ARTS S o, everyone has had lots of fun vilifying Sotheby's.
Cartoonists have shown them as upper-class spivs, commentators have pro- duced dire warnings of the end of the auc- tion trade as we know it, politicians have thundered about tomb plundering and all the other auction houses and dealers have kept very, very quiet. But, as more measured voices, until now drowned by the shrill cries of instant out- rage, are saying, the Channel 4 sting's most likely effect is to send unprovenanced works of art underground. Most of us who buy and sell at auction will notice no Change whatsoever. Much more interesting to ordinary buyers is the long-term shift from patronising dealers to bidding at auc- tion and the threat to the London art mar- ket by a proposed EU levy which would effectively drive much of its business to America (though that's another story). Peter Nahum, the London art dealer, is quite right to liken the big houses to super- markets. 'Our Sainsburys and Tescos are called Sotheby's and Christie's. They used to wholesale works of art — they now retail them. Just as the superstores are now offer- ing financial services, banking and anything else they can think of, so do Sotheby's and Christie's ... They now own dealers. They us — plus.' He might have added that, if the auction houses had stuck to wholesal- ing, Channel 4 would not have been inter- ested in their practices. Dealers have only themselves to blame for the public's flight. Fewer than 30 years ,ago, when auction house catalogues looked like PhD theses and views were thronged with desiccated grey men peeringat smudged hallmarks through magnifying glasses, the dealers were supreme. It was the time when antiques were offered by dealers without a price tag so it could be upped if you looked particularly rich and When supercilious young men, equivalent to those in Rolls-Royce showrooms, sneered at anyone less than a Getty before offering furniture that cost about the same as a Silver Ghost. It was no better if you were selling. Trea- sured possessions would attract the same camel-lipped sneer and, if you were lucky, the dealer 'would take them off your hands' for a couple of quid. Later, these same objects would turn up as stars in the dealer's window, though at least you were spared the knowledge of their actual price. As a result, most of us thought dealers would refuse to buy their own grandmother or more than a fiver while remarking that the old dear was in a bad condition and not especially sought-after but would happily sell her for thousands if she turned out to date from the Ming dynasty.
Dealers versus the auctioneers
Despite recent events, buyers are still favouring the auction houses, as Leslie Geddes-Brown reports The auction houses didn't take long to spot their opportunity. As Nahum says, they became retailers and if, in the process, took on the availability of Tesco or Sains- burys, it needed to be done. They cleaned up their act so that the public would entrust them with commission bids (in the old days, my auction house bids always ended up suspiciously near my top price, now they don't), they gave rough price esti- mates for every lot, they created catalogues as demandingly beautiful as the World of Interiors and they employed press depart- ments to make sure we knew all about it. And, if they demanded a commission from both buyer and seller, we still willingly paid. Each year the houses come up with new, publicity-attracting wheezes Christie's has its lot-finder service which Sotheby's will undoubtedly soon copy and Sotheby's, like Bond Street's other fashion- able stops of Nicole Farhi and Donna Karan, has a smart café. It's hard to know what the dealers, now, poorer, friendlier and more design-con- scious, can do to fight back. The big cheeses like Wildenstein are deserting Bond Street to sell from a 'non-gallery space', and Malcolm Hord, chief executive of the dealers' association, LAPADA, believes that such specialist dealers, whose mark-ups can run to 300 per cent, are Mum, can I borrow the pram tonight?' `rapidly becoming extinct'. In the Nineties, the grand names of Ackerman, Leger, Spink and Leggatt have either been bought out or closed (Spink falling to Christie's). Colnaghi sold its frontage to a fashion shop and, rather than downsize, upstaired itself. Karsten Schubert, the modern art dealers, fled Cork Street.
Dealers are now selling from home or sheltering in flocks in the equivalent of a covered market (as opposed to a supermar- ket) such as the permanent Gray's antique market near Bond Street tube or the bi- annual Fine Art and Antiques Fair at Olympia (160 stalls, 20,000 visitors, the next due from 25 February to 2 March). Michael Tollemache, chairman of the Soci- ety of London Art Dealers which repre- sents the top 100 London dealers, does accept that they need to be chummier. But they are fighting back. 'We are producing a brochure to explain exactly why it's better and cheaper to buy and sell through a deal- er. We are also running seminars in presen- tation and marketing.'
Hord is also far from pessimistic about the future which lies, he says, with our old friend, the Internet. With this, dealers can offer their goods internationally and 'take the waiting out of wanting'. Buyers can look at antiques, even try them in their liv- ing-rooms, on screen, then check up-to- date prices, lists of stolen and smuggled goods and the histories of the artists before deciding. 'It's expensive now but, in less than 10 years, the technology will be as common as calculators.'
As a former auctioneer (with Phillips in Amsterdam) he recognises what the sale- rooms have done — along with the Antique Road Show, Miller's Price Guide and the glossy magazines — to increase the market. Nearly everyone, from the family at the car-boot sale to the billionaire at the Impressionist sale, is a punter.
In the end, however, the choice of dealer versus auction house depends on character. Buying at auction is hugely exciting (95 per cent of those at big Impressionist sales are there for gasps, not Gauguins), auction- aholics have all the fun of betting at the races without losing their stakes. There are those (yes, me) who will buy a box of fossils unseen for the thrill of opening it up. Oth- ers prefer the safe world of the dealer, where the desk is wax polished and the clock is working, where the painting can be tried for weeks over the mantelpiece before the decision is made and the pietra dura table delivered to the top storey of a tower block. But, with both dealers and auctioneers clambering on the Internet, we buyers will soon be able to surf for Sevres, Sargent or silver however we please.
Previous page
