Pitfalls of buying at auction: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
Twenty years ago, when I first entered the revered doors of an auction house, I was overwhelmed, and I asked myself, “how can anyone or any business know so much about so many things”? Well it only took me a few auctions to realize that they really do not know everything about everything they’re selling. En garde, my foray into the world of auction.
As time went by, I made my mistakes, but I also learned quickly when it involved my money. The first thing I learned is that I knew little about value. Over time, I came to learn that real values can be an elusive and the disciple of appraisal is a comprehensive study.
My opener involved an artwork, which turned out, to be one of those example accomplished on uh… “One of his bad days?”. Verily and sadly, I had bought the name and frankly, that was about it. I remember giving it as a Christmas gift to one of my brothers only to receive it back the next year; reminiscent of Christmas fruit cakes and New Orleans Saints season tickets…. Wait the saints are winning… What’s that about?) My value mantra now reads, bad, better, excellent and exceptional. (Good)
My second gaffe was when I purchased a minor painting by Franz Richard Unterberger from a fairly well known auction house for “the right price”! Unfortunately, as it turned out, it was not actually by that artist according to three independent experts, all of which panned the painting. Of course, by the time I figured it out, the auction house told me that my right to return the picture had expired. Never mind misrepresentation and the expert’s opinions. The auction house stood by their attribution, claiming that it was “an early work.” I guess that rather equates to buying an “early” crayola on paper from Picasso’s third grade drawing class. See figure 1. (Bad)
Since many events seem to happen in trios, lets continue with the third ghost of Christmas past, when I purchased an artwork by a well known artist only to find out that that I had overpaid for it, “at auction of course”. As it turned out, I managed to place myself into the middle of a bidding campaign between two well-to-do privates (non-dealers), one couple that had just recently finished a three-martini? lunch at Cipriani’s (so said the specialist) and the other whose wife really had to have it because it simply matched the bathroom’s pastel colors. This painting currently adorns my mantle over the non-pastel fireplace. (Ugly)
Therefore, as it turns out, value truly can be a very elusive concept, one not to be treated lightly. By definition, value is “a fair return or equivalent in goods, services, or money for something exchanged under normal circumstances.” (I categorize my latter faux pas as temporalis duress). Overpayment never helps the buyer much when he attempts to resell and there are for some odd reason no takers. I wish auction companies had a buy-back policy in place.
Value is more than this; value should be approached as a long-term concept with serious consequences if not fully researched. Real values stand the test of time, supersede short-term fads, and are not subject to the latest “thing,” sorry Damien Hurst. (Please…. a 100 million dollar diamond skull…or should I say numb-skull!) Instead of bejeweled skeletons for value, I recommend you take a look at Hohenberg’s “A Friendly Discussion.”
