6 NOVEMBER 1976, Page 20

Fine Arts and Art Books

Public taste and public auction

Huon Mallalieu

Nowadays it is seldom possible to take Carlyle's advice and 'forget for a moment... the learned babble of the sale room and the varnishing auctioneer'. In the days of James Christie and Samuel Baker the 'varnishing' was done by the auctioneer from the rostrum itself—Christie in particular being known for his golden tongue. Today such a technique is regarded as suitable only for cattle sales, but the methods employed by the major sale rooms to gain publicity are no more sophisticated, consisting largely of press reports of ever higher prices obtained at auction.

The reasons for this are to be found in the tripartate nature of the art market, auctioneer, dealer and collector, whether private or institutional, and in the need of the first two to rely on the last as a source of supply as well as a potential buyer. The bulk of sale room publicity is aimed at producing new goods, and the report of a particularly good price for an artist or an object generally leads to more of the same appearing at the reception counters of the sale room in question. It will also go some way towards establishing a precedent for the potential buyer.

Although the auction houses might be thought to be the leaders in establishing new tastes and fashions among collectors, this is usually the work of the dealers, who may well use sales in doing so, and of outside events of which the auctioneers are quick to take advantage. An example of a largely dealer-created market is the boom in prices for jade snuff-bottles over the last few years. In contrast to many fields, age is hardly taken into consideration here. The attractiveness of the individual piece, which could have been made in Hong Kong two years ago, is all that seems to matter. However, even after a plethora of high sale prices, if only two major dealers were to drop their interest, the whole market would probably collapse.

There is one well-established case of art sales leading to a widespread change in artistic taste, and even then it was a matter of chance rather than policy. This was the revival of interest in Dutch landscape painting, as exemplified by Constable's work which took place in the 1790s and early 1800s after many years of subservience to the Classicism of Claude, the Poussins and our own Richard Wilson. This was very largely inspired by the sale in London during and after the French Revolution of the great collect ions of the French aristocracy.

In fact the role of the auctioneers in forming public taste is usually that of the second wave of troops in an invasion. In this Sotheby's, ably commanded by Peter Wilson, their chairman, and Marcus Linell, one of the directors, have generally proved quickest at seizing opportunities. They were the first to take advantage of the growing interest in Impressionist and modern pictures in the 1950s and early 1960s, and to see the need for a stake in the American market—where Christie's are still struggling to break their hold. The establishment of Sotheby's Belgravia was a rapid response to the Victorian revival, later followed bY Christie's South Kensington. Here 'Victorian' is too limiting a description, since the revival has not been confined to Britain, and Sotheby's were also the first to exploit the interest of the European countries in their nineteenth-century artists and craftsmen.

Other opportunities have been eagerlY taken by the auctioneers. The Islamic exhibition of last spring has led to the establishment of regular Islamic weeks of sales by both Christie's and Sotheby's, to some extent cooperating with each other. BY chance or good management, this month Christie's will be selling a major collection of American Indian and Eskimo artefacts, again coinciding with a major and influential exhibition. The years of the antiques boom up to about 1972, also provided opportunities for the establishment of new areas of collecting. The new interest in such things as gramophones, photographs and fairings, is directly attributable to the fact that the smaller collector had been priced out of the traditional markets. The same is true of English watercolours, where for 3 time, the most dreadful things commanded comparatively high prices, partly because of lack of knowledge, and partly because of the impossibility for most people of securing the best. The auction houses were swift to cater for such potential buyers. Unfortunately, the very success of the. auctioneers, both in fact and in terms 01 publicity, has led to something of a revolu: tion in the traditional art market. When in November 1970 Christie's sold 'Juan de Parejafor £2.3 million a commentator noted that the sale marked the transforma", tion of a firm of gentlemen into a firm 01 businessmen. This new approach--: Sotheby's had already demonstrated its financial effect iveness--created an imbalance between the old partnership of auctioneer and dealer, since the auctioneer has gradually taken over many of the functions of the dealer. One of these was the patient scholarship and research needed to authenticate and establish any major, and many minor, works of art. Until comparatively recently, a director of a leading house could say, in interviewing a candidate for a job who happened to have a degree: 'You'll have to forget all that academic stuff here.' Now the standard of cataloguing, at any rate for important pieces, tends to be high enough to put most museums to shame.

In a way, too, the dealers suffered from the boom, as they may eventually suffer from the present boom caused by the weak

ness of the pound and the cheapness of antiques here. Private sellers tend to turn to the auction rooms in the first instance' cutting out the dealer, and he has to buY much of his stock at the top of the market at auction. This can well lead to the tying oP of a great deal of capital when caution returns among buyers. Then there is the fact, although often denied, of the sale rooms engaging in actual dealing. The 'guaranteed reserve' scheme operated by SothebY s could be seen as an example of this, and the deal whereby the firm advised and bought for the British Rail Pension Fund, was 3 most dangerous one, since it is difficult t° see how their conflicting duties to seller and buyer could be reconciled. It is hard to see how London can maintatr its position as the capital of the art worlo. The pressures on British dealers, with VAT, and the new continental-style buyer s premium could be too strong. The auction' eers appear to recognise this by moving a considerable proportion of their business and assets abroad. This applies not onlY.t°, the big two, but also to Phillips, the ally' London house, which has usually beet] quick to capitalise on the successes and mistakes of its larger rivals. However' British auctioneering is the best anywhere' and wherever they are based British auction houses will maintain their standing as auctioneers to the world for the foreseeable future.