Value is a Mirror
Elevating an artwork on an easel for a photoshoot. “The 44” and me .
How do you value your art, or more importantly how do you value yourself? Artists go through this self examination every time they put themselves forward to exhibit or sell a piece of art.
Value can be fickle, it can be determined by market scarcity. Whole fortunes were won and lost by the perceived value of a tulip bulb in the Dutch ‘tulip mania’ of the 17th century.
Value can also be inflated. Dada artist Marcel Duchamp submitted an upside down men’s urinal for an exhibition titled it Fountain and signed and dated it under the pseudonym R Mutt, 1917. When it was rejected for the exhibition, he went on to defend it in a publication he started called Blindman
“Whether Mr Mutt with his own hands made the fountain has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an ordinary article of life, placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view – created a new thought for that object.”
This was a pivot moment in the history of art. Duchamp later went on to famously say “If I call it art, it’s art.”
So is art all in the eye of the beholder? Duchamp’s ‘readymades’ paved the way for artists to disrupt the narrative around what can be considered to be art.
Successions of artists after this continued to push out the boundaries. Andy Warhol’s’ Campbell’s Soup Cans, exhibited in 1962 was an installation of 32 painted canvases of Campbell’s 32 varieties of soups hung together as if they were soup cans stacked on shelves. The banal becomes extraordinary and worthy as art.
Nowadays artists know that if you elevate the status of an artwork, put it in a frame, exhibit it on a plinth, create a story around it with an intriguing title, you draw the viewers’ attention to your art.
Placement and position can also be important. In the time when fireplaces were the central feature of a home, hanging a piece of art over the fireplace or exhibiting it on the mantlepiece gave it an importance.
The same is true for exhibitions. Exhibit in a prestigious art show or with artists who you admire and your work takes on the ‘ethos’ of the group.
So then how do you price your artwork, especially when you are starting out? It may have taken you many hours to create, but to charge by the hour for your labour would mean the price would be exorbitant.
When you are first starting out in any profession, you are still learning. Your value as a ‘worker’ is not as high as someone who has been practicing their art or craft for many years. You can often get a cut price deal on a hair cut if it is done by the apprentice. A graduates’ wage is not as high as someone who has been in the job for years.
My first artworks for sale were in a group exhibition where they were all capped at the same price. Easy. That took the pressure off. The first series I exhibited were in a tiny gallery where very few people saw them. When I didn’t sell any pieces, I felt I had failed. I tore them up which then started my collage journey.
The next artworks I exhibited included the price of the framing and a bit more. Some sold, some didn’t. I know now that the more I exhibit, the more I value what I do and why I do it. Some artworks are small so they cost less to produce and their price reflects that. Larger artworks take more time and materials so they are worth more.
Valuing yourself for where you are on your journey means embracing all your perceived ‘failures’ and keeping on going. The more you put your art out into the world, the more you value yourself. Valuing yourself is a practice. And the more you practise your practice, the greater is your value.
A newspaper article from 2009 with my beehive etchings - I later tore all but one up which started my collage journey
