{"id":1295,"date":"2014-05-11T08:21:22","date_gmt":"2014-05-11T15:21:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/?p=1295"},"modified":"2014-05-11T08:21:22","modified_gmt":"2014-05-11T15:21:22","slug":"art-and-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/05\/art-and-money\/","title":{"rendered":"Art and money"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"buy<\/a>A.O. Scott, in his Times<\/em> article “The Paradox of Art as Work<\/a>,” begins:<\/p>\n

There are few modern relationships as fraught as the one between art and money. Are they mortal enemies, secret lovers or perfect soul mates? Is the bond between them a source of pride or shame, a marriage of convenience or something tawdrier?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He will go on to say some interesting things about how the economy of the arts in changing, but with that paragraph – and for that matter, the title of the piece (which he didn’t necessarily choose) – I think he really starts off on the wrong foot.<\/p>\n

Art is costly to produce. It takes skill, the labor of the artist and all the other people needed to bring the artwork to its viewers, readers and listeners, raw materials, and a space to create the work. These are all costly inputs, and they must somehow be paid for. Sometimes there are enough potential revenues from buyers to cover all the costs, sometimes philanthropists or the state picks up some of the expenses, and sometimes the artist herself bears much of the cost, when there are not sufficient alternative funding sources. But this isn’t a “paradox.” It’s life. It’s true of every other good and service we consume. And it isn’t a function of the “capitalist” world. The costs of making art pre-date capitalism, and do not disappear in communist or anarchist societies – people’s time and effort, raw materials, space, always have alternative uses and so always carry an opportunity cost, regardless of how society is structured, and someone has to cover those costs. There is no reason to think art is different in this respect<\/em>, or that it has a “fraught” relationship with money, that there is a “paradox.” Understanding the economics of the arts requires getting past the notion that there is something strange about the fact that artists buy and sell things, just like teachers and doctors and tailors.<\/p>\n

The article goes on to talk about how the compensation for artists is changing as a result of various technologies, and how so many artists are now bearing much of the cost of producing their work, as customers and their intermediaries pay so little, and this part of the article is very much worth reading. But it is best read, I think, with clear eyes towards how markets work. Let’s leave the mystical musings on the relationships between art and money behind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A.O. Scott, in his Times article “The Paradox of Art as Work,” begins: There are few modern relationships as fraught as the one between art and money. Are they mortal enemies, secret lovers or perfect soul mates? Is the bond between them a source of pride or shame, a marriage of convenience or something tawdrier? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1298,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-issues","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/art-fair.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3dIW5-kT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1236,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/04\/capital-inequality-and-investments-in-art\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":0},"title":"Capital, inequality, and investments in art","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"April 20, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"What are the effects of an increased concentration of wealth on the art market? Writing in the New York Times, Scott Reyburn looks for a link between the theories in most newsworthy economics book of the year, Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century, and what we are seeing at\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"so have you really read this through?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/piketty-199x300.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1784,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2015\/01\/enjoying-the-benefits-of-old-money\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":1},"title":"Enjoying the benefits of old money","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"January 2, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"I don't disagree with the assessment by Alec MacGillis at Slate that that rust-belt cities offer fine high culture opportunities at low prices: riches from the turn of the last century provided capital (physical, human, institutional) that created great organizations, that can, at least for the time being, survive on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"nice orchestra you have there","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/baltimore.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/baltimore.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/baltimore.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/baltimore.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2304,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2018\/03\/tainted-money\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":2},"title":"Tainted money","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"March 4, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"The New York Times reports on a stunt by New York magazine art critic Jerry Saltz, in which at the Metropolitan Museum of Art he registers his protest of the plaza named for donor David Koch: Mr. Saltz was carrying a long strip of paper that had been printed to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"who paid for this?","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Met-Museum.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Met-Museum.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/Met-Museum.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1390,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/06\/droit-de-suite-revisited\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":3},"title":"Droit de Suite revisited","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"June 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Today at Slate, Whitney Kimball tries to make the case for US adoption of resale royalties for visual artists, or droit de suite: In what would become the first scandalously record-breaking Sotheby\u2019s art auction in 1973, taxi magnate Robert Scull and his wife famously made a fortune on 50 artworks\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"We're back ...","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/auction.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/auction.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/auction.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1570,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2014\/10\/tax-deductions-for-artists\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":4},"title":"Tax deductions for artists (updated)","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"October 7, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The New York Times reports on a court case involving whether an artist working for salary as teaching faculty can claim tax deductions of artist's expenses (for supplies, travel, meals, etc) in excess of profits earned on sales of art. My understanding of this (tax people please correct me if\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"operates at a loss","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Goat.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2514,"url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/2019\/11\/the-wealth-tax-and-the-museum\/","url_meta":{"origin":1295,"position":5},"title":"The wealth tax and the museum","author":"Michael Rushton","date":"November 21, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"At Bloomberg, Tyler Cowen has a short post on some unintended consequences of a wealth tax. It's an idea being talked about in the Democratic candidate debates. In the US we do have a few wealth taxes already: local property taxes, and, for the very, very wealthy, estate taxes. But\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "issues"","block_context":{"text":"issues","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/reading-the-will.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/reading-the-will.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/reading-the-will.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/reading-the-will.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/reading-the-will.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/worth\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}