What other people spend their own money on is their business, but I just find it obscene.

Some picture

“What other people spend their own money on is their business, but I just find it obscene.”

Make your mind up then!

I would spend it on class A’s and expensive hookers.

£89 million…. Isn’t that what a premiership footballer trousers just for going to ‘work’ every day? 🙄

It’s up to them and them alone, but I find it obscene. Is that clearer?

I could think of more worthwhile things to spend the money on.

Art has a worthwhile place in the world. But £89 million for that isn’t it.

Just my opinion.

It’s a lot of money for three pictures innit.

If I had waaay more than 89 million to spend I might, though I don’t think it’d be that set

They’ll maybe even appreciate in value

I don’t know much about art but I do know personally I would not spend £89m on that!!

All relative though – if you are a multi-billionaire then spunking the equivalent of a handful of loose change on a drawing may not seem quite so bonkers

Its not really obsence thou is it.

I doubt that money will come straight out of the bank, more deals will need to be done to put that amount together, other works will be sold, earnings will be generated for people along the way. Lesser works may move out of private hands in to public galleries.

like all business its just a big machine.

it will have been bought as a investment, possibly by a hedge fund or similar. It will be locked away for a few years before being sold again to make the owner(s) 10 million quid or so. that’s how really rich people get even richer.

All relative though – if you are a multi-billionaire then spunking the equivalent of a handful of loose change on a drawing may not seem quite so bonkers

Indeed.

To quote many of my acquaintances

HOW MUCH? On a push bike?* You could buy a car for that

etc, etc.

*Of course, I make sure I punch anyone who uses the phrase “push bike”.

Bacon painting fetches record price

Don’t look like any bacon I’ve ever seen.

Why’s he sat in a bus shelter?

I spent £40 on a water bottle for my bike.
Now that really is obscene.

Bear in mind that painting is likely to only increase in value, making it a fairly sound investment.

Although I agree that the amount it sold for is obscene considering other issues going on in the world right now.

Some people might think spending £4-5,000 on a bicycle is obscene.

It’s alright, but it is hardly dogs playing poker.

If I thought it was a good investment, then yes. I’d just stick it in a safe though, I wouldn’t want it on my wall.

You think the new ‘owner’ purchased it to look at? It’ll be locked in a vault for 20 years (or perhaps loaned to a gallery), just quietly going up in value…

I’m regretting using the word obscene, it doesn’t really express my feelings about it. Art obviously does have its place and I agree with what a lot of you have said, all things are relative etc. I can appreciate someone / some organization buying it as an investment, it makes financial sense.

But, how can 3 pieces of canvas, a bit of paint and a few hours of someones time actually be worth £89m?

how can 3 pieces of canvas, a bit of paint and a few hours of someones time actually be worth £89m?

The thing is that ‘money’ has no value either, surely? All money is a collective belief that a nominal piece of paper has a value that we all accept and can use to barter.

So all that’s happening is that something with no intrinsic worth is begin swapped for something else with no intrinsic worth? As long as enough people remain convinced that a painting is worth an amount of money then it’s no different to carrying around a bankers draft for £90 million?

I think it’s quite good value, ok so it was £89m but it’s not like Bacon will be doing another will he. No doubt bought for investment but I hope that the public get to see them, then I think it would be worth it. Works of Art like this bring folks to Galleries all over the world who make money off the back of having such Art hanging around, the Uffizi for instance brings folk in on the back of a certain M Angelo, whose to say they would/wouldn’t turn up if any/none of his works were hung there?
Thing I find facinating is how they are valued in the first place. Pop over to any part of the UK and you will find folks dawbing on canvas in sheds or fields and sticking stuff on walls or selling at local markets/fates and craft fairs. Some of this stuff (works of art) is rather good but whose to say it’s worth £20-£40-£150?
Clearly provenance comes into the value, artists nature, subject matter and era, peer group etc.
But this ones a bit like saying Damien Hursts “Cow” or “Crystal Skill” isn’t worth what was paid for it in the first instance.
FWIW I like the Bacon pictures, to me they represent a personal view of his own image.

I’ve just spent £5.70 on a Sausage Sarnie (veggie) and a coffee… that was worth it. 😉

Bear in mind that painting is likely to only increase in value, making it a fairly sound investment.

only is so much as they can convince some other rich amoral soulless **** to join them in the ponzi scheme based entirely on your premise

Arts fantastic – Art as a business is generally vulgar.

Capitalism eh its beautiful…wonders how many land mines could be cleared, children given clean water, people given protection form preventable diseases etc

Just another example of the sickening and growing wealth divide.

“…while american businessmen snap-up Van Goghs for the price of a hospital wing…” Nothing Ever Happens – Del Amitri.

only is so much as they can convince some other rich amoral soulless **** to join them in the ponzi scheme based entirely on your premise

I never said I approved of it.

Although now and then an artwork is sold to raise money for some good cause or other, so occasionally the ‘overinflation’ of art values is of positive benefit.

Capitalism eh its beautiful…wonders how many land mines could be cleared, children given clean water, people given protection form preventable diseases etc

But then you wouldn’t have all those wonderful luxury goods, such as bicycles, that make your life so much nicer than those who toil to produce them…

But, how can 3 pieces of canvas, a bit of paint and a few hours of someones time actually be worth £89m?

Same as money. A suitcase of paper has no value unless everyone else is part of the illusion.

how can 3 pieces of canvas, a bit of paint and a few hours of someones time actually be worth £89m?

Economic philosophy aside, it probably took the bloke a bit more than a few hours to be able to paint like that. Why not have a go yourself? Let’s see how good your brush-work is after ‘a few hours’.

A guy I’d never met before bought a large painting of mine. I later found out he had a Bacon too. If I’d known that I’d have asked a little more for it.

Top bloke, he left a portion of his collection to Médecins Sans Frontières.

He fished in Orkney, the gillies said he’d sometimes bid on paintings at auction from the middle of the loch. He was a bit deaf as he shot too many grouse.

http://artdaily.com/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=24628&b=kahn#.UoNPKTtFA5s

But then you wouldn’t have all those wonderful luxury goods, such as bicycles, that make your life so much nicer than those who toil to produce them

Aye it would be impossible to end the vulgar excesses of capitalism and still have bikes – good point well made.

£89 million would have covered nearly a third of the UN’s Philippines Aid appeal.

We also do not know what else the purchaser has spent their money on.

For example I am sure Bill Gates has spent a fair few bob on trinkets but has also donated in excess of $28bn to charities through his foundation.

That’s a fair few quid to give away…

Aye it would be impossible to end the vulgar excesses of capitalism and still have bikes – good point well made.

A world like this?

mcmoonter – impressed. on several counts.

Economic philosophy aside, it probably took the bloke a bit more than a few hours to be able to paint like that. Why not have a go yourself? Let’s see how good your brush-work is after ‘a few hours’.

But I’m not an artist so I imagine my brush-work wouldn’t be very good – I’m not sure what you’re getting at.

Simple economics, innit. Say I have 10 Bacons that I paid £1million each for, and a fellow collector has 10 Bacons that he also paid £1million each for, we orchestrate an auction where we outbid one-another until the price is a world record, and suddenly every Bacon increases in value by about 50 times.
Now our collections are worth half a billion, for an investment of just £89 million. Genius. That’s how the art world works.

mcmoonter – impressed. on several counts.

He was a totally unassuming guy, though he did wear smart suits.

After he’d paid me for the paintings, he asked for them to be delivered to Marlborough Fine Art, that was suddenly well out of my league.

In the days before the web, I blindly went to visit him in Oslo. It then became apparent how important a collector he was.

Double post

Another way to look at it is it was just sitting on a wall, doing no good to anyone. Now somebody who happened to have £89m has spent it, paid some taxes here and there, paid the auction house (who has then used it to pay its bills). The person who had it now has what’s left after they have paid more taxes here and there and who knows what they’ll spend it on. Maybe they’ll leave it a bank or maybe they’ll blow it on luxury goods made by people who have employees, or maybe they give the lot to the Philippines. Still it’s better than it sitting on the wall.

My real question is how the hell did the buyer get their £89m in the first place, not what’s it’s spent on.

The only wasted money is money sitting in an account doing nothing. Money is just a tool and like any tool it’s useless just sitting on you workbench.

But I’m not an artist so I imagine my brush-work wouldn’t be very good – I’m not sure what you’re getting at.

What I’m getting at is that you haven’t taken into account the hours and hours and hours of work that go into being able to do something like that. He didn’t just wake up one morning and realise “I’m an artist!!”, buy a canvas and paints and set about spending ‘a few hours’ creating his painting. You appear to have no appreciation of craft.