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This book scrutinizes the excesses and extravagances that the 21st-century explosion of the contemporary art market brought in its wake. The buying of art as an investment, temptations to forgery and fraud, tax evasion, money laundering and pressure to produce more and more art all form part of this story, as do the upheavals in auction houses and the impact of the enhanced use of financial instruments on art transactions. Drawing on a series of tenaciously wrought interviews with artists, collectors, lawyers, bankers and convicted artist forgers, the author charts the voracious commodification of artists and art objects, and art's position in the clandestine puzzle of the highest echelons of global capital. Adam's revelations appear even more timely in the wake of the Panama Papers revelations, for example incorporating examples of the way tax havens have been used to stash art transactions - and ownership - away from public scrutiny. With the same captivating style of her bestselling
Big Bucks: The Explosion of the Art Market in the 21st Century, Georgina Adam casts her judicious glance over a section of the art market whose controversies and intrigues will be of eye-opening interest to both art-world players and observers.
List of contents
Introduction; Prologue; Part One: Sustaining the “Big Bucks”
Market; Chapter One: Supply; Chapter Two: Demand; Part Two: Price, Authenticity
and Forgery; Chapter Three: Price; Chapter Four: Authenticity; Chapter Five:
Fakes and Forgery; Part Three: Money, Money, Money; Chapter Six: Investment; Chapter
Seven: Speculation; Chapter Eight: The Dark Side; Epilogue; Appendix; Notes; Bibliography;
Index
About the author
Georgina Adam has spent more than 30 years writing about the art market and the arts in general. She was editor of the Art Market section of The Art Newspaper 2000-2008, then editor at large. She wrote a weekly column for the Financial Times for eight years, until 2016. In 2014 she published Big Bucks: The Explosion of the Art Market in the 21st Century (Lund Humphries). In addition to her specialisation in the art market, Adam is particularly interested in emerging cultural centres. She lectures at Sotheby's Institute in London and participates in panels about the market: she is a board member of Talking Galleries, patron of the Association of Women Art Dealers and member of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA).
Summary
Drawing on a series of tenaciously wrought interviews with artists, collectors, lawyers, bankers and convicted artist forgers, the author charts the voracious commodification of artists and art objects, and art's position in the clandestine puzzle of the highest echelons of global capital.
Additional text
'A “must-read” for anyone with an interest in the relationship between art and money.' Daily Telegraph
