commercialism

When I read the art pawnshop article, I actually wasn't surprised by any of it. As far as I know, people have used art as collateral for regular loans for quite some time and the only difference here is that the company takes possession of it. It was interesting to think of an art gallery made up of pawned masterpieces though. The article showed how the owners of these companies are using the art market to their advantage, and seem to be making quite a bit of money off of the loans and the artworks that they get.

The Kinkade video was very interesting to me. My grandparents have a Kinkade in their living room, and I've been inside a Kinkade gallery, but I had no idea this was how they were produced and that there were so many obsessed Kinkade fans. To be honest, I think he is a genius and if i were in his shoes I would probably be doing the same thing, though probably not as well. I think that art should be less exclusive (and expensive) than it is now, and producing pallets of prints gives anybody the chance to own a piece of good art. The one thing that bothers me, though, is the price. From my small experience in economics, it seems to me that a huge increase in supply should reduce the price, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I was surprised to say the least when I heard that a print with a little paint on it could be worth 50k. Kinkade seems like he's trying to wring every cent he can out of his fans, by adding a dab of paint here or there or signing stacks and stacks of prints to make them worth more. By the looks of that addicted couple shown in the video, I would guess that he's doing a good job of it.

While the art pawnshops are taking people's money in huge sums at a time, Kinkade is doing it with a ton of small purchases. They both show the opposite ends of the art market spectrum. One shows how you can make money off of works that are worth millions, and the other uses cheaper mass-produced art. Both of them bother me a little, but I would have to say that i support Kinkade more. After all, he is producing something that people enjoy and willingly spend money on, but the pawnshops are just taking advantage of people that need money, and then taking their expensive art if they can't pay back. I just hope Kinkade doesn't really turn into Disney, because if I see little chinese children putting frames on thousand dollar prints I will be a little perturbed.

Erik

I like an escalator, man, 'cause an escalator can never break. It can only become stairs. There would never be an "Escalator temporarily out of order" sign, only "Escalator temporarily stairs. Sorry for the convenience."

-Mitch Hedberg