Envy is the lot of the unwealthy art collector. I picked up a price list at the opening of Hollis Taggart Galleries’ Arnold Friedman retrospective on Wednesday, and it reminded me that any hopes I have of owning one of Friedman’s oil paintings–even a very small one–are contingent on my selling Hotter Than That: A Life of Louis Armstrong to Hollywood, or something at least as implausible.
I returned home feeling both elated (having just looked at four roomfuls of exquisite paintings) and depressed (knowing that none of them would ever be mine). Then it occurred to me to see if any Friedman-related bargains were to be found on the Web. I searched for “Arnold Friedman lithograph,” and what did I find? This. A few more keystrokes revealed it to be a pencil-signed 1940 Friedman lithograph for sale by the Philadelphia Print Shop for the unlikely-sounding price of $225. “That I can afford,” I muttered hopefully, and fired off an e-mail asking if it was still available. Answer came there eight hours later, and now the latest addition to the Teachout Museum is en route to my door via UPS.
The moral? You can’t always get what you want, but if you try some time, you just might find something (A) close enough for jazz and (B) a whole lot cheaper. And yes, I’m feeling incredibly smug….