Art matters

That lingering sense of deja vu you get when browsing an art auction catalogue is no figment of your imagination.

Ehhemm.. ehhemm.. (What…? That’s supposed to be me clearing my throat in an authoritative manner).

Data derived from my research:

1999-2004: 17… yes… that’s 17 (seventeen)… non-Aboriginal Australian artists generated 40% of the total art auction revenue in Australia.

1972-2004: 23,333 artworks by 2,791 ’contemporary’* artists were offered for sale at auction. 20% of those artworks were produced by just nine artists. That’s not a typo. 9. As in NINE.

The moral of the story? Artists establishing a good auction following = snowball, meet hell.

Come to think of it, that’s a really apt analogy.

* (defined as alive and presumed to be practising in 1990)