The Musings of an Artist, Collector and Merchant – Jacob Shmuel

When does the painter know that he has to set his brush aside and finish the piece, and what does influence its success in the free market? There are three factors: the balancing line, the “too much” line and the lacking line.

When does the painter know that he has to set his brush aside and finish the piece, and what does influence its success in the free market?

The artist’s ability and talent are expressed also in his awareness to the point in which he needs to put down his brush, leave the piece alone and present it as it is. As observers, we are unaware to the internal process the artist experiences, and moreover, we are not aware to the difficulty an artist might experience in that moment, and his decision in front of his creation. We receive the painting as it is. However, sharp eyes, practical exercise and regular, aware practice during explosion to many art pieces, can open for us a door to the artist’s deliberation point, and allow us to discover where is the extra line that usually leads to the perfectness of the piece.

The extra line and the perfect balance

There are three possibilities: the balancing line, the line that is too much, and the lacking line.

Many artists throughout history used to set the piece aside for weeks or months and live next to it until balances is completed. Once in a while, they used to return to it and add a line or two, let it go, continue painting other pieces and come back to it until that crucial moment in which they make the internal and intuitive decision that confirms for them that the piece is complete and balanced. The life of an artists who is dedicated to his work can be accompanied by a total devotion to the piece, and the more an artist invests in it from himself, the more balanced it is.

What is balance and how it is related to the free market?

Balance is wholeness, wonderful harmony that connects the colors in the same brush stroked to a level of perfectness. The magic of art is within us, and so, how can we identify an art piece if high quality? This is an individual process, so maybe I will ask it differently:

How is it possible that millions of people around the world agree on a leading painters group that their pieces’ value increases from year to year? Who is standing behind those choices, and which important decisions have to be made when discussing a purchase of art piece that worth millions of dollars?

The answer is complex and not always pure…

A painter who created a wonderfully balances art piece, in which he showed intuitiveness of high quality regarding the balance, color and other components, exposed his creation to professionals with experiences eyes that can detect pieces of high quality since this is what they do on a daily basis in the art field. These people can approve the artist’s creations as masterpieces. Those people are art dealer, art lovers and gallery owners.

However, even when there is consensus about the quality of his work, there is still a possibility that the free market won’t choose his pieces as “audience favorites” and the prices labeled to them will be low. Occasionally, the piece’s value rises with time. Then, the art professional will nod with satisfaction and indicate themselves as expert detectors for the artist’s quality.

Unfortunately, sometimes this kind of exposure can take a generation time period at least, or in some painful cases even more than that, due to horrendous neglect of art critics who don’t pay attention to the artist claiming that is a waste of time and money. To what extent the art fills its purpose, if the promotions of an artist and his creations depend of the economic investment of the sponsor? Some food for thought.

Another case is the one in which the artist is lucky and an art dealer recognized the potential of his creation and thus that profit of it. This depends on the professional eye of the dealer, his vision, motivation, the intensive publishing he performs and all the right ties he has that can help an unknown artist in his early days. The dealer, who takes the artist under his wings, knows that there is a long road until a state is reached in which the piece fulfills it full economic potential.

Let say that artist pieces are sold in the beginning for no more than 700 dollars. In order to create a situation in which the piece reach higher limits, the dealer must constantly invest to raise the public’s awareness to what his eyes see as art. As said, years can go by before the dealer manages to bring the piece to a state in which it is valued in a 5000$ price. This state, that requires a funding from the dealer, is a crucial state since it can reach the glass ceiling but not break it. In this point, the decision whether to keep investing in the artist is a complicated decision and sometimes its motive are not necessarily pore and not related to the quality of the painter or the piece.

Is this the world in which we want to live in when art is in question, when we consider the emotional, mental and sensory uplifting of both the artist and the art lovers who are exposed to his creations? Indeed, this is an important topic for discussion and it will be debated in some of the following articles.