Comments on: This Week in Comments: Part One, Warhol! Part Two, Powhida!

By: jane

jane — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:17:06 +0000

yes, the big ‘unkept secret’ in the early nineties was that you could purchase a painting from the Warhol estate/ Foundation for little monies but only if you purchased another Warhol from their dealers trove for a larger mark up.

By: jane

jane — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:17:00 +0000

By: jane

jane — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:08:25 +0000

@rachel// Sadly there are many “contested’ Warhol’s out there, one example are the ‘out of edition’ prints which are worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the foundation. Some are ‘trial proofs’ which Warhol never saw or approved, many of these were made after the artists death in one of the offsite print shops Warhol used and were later acquired by the foundation. Owners who submitted these works to the Warhol foundation pre authentication board were given an approval. In 1995 the board reversed this approval leaving those who had purchased these works due to the previous approval out of pocket. When, in 2007, the foundation moved to sell their own trove of ‘out of edition’ prints, this reversal was reversed with owners asked to re submit their works to the authentication board due to ‘new information discovered’. To be given a THIRD stamp. Of course the board severely limited the number of prints allowed to be submitted by outside collectors making the works owned by the foundation the only game in town. Tim Hunt, the exclusive print dealer for the foundation, made over $1m in commissions last year alone. The exclusive dealer for paintings made over $950,000 in commissions. This is another reason to spend millions of Warhol’s charitable funds to stop this lawsuit, buy as many “friends’ as possible and to keep the debate away from the practices of the board. This will end up being ‘bleak house’ with the lawfirms connected to the Warhol Foundation racking in millions protecting this racket. There is a photo of an ‘out of edition’ print on joe simon’s website
http://www.myandywarhol.eu/my/authentication.asp

By: jane

jane — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 11:08:00 +0000

By: Art Fag City

Art Fag City — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 01:30:32 +0000

@greg.org I thought their philanthropic presence might be the reason no one’s been too eager to make a big deal out of it too. Certainly, this blog has benefited enormously from the gifts of the Warhol foundation, so I’m not particularly thrilled with the thought that those gifts might need to be scaled back in the coming years.

But this is the kind of story that should have appeal beyond the fine art world. It’s sensational and everyone “gets” Warhol.

Still, the Powhida post that followed this one received an enormous amount of attention, despite being far less important. I’m guessing most of the people in that thread have not directly benefited from Warhol. I have the sense this is a media problem — no one’s told the story in a way that makes this sound like anything more than trade news — but these things are hard to know.

By: Art Fag City

Art Fag City — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 01:30:00 +0000

But this is the kind of story that should have appeal beyond the fine art world. It’s sensational and everyone “gets” Warhol.

By: greg,org

greg,org — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 16:41:34 +0000

If I’m not mistaken, the Bruno B portrait that Crone wrote about specifically, which is currently owned by Anthony d’Offay, is supposed to go to Tate Modern. Right?

So what had been a private battle between the Authentication Board and a collector or two is now embroiling one of the biggest art donations to one of the most important museums in the world.

With all that, it just blows my mind how quiet this thing continues to be. Maybe on one hand, there’s the perception that only rich collectors are being hurt, so screw’em. But I also have to think that the overwhelming market and philanthropic power of the Warhol Foundation is such that almost no one–dealers, museums, collectors/trustees, non-profits, artists–is too eager to make too big a deal over it.

By: greg,org

greg,org — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 16:41:00 +0000

If I’m not mistaken, the Bruno B portrait that Crone wrote about specifically, which is currently owned by Anthony d’Offay, is supposed to go to Tate Modern. Right?

So what had been a private battle between the Authentication Board and a collector or two is now embroiling one of the biggest art donations to one of the most important museums in the world.

By: Rachel

Rachel — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 18:42:28 +0000

@AFC – there’s not much for dealers to gain here. Most of the contested Warhols are already in private collections, and if they were authenticated, they’d in all likelihood be sold at auction. If there’s demand for an artist, a gallery obviously would want more inventory if they know they could move it, but they don’t necessarily have to worry about the long-term value of each individual work: they’ve already cashed in. Once a gallery has sold a work, it doesn’t financially help them in anyway if it goes on to appreciate value (obviously there are issues in terms of long-term relationships with collectors, artists, etc., but since the artist in question is dead, this doesn’t matter much.) \n\nAs for your speculation, I think you’re right — if these Warhols are authenticated, the Warhol Foundation’s board will have to justify the denial of all of the other so-called fakes over the years. Letting a handful of Warhols enter the market wouldn’t necessarily make a huge difference on the value, but the implications are much broader because it would be an admission that a “real” Warhol isn’t necessarily one that was physically created by the artist himself.

By: Rachel

Rachel — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 18:42:00 +0000

@AFC – there’s not much for dealers to gain here. Most of the contested Warhols are already in private collections, and if they were authenticated, they’d in all likelihood be sold at auction. If there’s demand for an artist, a gallery obviously would want more inventory if they know they could move it, but they don’t necessarily have to worry about the long-term value of each individual work: they’ve already cashed in. Once a gallery has sold a work, it doesn’t financially help them in anyway if it goes on to appreciate value (obviously there are issues in terms of long-term relationships with collectors, artists, etc., but since the artist in question is dead, this doesn’t matter much.) nnAs for your speculation, I think you’re right — if these Warhols are authenticated, the Warhol Foundation’s board will have to justify the denial of all of the other so-called fakes over the years. Letting a handful of Warhols enter the market wouldn’t necessarily make a huge difference on the value, but the implications are much broader because it would be an admission that a “real” Warhol isn’t necessarily one that was physically created by the artist himself.