#5177612 - 10/23/1109:32 PMRe: Lichtenstein Comic Inspired Art Estimated at $35-45 Million
[Re: pinupcartoonguy]
comix4funcomix4fun This is one of the rare times that having no friends works in my favor.
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Originally Posted By: pinupcartoonguy
I'm going to go out on a limb and say you have to give credit to a guy who can take a throw away panel from a comic book and turn it into a multi-million dollar enterprise. On a certainly level, whoever the original artists were are certainly getting more exposure than if Lichenstein had never lifted the panels.
We have to separate artistic ability, which should be lauded, and marketing ability, which can be good or bad depending on what's being sold and what the buyer is being told.
We have to be careful not to laud someone just because they got rich. These comic panels would have been transformed into new art if he would have told his appreciators where the panels came from, how he interpreted them and then RE-interpreted them.
Madoff turned nothing investments into a multi-billion dollar ponzi scheme. Not all marketing jobs should be applauded.
Selling people something that's really nothing is a talent and a skill that most people don't have or would not use if they did have it.
I just got an email today, that will allow me to buy my first Licht. piece, it's from an enterprising Nigerian man promising millions for allowing him to use bank account. What ingenuity on his part.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say you have to give credit to a guy who can take a throw away panel from a comic book and turn it into a multi-million dollar enterprise.
No you don't. He stole someone else's work. Whether they recognized the value in it or not, it was theirs.
If someone comes into my house, takes a quarter sitting on my dining room table (where anyone coming into my house can see it along with other change), pockets it, and then sells it for thousands of dollars because it happens to be a very collectible coin is he in the right just because I didn't recognize the quarter was valuable?
No it doesn't. He stole from me, and anything that he profits from that theft should be rightfully mine as it was MY property that led him to have those very profits to begin with.
#5177631 - 10/23/1109:38 PMRe: Lichtenstein Comic Inspired Art Estimated at $35-45 Million
[Re: tth2]
comix4funcomix4fun This is one of the rare times that having no friends works in my favor.
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Originally Posted By: tth2
Originally Posted By: comix4fun
As Aman mentioned the art world ponzi scheme....enough people with too much cash sit around contemplating their own navel and trying to be sophisticated and stuff like this, or the shark, or Campbell's soup cans suddenly become introspective masterpieces on the human condition.
It's not a ponzi scheme--the art world has always been a case of the market being heavily influenced by a few kingmakers, and those artists who were lucky enough to be favored by those kingmakers. It then takes the passage of time to separate those who were just popular flashes in the pan from those whose appeal continues to last (and those who weren't appreciated in life but become popular only much later).
This has been compounded in the post-photography era, as Aman has pointed out, because simply being a good or great draftsman, which seems to be where your interests lie, is no longer good enough (arguably it was never good enough). You've got to do something that stands out, whether that's creating formaldehyde sharks or Campbell soup cans. For what it's worth, I like Warhol a lot. Lichtenstein I can take or leave, but I can understand why others, particularly non-comic readers but of course who are aware of comic strips and comic books, appreciate his work.
Well the Ponzi scheme analogy is Aman's, not mine..but it makes sense when you think about it. Too many galleries, pumping too many substandard pieces and artists as the next "BLANK", while wanting nothing more than to sell pieces they already have in inventory or collect commissions.
Horrible conflicts of interest, compounded by ever climbing dollar amounts.
Give a piece or set of pieces enough exposure, enough backing, enough of just the right people saying it's great, and you will have all the people who with to be on the same level as those "right people" nodding their heads to the beat.
Too many people in the art world collect what people tell them is great, or tell them is valuable, or tell them is a masterpiece. That's where I think Aman's point comes from.
#5177635 - 10/23/1109:40 PMRe: Lichtenstein Comic Inspired Art Estimated at $35-45 Million
[Re: pinupcartoonguy]
comix4funcomix4fun This is one of the rare times that having no friends works in my favor.
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Originally Posted By: pinupcartoonguy
I think calling LIchtenstein a scam artist is a bit of a stretch. I don't believe he defrauded any investors, but I could be wrong.
I didn't call him a scam artist.
The person I was responding to said you've got to give him credit for taking nothing and turning it into something.
Madoff sold people on something that wasn't real. In the financial world it was a crime.
I was noting that him taking those panels without attribution is marketing and not necessarily artistic ability and that in other realms it would be nothing to be appreciated at all.
#5177646 - 10/23/1109:46 PMRe: Lichtenstein Comic Inspired Art Estimated at $35-45 Million
[Re: comix4fun]
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Originally Posted By: comix4fun
Originally Posted By: tth2
Originally Posted By: comix4fun
As Aman mentioned the art world ponzi scheme....enough people with too much cash sit around contemplating their own navel and trying to be sophisticated and stuff like this, or the shark, or Campbell's soup cans suddenly become introspective masterpieces on the human condition.
It's not a ponzi scheme--the art world has always been a case of the market being heavily influenced by a few kingmakers, and those artists who were lucky enough to be favored by those kingmakers. It then takes the passage of time to separate those who were just popular flashes in the pan from those whose appeal continues to last (and those who weren't appreciated in life but become popular only much later).
This has been compounded in the post-photography era, as Aman has pointed out, because simply being a good or great draftsman, which seems to be where your interests lie, is no longer good enough (arguably it was never good enough). You've got to do something that stands out, whether that's creating formaldehyde sharks or Campbell soup cans. For what it's worth, I like Warhol a lot. Lichtenstein I can take or leave, but I can understand why others, particularly non-comic readers but of course who are aware of comic strips and comic books, appreciate his work.
Well the Ponzi scheme analogy is Aman's, not mine..but it makes sense when you think about it. Too many galleries, pumping too many substandard pieces and artists as the next "BLANK", while wanting nothing more than to sell pieces they already have in inventory or collect commissions.
Horrible conflicts of interest, compounded by ever climbing dollar amounts.
Give a piece or set of pieces enough exposure, enough backing, enough of just the right people saying it's great, and you will have all the people who with to be on the same level as those "right people" nodding their heads to the beat.
Too many people in the art world collect what people tell them is great, or tell them is valuable, or tell them is a masterpiece. That's where I think Aman's point comes from.
My feelings exactly on Jackson Pollack.
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Because, you see, if Lichtenstein had been the one to ghost Kirby's...
Oh, never mind, I'm taking my genius comments and going home. Good night.
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