lack of confidence, and quality works are often the casualty, call it death by (un)friendly fire. Reputations go up and reputations go down, history is revised regularly, so why depend on any one signifier of value when in effect it is many variables that contribute to worth. Don't get me wrong I am a true believer in art and money and think they make cozy bedfellows, but the “market”, or rather dollar value, being just one determining factor.
Manet couldn’t find a gallery to sell his work or a collector to buy it early in his career so he was reduced to borrowing money from his mother to build a temporary structure to house a one person exhibit of his work as no one else would have it. Duchamp barely sold his own art so he ended up relying on interior decorating and art advising rich patrons; he also pulled off wildly unsuccessful and impractical entrepreneurial flubs, like cardboard optical illusions for children that spun on turntables and a shirt dying enterprise. Try to buy work by either now.
Consider Warhol’s market before and after his death. During his lifetime, his auction record was about $285,000 in 1986, a fact that disappointed Andy to the core: the painting, 200 $1 Dollar Bills, went to Greek born, London based collector Paulina Karpides who sold it in 2009 for close to $44m. When Warhol died in 1987 due to medical malpractice after what was routine gallbladder surgery at New York Hospital, he was more known for cheesy portraits of Pia Zadora, hanging out at a different type of studio—Studio 54, a guest appearance on the Love Boat, and handing copies of Interview Magazine out of a satchel in Soho. Hardly the glory days of the $100m painting where we are today. Which market characterization makes more sense?
In fact, the art market is incapable of judging anything about art other than what one person (not necessarily of sound mind) will pay for something at a given point in time. There are no assurances or guarantees that there is anything backing up a price other than capriciousness. There are countless instances of collectors, speculators and dealers getting fired up and excited about the day's soup de jour that turned into nothing, that is nominal scrap value or perhaps less. Rather than good, the market can be a very bad judge of markets—and value.
There are many, many instances of meteoric rises offset by swift declines: for example, since the early 80s, the markets of Donald Sultan, David Salle, Julian Schnabel; and the triumvirate of Francesco Clemente, Sandro Chia, and Enzo Cuuchi (I think Mr. Saatchi himself might have had a hand in their decline but let’s leave that to another debate, at another venue). They are not all bad artists, though some most assuredly are; the market certainly thinks so now—but it certainly didn’t think so then.
As much as I admire Damien Hirst and I do, the late 80s to mid 90s stuff anyway, in the art world it’s like admitting to reading the Daily Mail (that's another debate, I should do programming for the series). It is human nature to find something sexy knowing an artwork is worth a lot of money, or we wouldn't be so obsessed. But the Qatari’s, the alleged purchasers at auction for $19m of some metal shelving laden with garish tchotchkes: you have been forewarned. Beware of ever-decreasing insurance valuations.
In today’s terms, think of the most glaring recent examples of market madness. There is the $250,000,000 paid for Cezanne’s The Card Players, the highest price ever for a work of art, fittingly about gambling; $105,000,000 for Giacometti’s Walking Man to Lily Safra, call it gilding the gilded lily; and $150,000,000 for Jackson Pollacks and Willem de Koonings, and that’s meant to be plural. My question is for the market-equals-value pundits: couldn’t the money be put to better use even in the age of zero sum returns on cash, from charities to investments? Where is the upside from outer space?
Monday, September 5, 2011
Upcoming, unedited GQ feature: A Porsche to Die For, or Dying Made Fun
A Porsche to Die For, or Dying Made Fun
This is about death, cars, craft, and the power of contemporary art to suck it all in and spit it all out, or shit it out in this case. I took my wife and four boys aged 14, 13, 11 and 8 on a world-wind trip to Ghana to visit the Joseph Ashong aka Paa Joe Workshop outside of Accra, a folk artist specializing in what he calls Proverbial Caskets, one of which I had commissioned. In the west we buy Warhols to display wealth and status, in Ghana, they get buried in a Mercedes. They are crafted according to the station in life of the deceased (or soon to be departed): the Mercedes would be for a businessman; corn, tomato or onion for a farmer; cell phones; coke and beer bottles; and crabs and so on. One is more colorful, cartoonish and kitschier than the next in the best possible way. Paa Joe calls them “intriguing imaginations of helping to convert the departed in flamboyant manner to the world of the unknown while providing him/her a royal ride into the next world.” Sounds like the next best thing to a royal wedding. My coffin will be in the form of a 1973 Porsche 911 2.7 RS in baby blue. I have always loved Porsche design since childhood, the simplicity and cleanness of the lines, not to mention the reliability. Some are Ferrari people, others not; in fact, I relate to the car so much, I feel that I resemble the shape, like a snake that swallowed a mouse. I suppose as an art dealer, I should have gone for a giant Duchampian urinal; instead, after my trip to poverty stricken Ghana, I am practically too embarrassed of the materialist nature of my choice to even post about it.
I first encountered the artist and his designer coffins at Jack Bell Gallery in Vauxhall. The dealer tried to get me to buy two Paa Joe’s stating how much shipping and customs duties could be reduced with the addition of another coffin – to which I replied that I would only die once. Must admit I was as nervous about the trip as the macabre nature of what I was getting myself into – literally and figuratively. At first it was more just another artwork among artworks that I thought would look rather cool plunked in the middle of my house. But then it occurred to me that I might be tempting fate by putting my sculpture, which happens to be a coffin, smack in the middle of my bedroom. In retrospect perhaps it wasn’t the brightest or cheeriest of ideas, as it seems too much like inviting the scythe wielder into bed. I guess I was enthralled by the notion of a bespoke demise, a last lap around the track.
Before we even started, the adventure had begun. This would be life outside the comfort zone: the things that one has to do to avoid Starbucks. For my children (and me) who are generally more accustomed to the Saints, as in St. Moritz, St. Tropez or St. Barthes (a slight exaggeration but sounds good) we were ready for something new. From the get go, my wife was none too amused with my holiday planning. The night prior to our departure, CNN posted a quiz before a commercial break: “What is to the east of the Ivory Coast, mired in civil war?” Er, that would be Ghana. Next off came visits to the vaccination clinic, there was malaria, cholera, and many other ailments to worry about. There were pills to be ingested before, during and after the trip and a plethora of shots to be had. The nurse implored us to stay calm and not to overreact; easy for her to say as she called off the list of possible diseases we’d be exposed to like the specials in an exotic restaurant. The sensation of my three-course meal of shots was a burning pain that lasted for days. Out of all malaria drugs, funny how the pill with the least side and after effects cost fifty percent more than the rest. And don’t forget the sun screen, insect repellant and spare needles should you need a blood transfusion during your holiday festivities. Did you know tsetse flies prefer blue? There went my wardrobe hue of choice. Shortly after the series of vaccines, the kids all became stricken with a mild form of yellow fever, an apparent common side effect, which only increased the consternation of my already hesitant wife.
Though we made dash to attain traveling documents, my family hasn’t planned more than a few days in advance for anything—needless to say we didn’t come close to meeting the deadline for securing visas. Once off the plane, armed with no traveling documents, already not speaking to my wife, the dark clouds of divorce loomed. After about an hour of phone calls and haggling it was agreed we could pay our way through, good thing after two planes and eight hours of flying. When I handed over the cash, the officer returned two $20 notes, stating they were too dirty and the bank wouldn’t accept them. I didn’t know quite what to make of that other than the fact I would accept currency dripping in malaria. The moment we exited the airport the money grab began, literally, as it was snatched out of my hands by an unruly group of taxi facilitators, i.e. guys who follow you to a cab and try and take your money for a tip as you get in. An auspicious way to start, we were definitely not in Kansas anymore.
Once we arrived at the hotel, I was determined to eat anything and everything that came my way in the face of my wife’s utter resolve not to. The presidential suite I decided to treat my reluctant family to was closer in feeling to the local council. And low and behold, the first person I encountered in the hotel restaurant was a Jew from Boston. My first impression was how strange it was to be in a place with no art market, in fact I don’t think that had ever happened to me before. Imagine how out of place and utterly wrong a £20m Hirst vitrine or Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture would be? How did it feel? As if I was naked. Many people in Ghana live in what is nothing more than modified shipping containers and they travel by foot balancing all manner of stuff on their heads, for transport purposes and goods for commerce; in the case of one guy, he had 4 steel street signs atop his. Baby’s heads pop out of rucksacks front and back like little figures with bobbing heads you see in the back of some American cars. All over the markets and curbsides, they sell swollen sandwich bags ready to pop filled with water to fight the heat. My kind of diet—you lose weight while standing in place.
To start our sightseeing, we visited Jamestown, the poorest harbor town amongst the poor. We were touring in two cars and rolled up to a lighthouse at the seaside and picked up an impromptu guide along the way to take us through. We bounded up the decrepit structure where the wooden stairs became more irregular, like missing teeth. Once on top afforded panoramic views of the shantytowns, yet the protective railings could best be described as barely present. Maybe there is something to health and safety. The fishing shantytown at the harbor was like a pulsating, 3D Hieronymus Bosch painting come to life, exposing raw unspeakable poverty with bodies thickly and chaotically strewn about. We were told it’s impossible to drive down the streets in the area at night confronted with a carpet of sleeping people.
After the lighthouse, our off the cuff tour guide asked us if we’d like to venture through the actual fishing village. In doing so, we encountered a sometimes-hostile group of inhabitants screaming and hissing their displeasure at our intrusion. There were bands of youths, many with weeping eyes from drink and drugs, variously threatening and cajoling us. My kids were nearly relieved of their sunglasses by pickpocketers, one who swiped the camera out of the hands of my 14 year-old, only to hand it back moments later. Though an everyday occurrence on Kings Road, to say he was rather surprised would be the understatement of the century. I can understand their consternation, as we seemed rather gratuitous and pretentious in our foray into their modest village, but our intent was only to see and learn. We felt like bait, boldly protected by our fearless guide. Sadly, the history of the port included a fort where slaves were unceremoniously led from underground tunnels to awaiting ships, surely an atrocity worse than death. Fitting this about a coffin. The poverty would shock a fish in a tank of formaldehyde. The only bar in the desolate harbor town was called the London Bar, an apt reference to the hard drinking UK - that's what I call a reputation!
After a brief stint in a traditional crafts market, otherwise known as a tourist trap—unannounced, my crazy wife ambushed the kids and I and arranged for a visit to an orphanage. I guess the little figurines at market weren't enough. We were sat in the office and it was explained to us that the process would necessitate a series of meetings with social workers both in Africa and the UK to see if we were fit for such onerous parenting duties. They should have asked me, I would have readily admitted we weren’t. Within an hour, they brought out a brother and sister (one is never enough for my wife), so much for the assessment process. I was surprised there were any kids left in the region after Madonna, Angelina, Mia, and Sandra. Though thankfully she didn’t pursue it further, on Easter morning my wife did visit a local supermarket that was closely watched by armed guards, and then flooded the orphanage with food and gifts while I and a few of the kids hid in the hotel.
The only gallery in Accra is a spiraling, seaside disused hotel with all manor of wares from purely folk and decorative art to Paa Joe and other contemporary, more conceptual practitioners. The Artists Alliance Gallery, free of art world conceit and snobbery, was refreshing, accessible and priced a third less than the London counterpart, and priced about 20% less than the art purchased directly from the artist studios who could see us suckers coming for miles. Later that afternoon, the trip by car to Paa Joe’s studio witnessed a long snaking line of purveyors of everything from food, to clothing to household goods, all held aloft on the heads of the traveling merchants. The motorway, for the duration of the hour-long journey, veered seamlessly from asphalt to dirt and back.
When we finally made it to the studio of Paa Joe, whose nickname originates from the fact that his studio is apprenticed by a handful of the 8 children he has sired, they seemed to be laughing at us, but in a nice and disarming sort of way. Rather than for money, the traditional craftsman gain work experience in exchange for food, some booze, a goat, a pair of sandals, a roll of fabric, and a few quid; but, that relationship can go on for years until one breaks out on their own.
The workshop had no lights or electricity, and being in the midst of the rainy season made it darker than a winter day in the UK at 3pm. There was mold on the studio walls that would make any Londoner proud and though his marketing pamphlet alludes to sophisticated tools and machinery, these seem to be comprised of nothing more than hammers, nails and hand-operated wood carving tools. Rather than a negative, this constitutes the charm of the enterprise. And somehow, by hand-eye coordination and an intuitive response to the subject matter, they seem to get it just right.
My Porsche was taking shape nicely and was an amazing process to witness. Seemingly unrelated pieces of wood were nailed and glued to the frame, which initially looked nothing like the car I commissioned, until, using no more than a hand trowel, the surfaces were smoothed into the familiar form of the 911 2.7 RS. Granted, the shut lines of the lid appeared slightly off, as they do with most Ghanaian coffins, but its all part of the attraction and unwittingly, probably contribute to a virtual feast for bugs when these things are put into actual use. Come to think of it, Paa Joe never asked, nor did I, for a fitting. For the hedge funder, there's a smart lace-up brogue and I have seen a bible shaped coffin, the interior of which was fully illustrated; perhaps I should have chosen a life sized issue of The Daily Mail, admittedly my bible. My 8 year old couldn't resist jumping in one of the finished items and taking it for a test drive…
“For a Ga (the dominant ethnic community in the region surrounding Accra, the capital of Ghana) it is better to incur lifelong debts than to cut back on funeral expenses.” Going into Darkness, Fantastic Coffins from Africa, Thierry Secretan. Thames and Hudson, 1995, page 7. With my wife, incurring lifelong debt would be the cause of the funeral. Pointing out how these works of art are beyond any economic cycle, one of the leading lights of the trade of coffin making, Kane Kwei, said “all a dead person owns is his coffin.” Going into Darkness, page 20. The funerary art form of custom coffins, by nature intended to be appreciated only for the brief period of a funeral ritual prior to being buried six feet under, is that these objects of art have a shelf life before they are obscured forever, never to be seen again. Imagine doing that with your Damien or Tracey?
After our visit and purchase of some more small pieces, albeit over the mark, Paa Joe even pitied the taxi driver and shared some of the spoils with him prior to our departure, leaving him with a fiver. Not to be outdone, our enterprising, intrepid taxi driver pulled to the side of the hotel after our trip and tried to extort $1,200 Ghanaian dollars (40p for one Ghanian Cedi) for the ride. Thronged at the airport, thronged at the market, thronged at the harbor and thronged at the beach, we had reached our threshold after only two full days, but full they were. I called the travel agent from our roped off lounge chair on the roped off beach and planned our retreat. The squalor was otherworldly, heartrending and had taken its toll. On the beach alone, we struggled to ignore the onslaught of aggressive sellers; sellers of shells, paintings, sculptures, clothes, horseback rides. With some of the nutters gallivanting on the sand, it became clear the UK doesn't have a monopoly on eccentricity.
So, we a bailed a day early, and the UK never looked so good upon our return. When I got home I cried. My kids and wife, it feels like we all experienced the same simultaneous wound. When I mentioned the trip briefly on Facebook, within one short second after the post I had a reply from Paa Joe himself, which led me to believe that there was a secret, well-equipped underground nerve center to the operation. The experience in total made much of my life seem rather absurd and futile; the realization that half my obsessions revealed themselves as obscene was less than flattering. And I never saw my kids so sober-minded, which is a good thing, but my wife is still threatening to adopt. Though the bright pink Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture I mentioned might seem about the most irrelevant and frivolous thing in the world going forward, I could understand how it might brighten things up a bit. Maybe contemporary art is not quite nutritious, but thirst quenching nonetheless. Sadly with my insensitive, degenerate kids the effects didn’t last long: the lessons learnt about the ill effects of rampant materialism were short lived at best.
Inevitably, with all the prophylactics and vaccinations, we all got diarrhea before and after our return; I was struck down at a society luncheon in London shortly after touchdown. One by one we all began to spend more and more time either on the toilet or lording over it. There wasn’t a bathroom in the house without some residue of a Jackson Pollock splatter. My wife bundled up the kids and herded them to a series of doctors for tests, convinced a biological Noah's Ark of micro-organisms had lodged in the collective organs of my family
I focused on the words characterizing our trip and let my kids fight over whose images would pass muster with GQ’s photo editor. It became a competition with the end result that my 13 year old shot 4,773 images. What with the kids turned into a roving photo agency, I unwittingly created a group of mini Mario Testino monsters. As adamant as the kids were about photo credits, they were also persistent in pleading, “please don’t make us go back to a developing country for half-term.” In truth, in the past I never thought much about visiting Ghana or Africa for that matter. After my trip, it colors all that I think about and I can't wait to get back – I only hope I don't end up in my 1973 Porsche 2.7 RS coffin before I get the chance to. Is Africa going to be the next China in terms of development? Let’s hope so. Another upside to this episode in our lives, I received an indication my wife has moved on from the idea of taking another child on board-in one form anyway. Here is a recently received text: "I want to adopt an elderly person and we can take care of them so they don't have to be in a home." That could be my next article.
Epilogue
An email message from Paa Joe popped up that his fall gallery exhibit had been cancelled—a New York collector had purchased the latest body of work in its entirety and decided they didn't want it shown. Then Paa implored me to "find him more collectors." Though it honestly never occurred to me (a rarity, that), my coffin seemed to be appreciating in line with the car it was inspired by. And Paa was beginning to sound less like a hokey outsider and more like a middle-aged, aspirant YBA.
The eagle finally landed, after nearly a year in progress, it arrived; albeit a bit banged up after the long trip from Ghana, but it's a car, what can you expect. Not many people can say they welcomed, looked forward even, to such an unveiling. It’s a car that drives you to the next world, yet with my sense of direction, I will probably manage to get lost. I posted a casual phone picture on facebook and I was asked about the head peering behind the steering wheel, but strangely, in the real article, there is nothing (or no one) inside the passenger compartment. It’s an eerie apparition, the ghost in the machine or the ghost in the coffin. It’s that cool, who could blame him.
The exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum is titled “Power of Making” and is open from 6 September 2011 – 2 January 2012. It will focus on design and cut across a wide scope of areas. The Lion coffin is due to be a major feature.
This is about death, cars, craft, and the power of contemporary art to suck it all in and spit it all out, or shit it out in this case. I took my wife and four boys aged 14, 13, 11 and 8 on a world-wind trip to Ghana to visit the Joseph Ashong aka Paa Joe Workshop outside of Accra, a folk artist specializing in what he calls Proverbial Caskets, one of which I had commissioned. In the west we buy Warhols to display wealth and status, in Ghana, they get buried in a Mercedes. They are crafted according to the station in life of the deceased (or soon to be departed): the Mercedes would be for a businessman; corn, tomato or onion for a farmer; cell phones; coke and beer bottles; and crabs and so on. One is more colorful, cartoonish and kitschier than the next in the best possible way. Paa Joe calls them “intriguing imaginations of helping to convert the departed in flamboyant manner to the world of the unknown while providing him/her a royal ride into the next world.” Sounds like the next best thing to a royal wedding. My coffin will be in the form of a 1973 Porsche 911 2.7 RS in baby blue. I have always loved Porsche design since childhood, the simplicity and cleanness of the lines, not to mention the reliability. Some are Ferrari people, others not; in fact, I relate to the car so much, I feel that I resemble the shape, like a snake that swallowed a mouse. I suppose as an art dealer, I should have gone for a giant Duchampian urinal; instead, after my trip to poverty stricken Ghana, I am practically too embarrassed of the materialist nature of my choice to even post about it.
I first encountered the artist and his designer coffins at Jack Bell Gallery in Vauxhall. The dealer tried to get me to buy two Paa Joe’s stating how much shipping and customs duties could be reduced with the addition of another coffin – to which I replied that I would only die once. Must admit I was as nervous about the trip as the macabre nature of what I was getting myself into – literally and figuratively. At first it was more just another artwork among artworks that I thought would look rather cool plunked in the middle of my house. But then it occurred to me that I might be tempting fate by putting my sculpture, which happens to be a coffin, smack in the middle of my bedroom. In retrospect perhaps it wasn’t the brightest or cheeriest of ideas, as it seems too much like inviting the scythe wielder into bed. I guess I was enthralled by the notion of a bespoke demise, a last lap around the track.
Before we even started, the adventure had begun. This would be life outside the comfort zone: the things that one has to do to avoid Starbucks. For my children (and me) who are generally more accustomed to the Saints, as in St. Moritz, St. Tropez or St. Barthes (a slight exaggeration but sounds good) we were ready for something new. From the get go, my wife was none too amused with my holiday planning. The night prior to our departure, CNN posted a quiz before a commercial break: “What is to the east of the Ivory Coast, mired in civil war?” Er, that would be Ghana. Next off came visits to the vaccination clinic, there was malaria, cholera, and many other ailments to worry about. There were pills to be ingested before, during and after the trip and a plethora of shots to be had. The nurse implored us to stay calm and not to overreact; easy for her to say as she called off the list of possible diseases we’d be exposed to like the specials in an exotic restaurant. The sensation of my three-course meal of shots was a burning pain that lasted for days. Out of all malaria drugs, funny how the pill with the least side and after effects cost fifty percent more than the rest. And don’t forget the sun screen, insect repellant and spare needles should you need a blood transfusion during your holiday festivities. Did you know tsetse flies prefer blue? There went my wardrobe hue of choice. Shortly after the series of vaccines, the kids all became stricken with a mild form of yellow fever, an apparent common side effect, which only increased the consternation of my already hesitant wife.
Though we made dash to attain traveling documents, my family hasn’t planned more than a few days in advance for anything—needless to say we didn’t come close to meeting the deadline for securing visas. Once off the plane, armed with no traveling documents, already not speaking to my wife, the dark clouds of divorce loomed. After about an hour of phone calls and haggling it was agreed we could pay our way through, good thing after two planes and eight hours of flying. When I handed over the cash, the officer returned two $20 notes, stating they were too dirty and the bank wouldn’t accept them. I didn’t know quite what to make of that other than the fact I would accept currency dripping in malaria. The moment we exited the airport the money grab began, literally, as it was snatched out of my hands by an unruly group of taxi facilitators, i.e. guys who follow you to a cab and try and take your money for a tip as you get in. An auspicious way to start, we were definitely not in Kansas anymore.
Once we arrived at the hotel, I was determined to eat anything and everything that came my way in the face of my wife’s utter resolve not to. The presidential suite I decided to treat my reluctant family to was closer in feeling to the local council. And low and behold, the first person I encountered in the hotel restaurant was a Jew from Boston. My first impression was how strange it was to be in a place with no art market, in fact I don’t think that had ever happened to me before. Imagine how out of place and utterly wrong a £20m Hirst vitrine or Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture would be? How did it feel? As if I was naked. Many people in Ghana live in what is nothing more than modified shipping containers and they travel by foot balancing all manner of stuff on their heads, for transport purposes and goods for commerce; in the case of one guy, he had 4 steel street signs atop his. Baby’s heads pop out of rucksacks front and back like little figures with bobbing heads you see in the back of some American cars. All over the markets and curbsides, they sell swollen sandwich bags ready to pop filled with water to fight the heat. My kind of diet—you lose weight while standing in place.
To start our sightseeing, we visited Jamestown, the poorest harbor town amongst the poor. We were touring in two cars and rolled up to a lighthouse at the seaside and picked up an impromptu guide along the way to take us through. We bounded up the decrepit structure where the wooden stairs became more irregular, like missing teeth. Once on top afforded panoramic views of the shantytowns, yet the protective railings could best be described as barely present. Maybe there is something to health and safety. The fishing shantytown at the harbor was like a pulsating, 3D Hieronymus Bosch painting come to life, exposing raw unspeakable poverty with bodies thickly and chaotically strewn about. We were told it’s impossible to drive down the streets in the area at night confronted with a carpet of sleeping people.
After the lighthouse, our off the cuff tour guide asked us if we’d like to venture through the actual fishing village. In doing so, we encountered a sometimes-hostile group of inhabitants screaming and hissing their displeasure at our intrusion. There were bands of youths, many with weeping eyes from drink and drugs, variously threatening and cajoling us. My kids were nearly relieved of their sunglasses by pickpocketers, one who swiped the camera out of the hands of my 14 year-old, only to hand it back moments later. Though an everyday occurrence on Kings Road, to say he was rather surprised would be the understatement of the century. I can understand their consternation, as we seemed rather gratuitous and pretentious in our foray into their modest village, but our intent was only to see and learn. We felt like bait, boldly protected by our fearless guide. Sadly, the history of the port included a fort where slaves were unceremoniously led from underground tunnels to awaiting ships, surely an atrocity worse than death. Fitting this about a coffin. The poverty would shock a fish in a tank of formaldehyde. The only bar in the desolate harbor town was called the London Bar, an apt reference to the hard drinking UK - that's what I call a reputation!
After a brief stint in a traditional crafts market, otherwise known as a tourist trap—unannounced, my crazy wife ambushed the kids and I and arranged for a visit to an orphanage. I guess the little figurines at market weren't enough. We were sat in the office and it was explained to us that the process would necessitate a series of meetings with social workers both in Africa and the UK to see if we were fit for such onerous parenting duties. They should have asked me, I would have readily admitted we weren’t. Within an hour, they brought out a brother and sister (one is never enough for my wife), so much for the assessment process. I was surprised there were any kids left in the region after Madonna, Angelina, Mia, and Sandra. Though thankfully she didn’t pursue it further, on Easter morning my wife did visit a local supermarket that was closely watched by armed guards, and then flooded the orphanage with food and gifts while I and a few of the kids hid in the hotel.
The only gallery in Accra is a spiraling, seaside disused hotel with all manor of wares from purely folk and decorative art to Paa Joe and other contemporary, more conceptual practitioners. The Artists Alliance Gallery, free of art world conceit and snobbery, was refreshing, accessible and priced a third less than the London counterpart, and priced about 20% less than the art purchased directly from the artist studios who could see us suckers coming for miles. Later that afternoon, the trip by car to Paa Joe’s studio witnessed a long snaking line of purveyors of everything from food, to clothing to household goods, all held aloft on the heads of the traveling merchants. The motorway, for the duration of the hour-long journey, veered seamlessly from asphalt to dirt and back.
When we finally made it to the studio of Paa Joe, whose nickname originates from the fact that his studio is apprenticed by a handful of the 8 children he has sired, they seemed to be laughing at us, but in a nice and disarming sort of way. Rather than for money, the traditional craftsman gain work experience in exchange for food, some booze, a goat, a pair of sandals, a roll of fabric, and a few quid; but, that relationship can go on for years until one breaks out on their own.
The workshop had no lights or electricity, and being in the midst of the rainy season made it darker than a winter day in the UK at 3pm. There was mold on the studio walls that would make any Londoner proud and though his marketing pamphlet alludes to sophisticated tools and machinery, these seem to be comprised of nothing more than hammers, nails and hand-operated wood carving tools. Rather than a negative, this constitutes the charm of the enterprise. And somehow, by hand-eye coordination and an intuitive response to the subject matter, they seem to get it just right.
My Porsche was taking shape nicely and was an amazing process to witness. Seemingly unrelated pieces of wood were nailed and glued to the frame, which initially looked nothing like the car I commissioned, until, using no more than a hand trowel, the surfaces were smoothed into the familiar form of the 911 2.7 RS. Granted, the shut lines of the lid appeared slightly off, as they do with most Ghanaian coffins, but its all part of the attraction and unwittingly, probably contribute to a virtual feast for bugs when these things are put into actual use. Come to think of it, Paa Joe never asked, nor did I, for a fitting. For the hedge funder, there's a smart lace-up brogue and I have seen a bible shaped coffin, the interior of which was fully illustrated; perhaps I should have chosen a life sized issue of The Daily Mail, admittedly my bible. My 8 year old couldn't resist jumping in one of the finished items and taking it for a test drive…
“For a Ga (the dominant ethnic community in the region surrounding Accra, the capital of Ghana) it is better to incur lifelong debts than to cut back on funeral expenses.” Going into Darkness, Fantastic Coffins from Africa, Thierry Secretan. Thames and Hudson, 1995, page 7. With my wife, incurring lifelong debt would be the cause of the funeral. Pointing out how these works of art are beyond any economic cycle, one of the leading lights of the trade of coffin making, Kane Kwei, said “all a dead person owns is his coffin.” Going into Darkness, page 20. The funerary art form of custom coffins, by nature intended to be appreciated only for the brief period of a funeral ritual prior to being buried six feet under, is that these objects of art have a shelf life before they are obscured forever, never to be seen again. Imagine doing that with your Damien or Tracey?
After our visit and purchase of some more small pieces, albeit over the mark, Paa Joe even pitied the taxi driver and shared some of the spoils with him prior to our departure, leaving him with a fiver. Not to be outdone, our enterprising, intrepid taxi driver pulled to the side of the hotel after our trip and tried to extort $1,200 Ghanaian dollars (40p for one Ghanian Cedi) for the ride. Thronged at the airport, thronged at the market, thronged at the harbor and thronged at the beach, we had reached our threshold after only two full days, but full they were. I called the travel agent from our roped off lounge chair on the roped off beach and planned our retreat. The squalor was otherworldly, heartrending and had taken its toll. On the beach alone, we struggled to ignore the onslaught of aggressive sellers; sellers of shells, paintings, sculptures, clothes, horseback rides. With some of the nutters gallivanting on the sand, it became clear the UK doesn't have a monopoly on eccentricity.
So, we a bailed a day early, and the UK never looked so good upon our return. When I got home I cried. My kids and wife, it feels like we all experienced the same simultaneous wound. When I mentioned the trip briefly on Facebook, within one short second after the post I had a reply from Paa Joe himself, which led me to believe that there was a secret, well-equipped underground nerve center to the operation. The experience in total made much of my life seem rather absurd and futile; the realization that half my obsessions revealed themselves as obscene was less than flattering. And I never saw my kids so sober-minded, which is a good thing, but my wife is still threatening to adopt. Though the bright pink Jeff Koons balloon dog sculpture I mentioned might seem about the most irrelevant and frivolous thing in the world going forward, I could understand how it might brighten things up a bit. Maybe contemporary art is not quite nutritious, but thirst quenching nonetheless. Sadly with my insensitive, degenerate kids the effects didn’t last long: the lessons learnt about the ill effects of rampant materialism were short lived at best.
Inevitably, with all the prophylactics and vaccinations, we all got diarrhea before and after our return; I was struck down at a society luncheon in London shortly after touchdown. One by one we all began to spend more and more time either on the toilet or lording over it. There wasn’t a bathroom in the house without some residue of a Jackson Pollock splatter. My wife bundled up the kids and herded them to a series of doctors for tests, convinced a biological Noah's Ark of micro-organisms had lodged in the collective organs of my family
I focused on the words characterizing our trip and let my kids fight over whose images would pass muster with GQ’s photo editor. It became a competition with the end result that my 13 year old shot 4,773 images. What with the kids turned into a roving photo agency, I unwittingly created a group of mini Mario Testino monsters. As adamant as the kids were about photo credits, they were also persistent in pleading, “please don’t make us go back to a developing country for half-term.” In truth, in the past I never thought much about visiting Ghana or Africa for that matter. After my trip, it colors all that I think about and I can't wait to get back – I only hope I don't end up in my 1973 Porsche 2.7 RS coffin before I get the chance to. Is Africa going to be the next China in terms of development? Let’s hope so. Another upside to this episode in our lives, I received an indication my wife has moved on from the idea of taking another child on board-in one form anyway. Here is a recently received text: "I want to adopt an elderly person and we can take care of them so they don't have to be in a home." That could be my next article.
Epilogue
An email message from Paa Joe popped up that his fall gallery exhibit had been cancelled—a New York collector had purchased the latest body of work in its entirety and decided they didn't want it shown. Then Paa implored me to "find him more collectors." Though it honestly never occurred to me (a rarity, that), my coffin seemed to be appreciating in line with the car it was inspired by. And Paa was beginning to sound less like a hokey outsider and more like a middle-aged, aspirant YBA.
The eagle finally landed, after nearly a year in progress, it arrived; albeit a bit banged up after the long trip from Ghana, but it's a car, what can you expect. Not many people can say they welcomed, looked forward even, to such an unveiling. It’s a car that drives you to the next world, yet with my sense of direction, I will probably manage to get lost. I posted a casual phone picture on facebook and I was asked about the head peering behind the steering wheel, but strangely, in the real article, there is nothing (or no one) inside the passenger compartment. It’s an eerie apparition, the ghost in the machine or the ghost in the coffin. It’s that cool, who could blame him.
The exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum is titled “Power of Making” and is open from 6 September 2011 – 2 January 2012. It will focus on design and cut across a wide scope of areas. The Lion coffin is due to be a major feature.
Friday, August 26, 2011
simon's bar mitzvah
We were leaving a party in Jerusalem and decided to forego the bus back to Tel Aviv and make a dash to the hotel. We got into a random taxi outside the Dung Gate (a highly memorable designation) of the old city and the driver was of Saphardic descent. My wife asked: are you going to kill us? If you don’t, I will give you extra 100 Shekels; can’t deny her logic, its good to incentive-ize people. After we safely made it back we planned dinner. Another ostensibly less threatening taxi ride ensued where we argued the merits of a traditional Arab meal vs. the Israeli counterpart. You can imagine who took which side between my wife and I with the cab driver weighing in of course…it is Israel. After a salad and meat packed feast, my 15 year old’s face began to alarmingly swell, amidst a breakout of hives. So we had an after dinner drink at Tel Aviv’s very busy emergency ward—where the ambulances were demarcated as originating from New Jersey—I guess its hard to find good health care in the State’s nowadays. A little Cortisone and three hours later he was good to go.
In the morning I went for a run, with my glasses—had I gone without like last time in the rain, the ramifications could have triggered an international incident. When you think of the (sometimes heavy-handed) politics of the region, there is no reason the Jews, long persecuted, and Palestinians should not have peaceful places to prosper and co-exist. I went to the historical, stunning Arab city of Jaffa. I passed a gallery with kitschy, cartoonish paintings like a Palestinian Peter Saul—I actually ran through the exhibition; I am sure there is a joke there but I am not going to search. When I (barely) made it back in the scorching midday 30+ degree heat, I plopped down on a hotel bench and the security guard reprimanded me: “don’t sit after you run.” It is Israel after all.
In the morning I went for a run, with my glasses—had I gone without like last time in the rain, the ramifications could have triggered an international incident. When you think of the (sometimes heavy-handed) politics of the region, there is no reason the Jews, long persecuted, and Palestinians should not have peaceful places to prosper and co-exist. I went to the historical, stunning Arab city of Jaffa. I passed a gallery with kitschy, cartoonish paintings like a Palestinian Peter Saul—I actually ran through the exhibition; I am sure there is a joke there but I am not going to search. When I (barely) made it back in the scorching midday 30+ degree heat, I plopped down on a hotel bench and the security guard reprimanded me: “don’t sit after you run.” It is Israel after all.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Wet Run
It was raining so hard I had to run (didn't have to but need to seize the initiative when it crops) with no glasses on, the result was kind of like Mr Magoo. I am a step or two away from legally blind not to mention a stigmatism—my corrective lens need to be ground down so as not to resemble bulletproof glass. Wasn’t so much harrowing for me as for the hapless passers-by. Not being able to focus so much on my other-than-immediate surroundings was like going into a trance. I read of an ancient Arabic scholar who used the word unlearning to describe peasants who, with no formal education, could memorize the Koran by heart. This was more a matter of unseeing. At one point a postbox resembled a woman and at another, a group of four tourists huddled together in hooded raincoats I mistook for a horse. I stepped off the sidewalk to avoid pedestrians and when I tried to remount didn't realize the curb was two-tiered. My foot slid across the top level and I saved myself just before falling headfirst into oncoming traffic and becoming road kill. Near the end I resembled a wet t-shirt contestant, but more like a slightly chubby one on reality TV. A runner called out to me and I didn’t know if I knew him or he was voting for me. Maybe I should do an existential experiment and take off my specs for a week. If so, watch your flank.
Monday, August 15, 2011
"Gold and Picasso: Going Topless", for the Fall 2011 issue of Marc Faber's Gloom, Boom & Doom Report.
Gold and Picasso: Going Topless.
Sotheby’s (BID), the world’s largest publicly traded auctioneer said second-quarter earnings rose 48 percent for its best quarter ever, though the share price is, at the time of this writing, down over 40% since May 2011. It has been repeatedly pointed out that about every time the shares experience such a decline (and precipitous may be too gentle a description in this instance), a spike in the same direction for the art market in general is all but certain. That would not seem to portend a happy fall season for the upcoming spate of auctions, fairs, private treaty sales, exhibits, etc, etc. More like a happy fall in the loopy prices seen in the market of late, like the purchase for $250,000,000 of a Cezanne painting, the Card Players. Throw in the downgrading of the USA—how they deserve even an AA+ beggars belief, if I performed as badly surely I’d struggle for a B-; the imminent collapse of Europe; and the summer sacking of the UK in riots that witnessed mass pillaging and worse. It was always clear if widespread hardship rendered people unable to buy food, they’d ultimately take it. Rice was among the items depicted in the arms of London looters. Thus, all the ingredients would seem to be in place for the ideal recipe for the death knell of the art market as we know it.
Guess what? Not for the sake of being a gratuitous contrarian, but I am still bullish for the upcoming 2011-12 art market, and foresee records tumbling, not to the downside but rather falling upwards as new highs will be achieved before there is any palpable correction. Talking about fundamentals, the factors fueling the recent frenetic art market activities are only becoming magnified in the face of such worldwide jitters and uncertainly. Shares? If 500-point intraday swings don’t make you queasy, I am sure there are some strategic opportunities on the horizon. Currencies? I don’t think anyone in their right mind would proffer a guess as to the short term gyrations we are about to experience, other than the Swiss Franc seems poised to continue to behave like a balloon freshly filled with helium. Property? Still a mixed bag, with only the best of the best in the top regions performing, and there are less top regions by the day. Commodities? A whipsaw investment not for the unwary as speculation about the sustainability of China’s continued growth, pressure on demand, and spiraling costs. Interest rates seem to reside full time in the doldrums, unless you find zero an exciting number. Cash is going to earn negative returns for the next two years according to Bernanke’s statement last week and bonds can’t go much higher—and there is no sovereign default risk with Picasso. In a macro sense, the USA appears to be morphing into the new Japan, according to Bill Gross (more or less), who runs the world’s biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co. quoted on Bloomberg.com. Such a grim scenario gives new meaning to the doom and gloom in the GBD Report, which perhaps should consider dropping the boom in favor of a few extra heaping portions of gloom and doom.
But every cloud has a gold lining, if you are an art collector or holder of physical gold, which seems to have been going topless all summer. Where will it stop? I can imagine $2,400 to $2,800 an ounce in the short term, in the same fashion as I can comfortably accept that sooner rather than later the $250m Cezanne record will be eclipsed, pushing further into the clouds the stratospheric value placed on unrepeatable trophy art. Gold equals Picasso, and Picasso = gold. Picasso is the measure of value against which all else in the art market is compared, not to mention Warhol hasn’t been faring too badly either, thank you very much. Let us put to rest the notion that art is an erudite, unknowable, illiquid vehicle seen as a frivolous pursuit of the wealthy to impress upon their friends. Previously I would have said it was a pastime led by the Greenwich, Connecticut hedge fund elite, but markets and investigations have pretty uniformly battered them all of late. Art is a store of value, a systematic, objectively (for the most part) measureable asset class viewed in such a way by more and more collectors, investors and institutions, even. As a whole, art has never been as liquid, global and covetable as it is now, from China to Brazil, New York (still) to Russia, and India and Europe (still). These are good times for art and will continue to be so, for at least the next year or two. Baring some unforeseen, unspeakable tragedy all things art will trend up, but even a cataclysmic event can add to art’s allure. People want art so badly nowadays they are literally prepared to steal it; there's been a spate of art thefts, it's that desirable.
Some rather curious art world manifestations (shenanigans?) that have come to light recently are the notion of a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) to list on the London Exchange’s AIM, somehow involving art works and SplitArt, an actual art exchange to buy and sells shares in specific works of art. In their own (not entirely convincing) words: “SplitArt will operate the first regulated market for art, indeed the company is in the application process to obtain its license from the CSSF (financial sector supervisor of Luxembourg) and thus establish an electronic trading platform for art securities (MTF Multilateral Trading Facility) that will offer a wide audience access to a new transparent and potentially liquid market with low transaction costs.” I am not so sure how many people would be lining up to have their Picasso’s fractionalized like a time share in Florida, but one you can’t use for holidays. But stranger things have happened. Also, there are more and more funds with tangible collectibles as the core of their holdings like cars and wine, and more banks willing and eager to jump on board, from lending facilities to advisory services. These are all telltale signs of a maturing market with wider breadth and acceptance than at any prior stage in history. In my estimation, the plethora of new art initiatives, even the far-flung and unorthodox, is ineluctable evidence of the concept that art is more, much more, than a pretty picture. In effect, art is flying off the shelves faster than electronics in a London melee. We are in an age of art's rising economy; call me the voice of Boom amidst the chorus of Gloom & Doom. The right art is a safe harbor in today's rocky waters and a great place to dock cash.
Monday, August 1, 2011
Art4August
Today’s art collecting tidbit: Do NOT purchase art at art fairs, any, ever. Demand steeply exceeds supply (or so you are led to believe) and one is bound to get caught up in the irrational exuberance and impulse of unconsidered buying. The same applies for auctions; simply don’t. Ditto buying at commercial galleries during what is considered high season—for me that is eleven months a year. Rather, engage in what I call Art4August, Get the dealers when they are down on their collective knees, or cash flow anyway. Turn the tables on the typical master slave relationship that is the norm when patronizing snooty art galleries. Summer collect! When business crawls to a near halt, vist spaces or reach out to dealers for jpegs. The art supply is more or less consistent whether its Calders or Colens; there’s always death, divorce, taxes and pruning in all seasons, and contemporary continues to be churned out at an alarming pace, I meant carefully and willfully created. Sure the rule still applies to buy what you love, but make sure you love what you buy—do diligence!
Friday, July 22, 2011
freudian slip
freud was very much like uk version of phillip pearlstein, a stubborn realist. his early paintings AND drawings are kooky, weird and eccentric and should, in the long term, be the most esteemed. 7 days a week he had a dinner reservation at the wolseley-he painted the owner which went to sf moma-where the food is mediocre and the atmosphere sublime. he once asked me if we knew each other from the house of some socialite or another to which i replied, insincerely but honored to be acknowledged, in the affirmative. he was an artwork unto his artful, elegant self.
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