Thirteen of the Questions Most Frequently Asked
Me
by confused collectors who know I
worked thirteen years
in an auction house:
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| 1. |
How
can it save me money to ask a professional to bid for me
at auction?
An experienced bidder can hear when there is real
interest
from the room or the phone and
can also tell when no one is really bidding except the
auctioneer (in behalf of
the owner). In
the latter case you are not really in a competitive
situation, i.e., the cost of
the work is not
market driven. If you are simply bidding against the
owner, you may well be
paying too
much.
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| 2. |
Why
should I ask a professional advisor to examine a work
for me before I
buy?
A professional advisor will always
check the condition
report for a work before bidding.
These conditions reports are usually available at good
auction houses, but
you have to ask
for them. Don't just assume that because condition is
not mentioned in the
catalogue that a
work is in good condition. A good advisor will also look
at the work in person
and
evaluate the condition, compare how the work actually
looks with the
illustration in the
catalogue (the difference can be shocking sometimes). If
any questions arise
on personal
examination it may be necessary to engage a
professional restorer to provide
an additional
report, for a fee. This can be money well spent since
auction houses freely
admit that their
own cataloguers are not professional restorers and that
the in-house
condition reports they
prepare are only the result of a superficial examination
under an ultra violet
lamp. Certainly
the auction personnel do not make any claims about what
cleaning or repairs
can or cannot
be safely attempted on a work they are offering, and the
advice of a restorer
may be
invaluable in determining whether a painting that is not
in perfect condition
can be safely
restored. Some works should not be touched, so if you
are not satisfied with
the way a
work looks "as is" you should check with a
restorer before you
buy, not after.
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| 3. |
How
reliable are pre-sale estimates? Are auction prices
always wholesale?
A professional advisor will compare what's "on the
block" with
what's available "on the
market." Record prices are just that: the highest
public price ever paid
for a particular
object. This is nice for the seller, when it happens, but
if you are a buyer you
can be paying
over retail! I always remember when I buy at auction,
that I was the person
in the room
willing to pay more than 600 or 700 people! This is fine
in the case of a
masterpiece, like
the Frida Kahlo, Diego and I, that I bought in 1990 for
only $1,430,000 (the
good old
days), but not necessarily so smart for works readily
available at galleries
and art fairs. |
| 4. | What should I consider when I
buy at auction? Or
from a dealer?
A professional advisor will discuss with you the five
most important points
to remember
when considering the purchase of a work or art: quality,
rarity, condition,
provenance and
price. No one of these points is sufficient to warrant
overlooking the others.
All of these
points should figure into your decision, even if you
decide to make
allowances in special
cases. For example, if a work were extremely rare, you
might have to accept
a less than
perfect state of preservation. But it would seem
imprudent to buy a readily
available work
in less than fine condition.
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| 5. |
What is
provenance? How important is it?
Provenance - literally, where a work came from before
is always important.
It is never a
bargain to acquire a work with unknown or dubious
provenance, no matter
how
reasonable the price. On the other hand, provenance can
cost you money. I
have seen
collectors succumb to mass hysteria in the fever to
acquire a shred of
something that
belonged to someone famous. That is why some cookie
jars that belonged to
Andy
Warhol went for $25,000 in the celebrated Andy Warhol
single owner sale at
Sotheby's.
And worn ballet slippers that were used by Rudolph
Nureyev fetched
thousands of dollars
whereas ordinary slippers would be worth nothing. That
is provenance at
work and it is
something that auction houses exploit superbly. But if
all you want is a
collectable cookie
jar you can save a lot of money by waiting for an
ordinary auction at
Christie's East or by
hitting the flee markets. |
| 6. | If
the price is low, am I getting a bargain?
In fact a really low price should sound an alarm in some
situations. Never
buy something
because you are given a story that the owner is in great
distress and is
willing to sell
cheaply if the money comes quickly. I have frequently
seen fakes offered in
such cases and
have personally saved a few collectors many thousands
of dollars when I was
consulted
beforehand about "bargain" pictures. The
trouble is, many buyers
are convinced that they
do not have time to go through the methodical and
prudent procedures they
would employ
in normal situations, and this is when big mistakes can
be made. In fact, it is
exactly what
the pressure salesmen are relying on. Never suspend your
judgment because a
price seems
cheap. Don't think that because you are dealing with art
it is any different
from your normal
life. If someone offered you a house or a piece of land at
a great price you
would still
check the title and have the property professionally
examined before you
paid the seller.
Why would you behave differently in the case of an
artwork?
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| 7. | If
the price is high, am I being cheated?
Price should be a consideration but not the only one. I
have seen many
collectors pass on
great paintings because they thought the price was too
high and then go on to
form very
mediocre collections. These collections are usually hard
to resell because
they are just
merchandise. Some of the finest and ultimately most
valuable collections I
have seen were
put together by collectors who understood that
sometimes paying the price
pays off. When
markets fall off, it is generally the exceptional works
that hold their
value.
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| 8. | If I
notice a painting in an auction going way below the
estimate, should I buy
it?
Isn't that a bargain?
Not necessarily. Certainly bargains can come up at
auctions and a prepared
buyer can get
a great buy if for some reason the owner's reserve, or
minimum price is very
low. But if a
work seems to be going cheaply it may just be that the
estimate is too high
and the
auctioneer is having trouble getting buyers into the
bidding, even if the price
seems
ridiculously low to you. If you enter in at that point, you
may just be bidding
against the
auctioneer, who is acting for the seller. If you haven't
done any comparison
shopping in
relation to that lot you could be making a mistake. Also,
if you bid on
something that you
didn't examine first, you are making the classic mistake
of novice
auctiongoers: bidding on
impulse. Maybe the picture is in bad condition, and that's
why no one is
bidding. Maybe
the attribution is doubtful and other bidders have been
warned off. You
wouldn't know,
because you didn't check with anyone first. So be careful
about bidding on
works that you
weren't thinking about acquiring before you entered the
saleroom.
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| 9. |
If I
buy the most expensive works in a sale, I'm buying the
best, right?
No, sometimes the best works go very high, but
sometimes flukes occur. In
several cases I
observed very small but nice works going for way over
the estimated prices,
immediately
after a large important work by the same artist did very
well. A small work
by the popular
Nicaraguan artist, Armando Morales, went for almost
$100,000 in one of the
recent sales,
right after a large and important work by the same
artist went very high. The
price for the
large work was justifiable, but the small work was way
over priced (a friend
of mine
refused an opportunity to buy the very same picture
directly from the owner
this summer
for $40,000) and I suspect the purchaser will have a
difficult time getting
his money back
should he try to resell the painting any time soon. I have
seen postage stamp
sized Tamayo
paintings of watermelons (the most sought after
subject) go for over
$100,000 at auction
(stocking stuffers, perhaps?) which couldn't possibly be
sold for that amount
now, and I
have seen mediocre, atypical works by Frida Kahlo fetch
crazy prices in the
second day
sale ($100,000 for an early watercolor in 1990) right
after a record price
was established
in the night sale for one of her masterpieces. Auction
fever drives these
prices up and the
fear (incorrect) that it will never again be possible to
acquire a work by an
artist who is
suddenly doing well. The truth is that there is always an
opportunity to buy
again at the
correct price - you may just have to wait awhile for the
right opportunity to
present itself.
But buying rashly out of desperation is not good idea and
it can be costly.
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| 10. | So
if I wait until after the sale and see what didn't sell, I
can really get a
bargain?
Not necessarily. I was recently asked
this question by a
client of my gallery who thought
that a painting by a famous artist that was bought in for
less than half of
what it sold for a
few years ago would be a bargain if he could get it for
the price at which it
was passed
over in the sale. I explained to him that it was really
necessary to consider
if the picture had
been sold at the right price the first time round or if had
been inflated for
some reason. I
checked the 1992 price marked in my catalogue (not the
published price in
the pricelist,
which is 10 to 15% higher because of the buyer's
premium) and it turned out
that the
painting had indeed sold for twice as much in 1992.
However, I pointed out
that the price
it fetched the first time was exactly the low estimate
and that I had noted
in my catalogue
that the purchaser in 1992 was one of the big new
(inexperienced) buyers
who had been
bidding against the auctioneer only (no other bidders)
and had paid what was
probably the
owner's reserve price. Now that this buyer was forced by
circumstances to
become a
seller, the auction house had advised him to set a much
lower minimum price
than the price
he himself had paid three years earlier, and still the
work was not sold. My
advice to the
collector seeking to make a deal after the sale was that
the seller had paid
too much
originally and that even at half the price, the painting
was not really a
bargain.
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| 11. |
How come my reserve was
$150,000 and my
picture was sold for $140,000?
A friend of mine who consigned a work to one of the
recent auctions
approached me after
the sale, somewhat bewildered because he believed his
painting was unsold
since the
bidding did not reach his minimum, yet he heard someone
near him say he had
bought the
painting. I was sure that the work had been sold because
I heard the
auctioneer call out a
paddle number. I suggested that my friend check with
the department, since
sometimes the
auctioneer will let a work go for less than the owner's
minimum because he
knows that if
you add up the selling comission (6 to 10%) and the
buyer's premium (15% on
lots
bringing $500,000 and 10% of the remainder) there is 20
to 25 percent
commission to
"play" with. He can decide to cut the house's
commission, pay the
owner as if the work
had been sold for the agreed minimum and still make
some profit. This is
usually done in
close situations when the sale does not seem to be going
well and the
auctioneer knows
that he has only one "live" buyer in the room.
He can keep bidding
against that person in
behalf of the owner and risk the outcome that the bidder
stops before the
reserve is
reached, or he can "fold his hand" when he
gets near the reserve
price and take a little less
commission for the auction house.
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| 12. |
Why are you telling us all your
secrets in a free
newsletter?
In 26 years (13 at a prestigious New York auction house
and 13 running a
gallery) I have
actually acquired a few more secrets than can be fit
into a six page
newsletter.
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| 13. |
Any other reason?
Yes. I think the more informed a collector is the better
and I am happy to
make my own
experience available to those who seek my advice.
Sometimes the best deal
is at auction,
sometimes it is at a gallery. Sometimes the best
paintings go to auction,
sometimes they are
sold privately. An informed collector will check out the
major auction
houses, the reputable
art fairs, and the galleries. We're very patient. We can
wait for
you.
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Mary-Anne Martin Winter 1996
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