Seven Days in the Art World Read Online Free Page A

apologizes, stands up, pays the bill, and says, “It has been my pleasure.”
    I sit, finishing my water and collecting my thoughts. Ségalot is infectiously zealous. We had been sitting for almost an hour and he had spoken with absolute conviction the entire time. This is a talent essential to his job. On one level, the art market is understood as the supply and demand of art, but on another, it is an economy of belief. “Art is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it” is the operating cliché. Although this may suggest the relationship between a con artist and his mark, the people who do well believe every word they say—at least at the moment they say it. The auction process is about managing confidence on all levels—confidence that the artist is and will continue to be culturally significant, confidence that the work is a good one, confidence that others will not withdraw their financial support.
     
    6:35 P.M. The doors in the two-story glass wall of Christie’s lobby revolve continuously with a steady flow of ticket holders. Many dealers and consultants are already here, as the evening sale is an opportunity to meet and greet “the money.” In the queue for the coat check, and again in the line to pick up paddles for bidding, people speculate about which objects are going to do well and who is likely to buy what. Everybody knows something. People drop their voices when they utter a name or a lot number, so you tend to hear only the verdict: “That’s going to fly” or “That estimate is way off.” As people part ways to go to their seats, collectors say to each other “Good luck” and “See you in Miami.” It’s all gleaming smiles.
    The crowd is international. You hear a lot of French in an array of Belgian, Swiss, and Parisian accents. Belgium and Switzerland probably have the highest per capita ratios of contemporary art collectors. Until World War II, France was the center for buying and selling art. From after the war to the early 1980s, London was the auction capital, but now the British city is a secondary site, where the buyers tend to bid over the phone. Looking at this busy scene, it is hard to believe that New York was a provincial outpost of the art business until the late 1970s. Christie’s started holding auctions here only in 1977, but now, in the words of one Christie’s expert, “The market is alive—all the major players are in the room.”
    I see David Teiger, a New York–based collector in his late seventies. He is talking to a well-preserved woman close to his own age.
    “What period do you collect?” she asks.
    “This morning,” he responds.
    “You like art by young artists?” she asks earnestly.
    “I don’t necessarily like it, but I buy it,” he jokes.
    “So…are you bidding tonight?”
    “No. I don’t come here to buy. I come to smell the perfume—the aroma of what is in the oven—to gauge where the public is going. That is nothing to do with where I might go. I’ll go somewhere overlooked or undervalued.”
    Teiger prides himself on his independence; auctions have too much of a pack mentality for him. He bought Andy Warhol out of the Stable Gallery’s show in 1963. “You know how much I paid for it?” he says. “Seven hundred and twenty dollars! Do you know when MoMA bought their first Warhol? 1982!” Having done that, why would he want to spend $10 million on a lesser Warhol now? It wouldn’t sit right with his adventurous self-image. He’s not that kind of collector.
    So who buys at auction? Many “serious” collectors of contemporary art buy from primary dealers. It’s a lot cheaper, if a lot riskier, to be ahead of the curve. On the secondary or resale market, the risk is lower, because the work has been market-tested. All art is “priceless,” but assurance is expensive. A small percentage of collectors buy only at auction. “They like the discipline of the deadline,” explains a Sotheby’s director. “They’re very busy, so