In 1991, 26 year old Damien Hirst, today’s most successful living artist, delivered his iconic commission, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, to art collector Charles Saatchi. Unfortunately the shark at the centre of this work deteriorated badly in subsequent years and in 2006 it was replaced by another, more carefully preserved specimen.

The controversy surrounding Hirst’s conceptual art has continued to generate record sales, wide publicity and enormous wealth for the artist and his investors, but the question remains:

Will today’s highly priced contemporary art last hundreds of years?

I asked Michael for his thoughts on creating multi-generational art and what steps he takes to craft pieces that endure.

“Conservation of works: I think it is pretty important as an artist to conserve your works as best you can, and prepare them in a way that is sensitive to them lasting a long time. Because if someone’s paying a fair bit of their money for a work of art then they want to know that it’s going to last. It sort of makes common sense. But it does mean that you have to spend a little bit more money on products, on art materials, canvases, linens, paints, good artist-quality stuff so it actually does last longer.

For oil painting you’ve got to learn a lot about layering, how long you have to leave each layer between coats of paint, and fundamental things about the properties and behaviour of different materials in order for your works to last.

The style that I paint is multi-layered, which can be prone to cracking and other problems, so I get good quality linen, give it a solid base and good priming. And when I do my layering I give them ample time to dry, at least a week between each working depending on the thickness of the paint. I sometimes use mediums as well which make drying a bit more consistent, because different paints have different drying times.

Also you don’t want your colours to fade but if you get artist’s quality paint pigments they won’t do that. I think the quality of paint these days is a lot better than it used to be. You’d imagine that it’s improved over time… I’m not positive about that but you hope it would have if you use good quality ones.

It doesn’t matter how good your materials are you can still make a bad painting out of it. Sometimes a painting just doesn’t turn out as well as you’d hoped. There’s nothing you can do about that except start again. In general you’ve just got to do the best you can, be as professional as you can, and if people are going to spend money on your work, aim to give them a good product.

I think if your works turn out to be really beautiful, insightful works and they are collected, what you want in a couple of hundred years is colours that remain the same and paint that doesn’t peel or crack off. Your art might not ever get to that stage in acknowledgement, but as an artist if you give yourself respect and make it your life’s work you may as well spend the time preparing your works well.”

References:
1. Michelangelo 2012. Encyclopaedia Britannica Online. Retrieved 16 April, 2012, from <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/379957/Michelangelo/>.
2. O’Hagan, S, 2012. Basically, it’s just a big aquarium with a dead fish in it, The Weekend Australian Magazine, April 14-15, pp 20.
3. Voice and video recordings, Michael Knight, April 2012.

Conservation of contemporary art is a new problem for museums and collectors. Check this out if you are interested in any further reading.

From Sharks to Sugar: Addressing Conservation Issues of Non-Traditional Contemporary Art Media. Masters thesis by Jennifer Levy as part of the Museum Studies program at John F. Kennedy University in Berkeley California, 2008.

Related posts:
Keep all your art receipts: the importance of provenance.

FOR SALE – $4500

From Knight’s Charlie Chaplin series – based on stills from Chaplin’s performance of the Jewish barber mistaken for Adenoid Hynkel in ‘The Great Dictator’.

“These works relate to my exploration of a man, his life and the way his mind might work. The paintings don’t idealise Chaplin but provide a vehicle for me to portray his talent and illuminate the complexity of his nature.” Michael Knight

112 x 107cm, oil on canvas, 2011.
Significantly reworked since it was first exhibited in Melbourne and Sydney, 2010.
© Michael Knight.

To buy, or see more detail of this work, please call Michael on 0414 276 783, or send us an email via the contact page.

FOR SALE – $4500

107 x 112cm, oil on canvas, 2010.

“This is a colleague who worked with me teaching art at a supported residence in Melbourne. The art project that day was for everyone to paint something meaningful to them from their childhood. Despite moving to another country, there was obvious joy in her early memories of life in Somalia.” Michael Knight

Exhibited: Melbourne and Sydney, 2010.
© Michael Knight.

To buy, or see more detail of this work, please call Michael on 0414 276 783, or send us an email via the contact page.

FOR SALE – $900

One of a series of three experimental works depicting personality and mood. The simple coloured backgrounds (red, blue and yellow) allowed the face to be the main focus.

30 x 28cm, oil on canvas, 2010.

Exhibited: Melbourne and Sydney, 2010.
© Michael Knight.

To buy, or see more detail of this work, please call Michael on 0414 276 783, or send us an email via the contact page.

“So my idea of collecting is not going and buying bankable names, but buying people that I believe really are contributing something to my artistic life.” Dennis Hopper

Recently Mike and I watched a quirky little documentary called “Who the  #$&%  is Jackson Pollock?”. It follows a female truck driver from California who purchased a painting from a charity shop for $5 that could be a Jackson Pollock original worth millions.

Paul Biro, a forensic art expert used by several international museums, matched a fingerprint on the piece to other Pollock paintings and paint samples to his studio, but art dealers and Pollock experts refuse to acknowledge the unsigned, undocumented painting. Without expert authentication a high-priced sale is unlikely.

While your art purchases are likely to be more conventional, good documentation of your collection is important.

What is provenance?

“Provenance, from the French provenir, ‘to come from’, refers to the chronology of the ownership or location of an historical object.” Wikipedia

That could mean passing through generations of one family; changing owners several times via art auctions or dealer sales; famous collections it’s been in; and so on.

What documentation do you need to keep?

Even if your purchase is not in the Jackson Pollock league just yet, keeping good records is worth doing. Not every artist will return millions to your descendants but even a modest gain from a well-documented piece would justify your investment.

Create a small hardcopy file for your artwork and add as many of the following as you can:

• Your receipt of purchase
• Where you bought it
• Exhibition catalogue; price list; gallery brochure; artist brochure or business card
• Any details you have about the artist
  Where are they are in their career? Was this his first solo show or his 15th?
• Any details you’ve been given from the artist or dealer about the artwork
  What is the subject; where was it created; has the artist written a statement about the piece?
• Any reviews written about the artwork
• A photo of the artist
• If you buy a piece at auction keep any documentation that is supplied

What if you bought a painting years ago and have no records?

In the past young artists may have sold work to friends and family with no thought for documentation or future sales (now that artists are entitled to resale royalties it is probably less common).

You can still write down everything you remember about the purchase.

If the artist is still living, the age of the internet makes it easier to track them down. Contact him or her and ask for a signed statement or description of the artwork for documentation purposes.

Having said all that, Michael is probably guilty of providing little documentation for his early work too!

If you have a Knight original and would like some signed paperwork send us an email and Michael will happily provide some details.

References:
Bamberger, A. How to Collect Art like a Pro – Building a Collection, www.artbusiness.com, accessed 4 January 2012, <http://www.artbusiness.com/collectpro.html>.