The $12 Million Stuffed Shark: The Curious Economics of Contemporary Art Paperback – Illustrated, 13 April 2010

Only recently, Tracey Emin's installation "My Bed" was sold at auction for £2.5 million.This book explains such phenomena. It was written for people who read about multi-million dollar prices for contemporary artworks and wonder how such eye-watering figures are reached. Most of the art discussed in the book is conceptual, but then a lot of contemporary art is conceptual.It looks at artists like On Kawara, whose pictures of dates - literally pictures of dates - sell for up to £300,000 each.Or Felix Gonzales-Torres, whose sculpture "(Untitled) Lover Boys" made of 355 lbs of individual wrapped blue and white candies, sold for $456,000.Gonzales-Torres also did another sculpture of a pile of 10,000 fortune cookies. This did not reach its reserve price at auction, but the bidding went up to $520,000. In both instances of course there were ideas behind these works. They weren't just cookies or just sweeties. But for some of us the accusation that the emperor is not wearing any clothes cannot help but float to mind.The author is an economist who has taught marketing at both Harvard Business School and the London School of Economics. He obviously enjoys contemporary art, both as a collector and an observer, and he casts a wide net. He looks at artists, dealers, auction houses and art fairs, and he follows the funnel that sucks in newbie artists at the top, and pops the lucky ones, (the very lucky ones), out at the bottom, as huge iconic branded figures like Damian Hirst, Jeff Koons, Andreas Gursky or David Hockney. We follow the artists' journey - which is mostly one of patronage, from when they leave art school to when they reach the big time, and each step of the way is analysed.Points of interest I noted from the book....1) I realised how woefully ignorant I was when it comes to contemporary art. The book mentioned many successful artists with whom I was unfamiliar, and it was good to google their work, and get an idea of what they were doing.2) It really alerted me to the power of branding, of making oneself into a megga celebrity whose casual signature - let alone artworks - would be treasured for posterity.3) It gave me a taste of how the super rich wheel and deal. I'm a pore pore woman from sleepy middle England, and I found this eye-opening stuff. These multi-millionaires can be surprisingly insecure though, often relying on the taste of their dealers to tell them what they need to buy. Sometimes they even buy blind, without actually seeing the artwork.4) Snobbery and status. This would seem to be the underlying impulse for a lot of people buying expensive art. To be seen to have a Damian Hirst on one's wall is big time kudos. Think of owning a Gucci handbag, but bigger, brighter, bolder and sexier.I have done little to describe the full compass of this book - it really is wonderfully researched and detailed, whilst still being hugely fun and readable. Its ultimate message ? Buy the art you like, and enjoy it. The likelihood of it being a good investment is small. Even Charles Saatchi falls over on a regular basis. Just go for things that give you pleasure.Absolutely fascinating and highly recommended.---------------------------------------------------------In tandem with reading this book, I listened again to Grayson Perry's fantastic series of Reith Lectures on contemporary art. If Thompson explains the backstage mechanics of today's art market, then Perry explains the heart, creativity and excitement of modern art and artists. Both compliment one another beautifully.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtehJ3...

I came across this book from a programming course I was doing online, where we wrote a programme to make a replicate of Damien Hirst, painting that has dots on it with different colour. The instructor recommended reading the book. It’s a nice read full of bizarre facts about contemporary art, it’s quite fully detailed for a seasonal reader, which I think is a bit too much. But, overall it provided me with a lot of information about modern art and how does it work, how dealers price and make money in this market.

Don Thompson took on the phenomenon of contemporary art, and more importantly the very hair raising prices achieved for some of the pieces (where on occassion your average observer from without the art world would fail to note artistic merit) and analysed it from the point of view of the way this market functions.He covers all aspects, from the auction houses (primary focus on Christie's and Sotheby's), to branded dealers, to mainstream dealers, art fairs, celebrity collectors, museum curators, art consultants, critics, branded artists themselves, and finally modern buyers and puts these together in a coherent whole, providing a compelling explanation for how the contemporary art world functions.At the same time this does not read like a stuffy tome on economics, it is much more Malcolm Gladwell in style (with some added structure). He starts off with a good introduction to the phenomenon as a whole, and then subsequently delves into increasing detail on specific aspects (like what mechanisms / tricks of the trade an auctioneer uses for most success). This allows those with a passing interest only to get a good overview early on, and then to skip to perhaps one or two chapters they are particularly curious about, while a more determined reader has the whole spectrum available for a cover to cover read.The book does come with a short disclaimer - while the author does raise the question of whether art can still be contributed to an artist, if they hardly lay hand on it during its creation, or whether 'a jacket in the corner of a room' is art, the book will not delve in depth into such matters. Thompson takes these things as a given, and rather focuses on the psychological setups and uncertainties of the modern buyer to explain the prices achieved, be it in the end art or not.How far the concept of branding has made it in the art world, and how important it became may be a shock to most outsiders but the sources used (many of the who's who of the contemporary art ecosystem) add the view a lot of credibility and while art critics or the odd artist may be vexed by the utilitarian view presented of some aspects, it at least appears perfectly plausible.The book has a good reference section at the end and with the index one can surf back to the section of interest quite nicely on a Kindle. The fact that all the pictures are at the very back in the Kindle format does not help (would in my opinion work better next to the text) but overall the formating of the Kindle version - for all sizes - is spot on.A book well worth buying for anyone curious about the prices achieved, as well as into how a completely unregulated market can arrange itself and what practices develop in order to take advantage of the setup - can hardly praise it hard enough.

Great insight into the commercial world of art and how the economics work at the very top end. As an art critic, and an economist in a former life, I found this to be an engrossing read into how the vagaries of the art world actually work.

Don Thompson writes well and the book is engaging, but it is obviously a few years out date now - galleries have changed, some have closed, and the economics of the artworld is not the same now as it was in 2008.You're better off buying 'The Supermodel and the Brillo Box', also by Thompson. It covers some of the same ground but feels more relevant as it was published in 2014.

A fascinating insight into the contemporary art market. It absolutely is a market, all about brands. Well written. Intend to read it again. My only gripe is that the print is very pale so it isn't the easiest read.