How early is too early for fame? That seems to be the underlying question of this Timesarticle.
It seems that graduate student art is the new hot commodity on the artscape. Venture capitalists, scouts and collectors are pushing ahead of galleries (who traditionally do the discovering and displaying) and trying to grab talent at the source. If the article's title is to be believed, these people are looking for the next Warhol. And they're conducting their search at the country's premiere art schools, like Columbia and Yale.
Personally, I'm disgusted by people who look at art purely as a financial investment, as some sort of buy-and-sell game. Apparently the director of Sotheby's department of contemporary art, doesn't feel too differently:
Tobias Meyer, director of Sotheby's contemporary art department worldwide, calls it "a hunting sport." "Collectors want to beat the galleries at their own game," he said. "This insatiable need for stardom has made buying student work the art-world version of 'American Idol.' "
According to the article, those who are alarmed by this trend are reminded of Charles Saatchi, "the London advertising magnate who was the first to scoop up work by the so-called Young British Artists a decade ago, and then the first to dump much of it on the auction block... The market for some of those artists never recovered."
The other danger is that students who are showered with money and fame too early on won't amount to much in the long run. Mara Sprafkin, a second year grad student at Columbia's art school put it like this:
"If you do this amazing body of work in graduate school, and you hook up with a dealer and become known for that kind of work, how do you build on it?" she mused. "It's risky when you're young."
Some art schools are taking measures to protect their students from the vultures who descend upon their campuses.
There are some students, though, who feel that they're not given enough instruction about navigating the commerical aspect of the art world. Perhaps this is why some of them succumb to the attention they get from collectors and dealers while still in school. It could stem from being unsure they'll be able to make it on their own later. The answer, then, seems to be more career counseling. And perhaps even a class devoted to the commercial side of art -- after all, they do need the skills to survive.
On the bright side, there are also a few dealers and collectors who have realized they are not doing the students any favors by inflating their value so early in their careers -- practically before their careers have started, really.
"It was good at a time when few people were doing it, but I don't go to open studios anymore," said Dean Valentine, a Los Angeles collector. "It's giving the artists the wrong idea about what to expect. The chances of finding the next Warhol in a student show are zero."
