Are the Rich and Powerful Nuts?

By Rich Kozlovich
 

I recently read an article by Mary Romano entitled, Billionaires Chasing Warhols Fuel $16 Billion Art Sales, that really made me think the rich and powerful are ….well….nuts!.

Are you an art lover? I’m an art lover! Of course that means different things to different people. I love seeing Norman Rockwell paintings. I love his work for two reasons. One, he really could paint things the way they looked, and most importantly his work didn’t look like he was on drugs or insane. And secondly, the message his works sent was profound at so many levels.

I’m also an art hater! I hate modern art! I think Pablo Picasso was the con artist’s con artist. He must have had a great public relations firm behind him to convince the world this guy was some kind of artist other than a con artist, let alone a great artist. His work was crap! See….clarity! We really do need to understand that manure stinks - and even if you call it compost - it still stinks.

The biggest art huckster of all in my opinion was Andy Warhol. He “created” these two works called, "Triple Elvis," a 1963 silkscreen of Elvis Presley, sold for $81.9 million at Christie's on Nov. 12, 2014” and "Four Marlons," depicting four identical images of a young Marlon Brando fetched $69.6 million”. The auction house brought in a total of 151.5 million dollars to the owners of these works.

How was that creative? Any old ad agency produces stuff like this on a regular basis promoting some product or other.

Now here’s a piece that really is fascinating. Whoever did this must have gone to school back when we kids still had to use fountain pens. Why? Because drawing ovals was part and parcel of writing class in those days, and anyone who had to draw ovals with wet ink on coarse paper, sometimes with tiny pieces of wood still in the paper, knows about ovals. The best you could hope for in those days was an “A” in writing. This artist would have been lucky to get a "C" for his ovals, but the owner of this piece got 69.6 million, and the “artist” didn’t even name it! Well, if I drew ovals that badly I wouldn't name it either.

But you have to give this next “artist” real credit for brass. He covered half the canvas with black paint and the other half with some sort of beige with a racing stripe off center, and called it “Black Fire”. Any painter of race cars could have done as well if not better. Well at least he named it, which must be why it brought in 84.2 million dollars.

Which brings me to my point. Do we really believe these people actually like this stuff and actually think it’s art?

Well….actually….yes, they do! I’m also sure much of this “compost”is being bought as investments, but people really do like art “compost”.

What’s troubling is these are rich, powerful, well educated and many of them are in leadership roles making decision that impact the lives of millions of people. Wow! Do I feel confident now or what?

Oh, one more thing. Don’t send me anything telling me how you disagree me. This is one case in which I don’t care what anyone thinks unless they agree with me. See, clarity!