“The art of dealing in art” (Post 65)

This afternoon I walked past an art dealer in a shopping mall and I had the pleasure of meeting him and his son. Large lavishly framed and unframed pieces by well-known and marketable South African artists were beautifully displayed in the passage. The father asked me which art work I was interested in and I told him that I was just appreciating the “sweet” or “popular” pieces he had on show and that I was an artist myself. He immediately handed me his small business card and I put it into my wallet. I had been aware of the art dealer for a number of years now, but he did not know me. I never had an opportunity to introduce myself and in the past when he had a shop elsewhere, I never quite felt that they would be interested in my work, because I felt my work was not as “sweet”, so I never bothered.

His son asked me what type of art work I enjoyed doing and I gave him a brief overview and I sent him one of my YouTube videos, so that he could have an idea of my South African “repertoire”. As I was talking to them, I became aware of my own discomfort. They were art dealers and they were framers too; they did nothing wrong, but my perceptions of art dealers (and my unfortunate experiences in the past with one opportunistic art dealer in particular) somehow dimmed or clouded the flame of my inner expectations. Deep down I would not mind to be represented by an art dealer in a venue like theirs, but at the moment I do not have any work available to impress an art dealer with. I had to reprimand myself, because I may need an art dealer in the future. As an artist, I cannot do all the work myself, even if I wanted to remain independent and self-sufficient; I may need an agent.

However, the conversation remained amicable regardless of my cautious stance and the son asked me if I did portraits. They were “struggling” with an artist who was supposed to deliver a portrait of a client’s wife. He told me that seeing I am an artist I would understand what he meant by “struggling”. As artists it is easy to think that the art dealers are a bit of a “problem” and art dealers may perhaps have reason to maintain that dealing with temperamental artists is a “struggle”. I think artists and art dealers – if they can find common ground – should light their lamps of goodwill, because both parties are dealing in art, and beautiful things make us all feel better. I included an oil on board work I made during the late 1980’s.