Auction Houses in the News (Or Not)

Daniel Grant alleges an auction-house conspiracy of secrecy in today's Wall Street Journal, developing a theme he had already explored in last month's Art and Antiques magazine. Today he took aim at secret reserves, chandelier bidding and guarantees to sellers (including occasional third-party participation in those guarantees).

I've examined some of the issues raised by guarantees here and here. As for the reserve---the undisclosed price below which a work will not be sold---I think it's an entrenched, time-honored auction practice that's often been challenged but never overturned. It was interesting to me that even Gilbert Edelson, a veteran combatant in the dealer-auction house wars as administrative vice-president of the Art Dealers Association of America, conceded this to Grant:

If there were a law requiring the auction houses to reveal my reserve price, I would try to sell my property in London, where they don't have a law like that.

What I think is that auctioneers should be allowed to place only one bid on behalf of a reserve, declaring a work "passed" if there are no further bids. After any "real" bid, the auctioneer would have one, and only one, opportunity to bid to protect the reserve. That would be a cleaner, more honest process, giving buyers and sellers a much more accurate sense of the depth of the market (or lack thereof), than an unbroken string of sham bids emanating from the light fixtures.

Meanwhile, Christie's and Sotheby's have perversely announced dueling press previews for their Impressionist/modern sales, commencing a mere 30 minutes apart on Friday morning. Have some hard-working art-market journalists mastered the art of being two places at the same time?

Sometimes a little collusion between competitors is a good thing.

October 31, 2007 5:51 PM | | Comments (0) |

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CULTUREGRRL , aka Lee Rosenbaum, is your inside guide to the artworld, consulted daily by the most important museum directors and curators, art dealers and auctioneers, collectors, scholars, critics, journalists and art lovers.
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LEE ROSENBAUM
I'm a veteran cultural journalist who writes frequently for the Wall Street Journal's "Leisure & Arts" page. I've been a regular cultural contributor on New York Public Radio (WNYC). I've appeared as an art-market commentator on BBC-TV and have published numerous Op-Ed pieces in the New York Times and Los Angeles Times. I am author of The Complete Guide to Collecting Art (Knopf) and have lectured on cultural property issues at the New Acropolis Museum and the University of Pennsylvania, on deaccessioning at Columbia Law School, the University of Iowa and the annual conference of the Museum Association of New York, and on museum governance and cultural property issues at Seton Hall University. more

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The Walton Effect: Art World Is Roiled by Wal-Mart Heiress

Tricks of the Auction Trade

The Seattle Art Museum: A Work in Progress

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Glenn Lowry's Unorthodox Compensation Package
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Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts' sale of Eakins' "The Cello Player"

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About this Entry

This page contains a single entry by CultureGrrl published on October 31, 2007 5:51 PM.

Italy/Princeton Antiquities Deal: Reasons for Give-Backs Hide Behind Wall of "Confidentiality" UPDATED was the previous entry in this blog.

MASS MoCA Fundraiser: Beyond Büchel is the next entry in this blog.

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