Forbes magazine is publishing a "2005 Collectors Guide" in the forthcoming issue for the week of Dec. 27, 2004. "Collecting smart -- what's hot, what's not, and how to tell the difference," promise the cover lines. Here are some highlites:
The articles begins with a surprisingly frank story on a 20 year scheme by French art dealers Michel Giraud and Jacques de Vos to quietly corner the market on Art Deco furniture by little-known Lyonnaise master André Sornay, run up the prices at auction and now turn a tidy profit by selling the works at their new Manhattan gallery.
A profile of Mexican fruit-juice heir Eugenio López Alonso, founder of the celebrated (and well-fortified) La Colección Jumex in a slum outside Mexico City, reports that the "Pan-American playboy in a classic mold" has spent $12 million in the last four years supporting Latin American contemporary art, and in 1994 helped launch the successful career of Gabriel Orozco.
An article on Madison Avenue 19th-century painting dealer Mark Murray reveals that he finances his deals through limited partnerships with an elite circle of wealthy investors. Another piece that proved irresistible to Forbes focuses on the market for artworks made by the late rock musician Kurt Cobain.
The report on the contemporary art market, written by Forbes Collector newsletter editor Missy Sullivan, warns of "irrational exuberance" as it cites the art-market appreciation of Maurizio Cattelan's notorious wax statue of Paul John Paul II struck down by a meteor, which was bought by Geneva dealer Pierre Huber for $886,000 and "flipped" for $3 million at a Phillips, de Pury & Co. auction last month.
"Ultimately the economy will shift, people will start getting burned, and the whole thing will crash," said Tribeca supercollector Michael Hort, who reportedly was offered $600,000 for a Kai Althoff painting he bought for $10,000 four years ago.
You might want to pick up a copy.
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