>Chinese tycoon Liu Yiqian, 52, bought Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani’s ‘Reclining Nude’ after a frantic bidding war at a Christie's auction in New York last week.
>But despite making a string of extravagant purchases for his two museums in Shanghai, Liu happily admits he knows nothing about art.
>‘Whenever, I saw others bidding, I just competed,’ he once said. ‘After I made the buy, I would ask them "why is this piece good?"'
>http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3324009/Did-points-Chinese-billionaire-paid-170million-famed-Modigliani-nude-American-Express-card-frequent-flyer-miles.html
Thoughts? Do you 'get' "art"? How does one piece of canvas cost more than a house and lot, a car, a lifetime worth of money, heck even more than enough money to feed a town, all the movies, dvds, blurays, entertainment you want? All the high-tech shit that are very powerful today? How did this even get to this state?
>>2320550
>How does one piece of canvas cost more than a house and lot, a car, a lifetime worth of money
it's the frame doofus
i do art because its fun. i like drawing cartoons because its a good way to mellow. people spending millions on art are simply doing it just to do it. i dont understand what you are so confused about.
Everyone in that room has more money than they could use in their entire life. In that situation, anything put up for bid would be really expensive.
Also, take into account that there is a whole industry of experts that exist to tell these rich guys that they did a good job.
In cases like this it's a prestige thing. It's a show of wealth. It's "look what I can afford."
It's like people who buy 30 cars even though most of them just sit in their garage. They don't do it for practical reasons, they do it to show off how affluent they are.
Usually with art, you have the opportuntity to buy something that's one of a kind, which immediately inflates its value among exactly the sort of people who want to show off how wealthy they are. That said, it does still boggle my mind how expensive some art pieces can get - though I understand the ones with deep historical significance.
>>2320572
>Also, take into account that there is a whole industry of experts that exist to tell these rich guys that they did a good job.
I just don't how to feel about this.
Come on, people don't usually bid on art "for the sake of it". They invest their money because the artwork they buy will most likely increase in value over time. Many of these people also have a genuine interest in art. The guy in OPs article is a minority in this setting.
>>2320570
Wass that?
>>2320550
Damn, if I had a 170 million to blow on art I would literally build a museum sized collection. There's so many good paintings out there by names that are not as well known that you can buy for only a few thousand each. I remember at one point I was looking into buying an out of print book on Cornwell, and I found out I could buy original artwork from him for less than the book cost. Sure, they were mostly drawings or colour sketches, but even his finished work was usually only a few grand to maybe 10k max. And Cornwell isn't even obscure.
>>2320572
>Also, take into account that there is a whole industry of experts that exist to tell these rich guys that they did a good job.
Perhaps the best summary of the modern art scene I've ever read.
>>2320550
Not all of them, but most rich people use art like ingots. You buy ingots to diversify your portfolio, not because you like them. So if your stocks get fucked, you can just sell the painting to reinvest. A lot of them will not display these artworks. That would be really dangerous and stupid, a painting is super easy to steal (compare it with something of equal value like the apartment itself. Can't steal that). Instead, they put them in a secure vault and they will stay there until they sell them to somebody else.
>>2320877
>That would be really dangerous and stupid, a painting is super easy to steal
I'm sure there are some rich dudes with Rothko's on their walls. It's a status thing too. It's like buying a Bentley then not having it in your driveway. I'm sure they insure the paintings too so if it gets stolen they don't lose out. Of course there are lots of people who leave them locked up in vaults, but those are the ones that are into it just for investments and have zero interest in art. While there are lots of people like that, they don't make up the entirety of the art market.
Also your comment about it being dangerous to have paintings in the open reminded me of the time that dude put his elbow through his Picasso right before selling it for $139 million: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/10/23/the-40-million-elbow
It's an investment. Fine art = trading stocks. Or, perhaps it's more like trading pokemon cards. At least stocks are tied to the productivity of actual companies.
Ha! and fine artists like to tell us illustrators how we're sell-outs and shit.
Fine art is a tax-avoiding stock investment. Modern art is a money laundromat.
