A Few More Thoughts in Preparation for Tonight's Tweevenings Lecture at the Tweed: Picasso, Storytelling and The Unknown Masterpiece

Yesterday world leaders commemorated the 100th year anniversary of the outbreak of World War I. Tonight I will be speaking at the Tweed Museum about the illustrations Pablo Picasso created for the 100th year anniversary of Honore de Balzac's The Unknown Masterpiece. Balzac's story about three painters whose paths serendipitously cross is a masterpiece of storytelling.

Ambroise Vollard, the editor of this commemorative edition of the book, commissioned Picasso to do the illustrations so as to help elevate perceptions about printmaking as an art form. Picasso, who arrived in Paris in 1901 at age 19, wasn't an arbitrary pick in this matter. His relationship to Vollard went all the way back to the beginning of his career. Vollard assembled the ambitious young Spanish painter's first Paris show. Vollard purchased 27 canvases, including everything from his Blue Period, in 1906. Vollard made purchases twice annually through the next five years, and introduced the young artist to others whom he could sell works to including Leo and Gertrude Stein.

Three decades later Picasso was a celebrated artist and major force. For this reason Vollard saw an opportunity to cash in some chips on his notion that reproducible work could be considered art.

As art collector Rob Leff pointed out in a Tweevenings lecture late last year there were others embracing this idea, one of them being Stanley W. Hayter, a British printmaker who moved to Paris and founded Atelier 17, one of the most influential art studios in the world. All this to say Vollard wasn't entirely unique in exploring the possibilities of these new paths for artists.

During this period when Picasso was commissioned to illustrate The Unknown Masterpiece he was already commissioned by Vollard to produce 100 etchings for a series that became known as The Vollard Suite. Picasso's innovative approach included efforts to make effects by using syrup and acid, for example. The last three pictures in this Suite are portraits of Vollard himself.

I'm reminded here of collector Steve Wynn's exhibit in the Wynn Casino in which the final piece is a Warhol screen print of Wynn.

Speaking of Wynn, his sale of Le Reve to hedge fund billionaire Steve Cohen shows just how valuable the Picasso name has become. Vollard was clearly a primary agent in creating that value. This is not to diminish Picasso's innovation, prolific productivity and other achievements.

Balzac proved to be one of the most influential authors of the first half of the nineteenth century. Picasso became one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century. Four of the Picasso drawings for Balzac's book will be on display tonight. I'll attempt to make a case as to why these pictures are signiicant. Perhaps we'll see all 13 in this set again sometime before long.

 Meantime, art goes on all around you. Engage it.

Is the Art Dealer Scene Out of Control? What Next?

On this day in 1890 Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh died from a gunshot wound.

When avant garde art dealer and collector Ambroise Vollard died, he purportedly owned 10,000 works of art by many of the leading painters of the previous half century, including Van Gogh, Cézanne, Renoir, Roualt, and the prolific Picasso. With Van Gogh's Vase with Sunflowers selling for more than $80 million, one wonders what Vollard's collection would be worth today.

Vollard purchased 27 canvases from Picasso in 1906 and continued a relationship with the effervescent artist till the dealer caught an early death in a freak accident on the road to his chateau in 1939.

The Second World War was just around the corner and I'm curious to know to what degree these works were successfully whisked out of the country before the Nazi occupation. I recall reading somewhere that after his death efforts were made to send the collection to North America and the first boat, with 500 pieces aboard, had to be routed to Canada.

No doubt Vollard knew the treasures he had. But I am totally convinced that he'd been apoplectic to learn the kinds of prices such pieces have been obtaining in the new art market.

In May, Forbes magazine had a story about this sea change in art valuations that has occurred since Warhol arrived on the scene. The article is something of a sketch in that without filling in all the details it shows us with a few deft lines how things changed. Leo Castelli, himself a collector of avant garde artists' works, was in the center of it -- the center now being New York. After the Nazis set their jackboots on Parisian soil, many of the most talented and intelligent artists and thinkers made a break from the Continent, and a new power center formed in the heart of Manhattan.

Counterfeit Warhol portrait of Ennyman

Caleb Melby's piece, titled Larry Gagosian, Andy Warhol And The Rise Of The Superdealer, shows how the Vollard eye combined with a new collector culture  has made an immense difference in valuations. What changed isn't the interest by some in collecting, but rather, "the explosion of the global nouveau riche, the proliferation of international fairs like Art Basel and, most critically, the fetishlike cult of contemporary art, a phenomenon that has metastasized over the last 50 years."

Interesting word: metastasized. Is Melby calling today's art collecting the new internet bubble? All three definitions of metastasize carry ominous overtones, the first being its association with cancer. The second  is simply, "to spread injuriously." And finally "to transform, especially into a dangerous form."

When Pablo Picasso died in 1973 Andy Warhol read, or heard (I don't have my fact-checker up yet this morning), that Picasso had produced 4,000 masterpieces. Warhol quipped, "I can produce 4,000 masterpieces in one day." Indeed, his screen print presses did crank out volumes. His "work alone accounts for roughly 20% of the value of the contemporary art market."

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My take is this. You like a piece of art? Don't buy it in the hopes it will increase in value. It's real value is in your relationship with it, your ability to appreciate and cherish it, not just for a few moments in a gallery, but on a wall in your home or office... for the rest of your life.

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For what it's worth, next week on August 5 I will be giving a talk on Picasso, Storytelling and The Unknown Masterpiece at the Tweed Museum of Art here in Duluth. Never been to the Tweed? They have a great collection. Check it out sometime.... You will be impressed.

Meantime, art goes on all around you. Engage it!