“The catbird seat” is an idiomatic phrase used to describe an enviable position, often in terms of having the upper hand or greater advantage in any type of dealing among parties. It derives from the secluded perch on which the gray catbird makes mocking calls.
–Wikipedia
Roberta and I are currently watching The Day of the Jackal, a miniseries based on the 1971 novel by Frederick Forsyth. (A movie was made of the book in 1973.) In this year’s iteration, Eddie Redmayne plays a professional assassin code-named The Jackal who is hired by shadowy employers to carry out killings of persons whom they believe to be a threat to their interests. The Jackal’s current target is a tech genius who has developed a soon-to-be released software called River, which will permit total transparency in worldwide financial dealings. The monied powers-that-be don’t want that to happen.
Eddie Redmayne as The Jackal, photo courtesy Peacock
Fortunately for Magnus Resch, art dealers and the owners of art world databases did not have to hire The Jackal to eliminate him when he unveiled an app in 2016 that would, he claimed, lead to total transparency in the art market. Using the app, visitors to an art fair or a gallery could scan an offered artwork with their cell phones and immediately learn the name of the artwork, its artist, its previous exhibitions and sales, and the current price being asked for similar works by competitors. Lawsuits from dealers and databases concerning copyright and intellectual property infringement succeeded in getting the app removed from the Apple store.
Back when I began working for a gallery, dealers were in the catbird seat. We had the information on previous auction sales because we had attended those sales and had written down the sale prices (and the names of the buyers, if we recognized them) in the auction catalogues. We also made notes on a work’s physical condition. Those catalogues were an indispensable part of our libraries. The Art Sales Index published a comprehensive listing of artists’ results at auction, but there were no photos in the book, it came out only once a year, and the description of the work was often simply, “Landscape, oil on canvas, 24 x 30 inches.” If you didn’t have ready access to the information, there was no way that you could know whether the price being asked for a work was fair market value.
Databases such as Artnet and Askart changed the art market completely. Now anyone considering a work of art can look up the results for that artist with a few keystrokes. Over the past 25 years, dealers have quit buying art for inventory at auction, since any would-be buyer will be able to find out the price the dealer paid and may balk at paying more than a modest commission.
But these changes aren’t enough for Magnus Resch. In a recent talk he gave at Art Law Day, an event co-sponsored by the Appraisers Association of America, Resch pretty much consigned gallery owners to the dustbin of history. They will cease to be the gatekeepers to the art market as a new generation of collectors, accustomed to buying online, will now buy directly from the artists’ websites.
To add even more transparency, Resch said, artworks when they are sold will be accompanied by non-fungible tokens, digital identifiers recorded on a blockchain (and don’t ask me what a blockchain is), and those identifiers will document every subsequent resale of the piece. The issue of artists receiving a commission when their works are resold has been a contentious one for many years, but such blockchain records would certainly strengthen an artist’s hand in pursuing such commissions.
The role of dealers will shift from being gallery owners to functioning much more like artists’ agents, according to Resch, similar to agents in Hollywood who keep track of promising opportunities and lobby the production companies to get starring roles for their clients. In the future, artists’ agents will strive to get their artists included in the exhibitions and other venues that will make them stars.
And the art world is all about stardom. Resch pointed out that each year 20% of all artists account for 50% of all art sales, in terms of dollar value. “Who knows the name of the player who is currently the number 35 seed in pro tennis?” he asked. Like those good-but-not-great tennis players toiling in obscurity, traveling around the world to play at minor tournaments, and barely breaking even financially, artists who haven’t made it big in their first 5 or so exhibitions might as well hang up their brushes. If you want a real career in art, you have to hit the big time while you’re still young.
There’s an odd contradiction between Resch’s announced desire to bring transparency to the art market, a transparency which he says will help both artists and collectors, and his view of the art market as the playground of a few real collectors. Actually, you can delete the word “real” in the preceding sentence, as Resch considers the term “collector” to apply only to the 6,000 persons who will spend at least $100,000 per year over a five-year period. The rest of us are simply occasional acquirers.
Has Resch seen the future, and does it work? Well, crazes come and go in the art world. The artists who are this year’s hot IPO’s, to use a business analogy, may be penny stocks in 20 years, their works de-accessioned by major collectors, who may themselves be relegated to sideline status as a new generation finds their taste old-fashioned. As on Wall Street, no one has a crystal ball.
If you’re one of those who might quaintly be termed “art lovers” and don’t have $500,000 to spend on building a “real” art collection, find a piece that speaks to you, get information wherever you can find it (or hire me to do so), and make a considered purchase. Then enjoy it while you experience the difference it makes in your home. You’ll never be in the catbird seat, but at least you won’t have The Jackal on your trail.
