I remember sitting in my gallery back in 2012, watching a young artist try to explain a three-minute loop to a collector who just wanted to know if he could hang it above his sideboard. The collector looked baffled, the artist looked defensive, and I sat there realizing that the traditional rules of “objecthood” were […]
Stop treating an auction catalogue like it’s a holy text. I spent twenty-six years watching collectors—and far too many artists—stare at a hammer price as if it were an objective truth, when in reality, it’s often just a snapshot of a very specific, very loud moment in a room full of people trying to outbid […]
I remember sitting in the back of a cluttered studio in the late nineties, watching a young painter struggle with a bowl of fruit that looked more like a collection of colorful lumps than actual light and shadow. He had spent a fortune on the finest sable brushes and expensive pigments, yet he was still […]
I remember standing in the back of a sleek, white-walled institution in London, listening to a curator drone on about “interrogating the liminality of space” while I looked at the actual work. It was a beautiful, expensive way of saying absolutely nothing. People treat the process of how curators build exhibitions like it’s some sacred, […]
Most people think a “complete guide to sculpture” should be a lecture on the chemical composition of bronze or the historical lineage of the Renaissance masters, but frankly, that’s a waste of your time. I spent twenty-six years watching brilliant makers pour their souls into stone and metal, only to realize they had no idea […]
I remember sitting in the back of a drafty studio in 1998, watching a young man spend three thousand pounds on a high-definition video setup for a piece that lasted exactly twelve minutes. He thought the expensive lens would somehow capture the “soul” of the movement, but all he actually captured was a very pricey, […]
Everyone tells you that museum acquisition is this grand, mystical alchemy where a curator discovers a soul and a committee grants immortality. It’s a lovely fairy tale, but it’s absolute nonsense. In my twenty-six years in the trade, I learned that understanding how museum acquisition works has far less to do with divine inspiration and […]
Most people think a “complete guide to photography collecting” should involve a lecture on the sublime nuances of silver gelatin processes or the philosophical weight of the decisive moment. They are wrong. If you walk into a high-end gallery expecting a seminar on aesthetics, you’re going to get fleeced. I spent twenty-six years watching well-meaning […]
I remember sitting in the back of a crowded gallery opening in the late nineties, nursing a lukewarm Chardonnay and watching a collector stare, quite intensely, at a seascape that cost more than my first car. The artist was a lovely person, but the painting was a disaster; it looked less like the Atlantic and […]
I remember sitting in a cramped back office in 1998, staring at a contract for a mid-career painter who was about to walk into an auction house with nothing but hope and a very expensive set of oil canvases. The broker was using all the right buzzwords—risk mitigation, liquidity, market stability—to explain a deal that, […]