I wanted to review my 2009 predictions to see how the year really turned out, boy was I surprised. So before I go into my meditative cocoon to conjure up my 2010 predictions lets review 2009.

• 2008 was a year of years for sure, who could’ve predicted Two Thousand and Eight.

I dun’ no but here are some of my predictions for the New Year 2009.

• Wall Street Investors and Bankers who bought multi-million dollar artworks of various livestock genre to hang on the walls of their mansions will begin to create recipes for new and unusual entrees.

Beef Formaldehyde-tine, and of course, the new hamburger rave, the Mad Cow. Yes, it is a lot of beef but let’s not forget about the sea food menu. Pan Sautéed shark in a cream formaldehyde sauce with “capers”. This is a quick variation on a stuffed flounder recipe. And I predict Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern will show up at several of these feasts wearing a new Damien Hirst Tee Shirt and exclaim, now boy that’s really good as he samples the various delicacies.

• I couldn’t have been further off on this one. Just when I thought the Banking Executives were going to take a licking, they really surprised me and they did very well in 2009. I hope they used some of that bonus money to buy art. And as I was poking fun at Damien Hirst poking fun at modern society, that is what he does and boy is he right on. Hirst successfully unloaded his studio too; yeah those rich bastards in an early 2009 auction bought about $200,000,000 in Hirst art he sold after cleaning out all of his closets. Andrew Zimmern never showed up he is still just eating anything that can’t craw away from the table and some stuff that tried. I think the Wall Streeter’s feasted on Pork all year long.

• My prediction for the art market and art sales for the New Year is the same as last year.

Art will still be sold to the highest bidder and perhaps to the bidder that is“High”… But from what I can see is we all want the relationships between the artist and the market to change, well I predict that it will. Those questionable galleries that we all complain about, well they are going away in 2009. Artists will re-invent the Art Market Place by taking their art to the streets. Most will be holding signs, that they painted that read, “Will Make Art for Food”. But just maybe you have an unrealized ace in the hole? Christie’s reports that Collectable Wine sales reached the third highest ever $50,665,602.00. Global sales were $1,898,068.00. The top seller was a vintage 1961 Hermitage La Chappelle for $60,000.00 The good news for me is I found a vintage bottle of Boone’s Farm Strawberry 1968 or 69, who can remember it was the sixty’s,  while cleaning out the old VW Bus getting it ready for the scrape yard. So I predict if you look under that sofa or under the cushions you might just be rich. As for art sales I dunno, Art Business.com Reports that trying to track art sales is like trying to count the stars in the sky.

• Well I was unfortunately right about this one. Read the article about the once lucrative Denver art Market. http://www.denverpost.com/ci_13971873 Seems that the story is the same everywhere you looked in 2009. Sorry I want to be funny but the truth is there just nothing to laugh at if you are a self-employed artist. As for myself, I am just drinking all that fine wine these days’s waiting for better times. I am reminded of the song “My Bucket has a Hole In It”

• The Associated Press reports that nobody knows where the first 350 billion of the bailout money went.

They contacted 21 banks that received a billion dollars or more to find out. Nobody is talking. They asked, how much did you spend, what did you spend it on, how much are you saving and what are your plans for the rest? Only JP Morgan/Chase commented and they said, “We’ve lent some of it, we’ve not lent some of it, we have not disclosed that to the public, we’re declining to.” REALLY that was their answer. So I predict the next $350 billion will be spent trying to figure out where the first $350 billion went. I also predict that throughout corporate lunchroom’s you will hear, Hey Morgan can you pass the  1961 Hermitage La Chappelle, this Beef Formaldehyde-tine is a little dry. Here you are Chase, by the way do you miss “The Golden Calf,” by Damien Hirst that was in the boardroom. How bout those hooves and horns of 18-carat gold. You did save those didn’t you?

• Well I was wrong about this on too. The Bankers found all that money! It was in their pockets all the time. I was right about the corporate lunchroom chatter. The Bankers on Wall Street are eating very well as 2009 comes to a close. I was wrong about them saving anything. Even the Golden Calves hooves were hocked to pay out bonuses. I am watching Pawn Star’s to see how much they got.

• I predict that the global Environment will improve; better cleaner air and water.

With the downturn in manufacturing, I see un-looked for benefits that will help the environment. Except for the floating continent of Plastic trash http://davideubank.wordpress.com/man-made-continent-of-trash-a-fantastic-story in the Pacific Gyer, Its size will increase by an untold magnitude as trillions of new small bits of plastic turn up this year. I predict scientists will trace the increase to all of those credit cards we will all be cutting up and disposing of in 2009. And don’t burn them either or Global Air quality will plummet.

• Well right again. Please dispose of all that plastic responsibly. And if you were one of the lucky millions whose interest rates were raised to the max, by Chase and Bank of America. You are useful, your helping them pay back your money to the TARP fund. And be sure that in the coming year with the new consumer credit legislation becoming law they won’t be able to raise your interest rates any higher. Now that’s good news.

• I predict the old Obama slogan of Hope will be replaced by Obama’s new slogan What the F_ _ _ were they thinking.

He will also be heard yelling, they did WHAT!…

• Yup almost right on this one too. Except the Presidents voice can be heard in the halls of the Whitehouse and the Congress yelling “What the F_ _ _ Now!!!!!” Sorry Mr. President we the People can’t believe it either.

• One more prediction for 2009 is that if the New Year is anything like the old one it will be exciting and unpredictable.

But artists are the creative pulse of the human existence and creativity is our business. Many new innovative and creative ideas begin in the arts. Artists recognize the new first and then the rest of society well follows. So I predict we will be the creative leaders of the future as we have always been. . Don’t blow it!.. Stay positive and create.

• Yes, I was right again. You are still wonderful and you are creative leaders. Please consider this as 2009 ends. It is time for change. We as a society have to move away from business as usual, as painful as that may be. We need to pick ourselves up and move forward. We need to find new ways to become successful. And through our creative energies lead the way to a better future.

Look for my 2010 predictions coming New Years 2010.

Shepard Fairey Admits “He Lied” About Obama Poster Image.

A new twist in the controversial case of Shepard Fairey and the copyright infringement case filed against him by the Associated Press has taken on a new dimension. Fairey admits he lied about which image he used to create the now famous Obama poster. He has also admitted to attempting to conceal the truth by submitting false evidence to the court and his attorney.

“In an attempt to conceal my mistake, I submitted false images and deleted other images,” Mr. Fairey said in a statement, released on his Web site. “I sincerely apologize for my lapse in judgment, and I take full responsibility for my actions, which were mine alone.” Shepard Fairey

Read More Here

Artist Admits Using Other Photo for ‘Hope’ Poster

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/arts/design/18fairey.html?_r=1

Fairey who has been represented by Attorney Anthony Falzone of the Stanford University Fair Use Project is now looking for a new lawyer. Falzone has said it would be effectively impossible to represent a client in this situation. Falzone is withdrawing from the case.

http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/3136

The big disappoint here is that Fairey has taken the stance that he intended to pursue the right of an artist to use an image as a source under the Fair Use and Transformation  factor of copyright law to create a new and unique work of art. Which I believe is a very important issue today given the growth of modern media.

Before you get your back up stop and ask yourself the question, is there anything really new in the world of creating images that does not reference some historical source?

The whole issue is a Can of Worms that Fairey opened under false pretenses when he decided to lie and create false documents. I guess the question is why? Because under the Fair Use rule it would not have made any difference to his case according to his attorney Anthony Falzone. The fact that Fairey lied about which image he used however does change the issue. Now he is not an Artist who used a source image to create a new work of art; he is a, perjure, a liar. That changes the focus of his defense from Fair Use to Perjury.

Shepard Fairey has stepped up now, has taken full responsibility for his actions, and admitted his mistake. As disappointed as I am that he lied I have to give him credit for now telling the truth.

The truth is today it is far more complicated to make images than every before and it is just going to get more complex in the future. Just look at just about any TV commercial and you will see a reference to familiar imagery. The same is true in modern image making. We have all been assaulted with the imagery of the past. Because we are human, we react to the familiar. I think recognizing the fact that we individually do retain an image vocabulary of our own, built upon a history of images of the past; we need to be truthful to our audience and ourselves and give credit to the source, the influence. This may not help you as far as the Law is concerned but it will help you be truthful about your work and your influences and inspiration. It may help you make more honest art.

We only need to look back in time a short way to the DaDa and Pop Art movements to reference the obvious. Warhol’s Campbell Soup Cans or DaDa collages. It is not about the source it is about the truth. We are not even close to figuring out the complexities of modern image making. What we have to decide as artists is, are we going to pursue the question or are we going to allow the courts to decide for us? If you never achieve fame, it is probably not a very important issue, but if you do, it might be. Guess Shepard Fairey found out.

An Important Footnote to the Story and the AP Case

Manny Garcia the Photographer who took the Obama image has filed his own suit against the Associated Press AP. Garcia stated in court documents that AP has never owned the copyright to the image in question. Garcia stated he was hired to photograph George Clooney and that he never assigned the copyrights of the Obama image to AP. Garcia contends he alone owns the copyright to the Obama image, which Fairey used.

Read my original post here:

Copyright Fair Use and the Transformative Factor, by David Eubank

http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/02/11/copyright-fair-use-and-the-transformative-factor/

Check it out for Yourself

Resource: Stanford University Library Copyright and Fair Use

CHAPTER 9. Fair Use

http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/index.html

B. Measuring Fair Use: The Four Factors

http://fairuse.stanford.edu/Copyright_and_Fair_Use_Overview/chapter9/9-b.html#1

Buky Schwartz (1932–2009)

Sculptor and video artist Buky (pronounced “Bookie”) Schwartz died on Wednesday September 2, 2009 He was 77.

I met Buky in 1979 and assisted him with his video installation Color Bars at the Akron Art Institute where I worked as an exhibit builder. I was also an art student at the University of Akron at the time and had limited experience in the visual concepts that Buky so patiently attempted to explain to me as we began the work of building the installation.

He wanted to build a wall in the middle of the gallery floor shaped like a triangle. Then we would plot out lines across the space and paint the video color bar across the gallery floor, walls and over top of the triangle. He told me when we were done that the sculptural space of the installation would appear on the video monitor as the traditional color bars used at the beginning of a video. I understood what the color bars were but still didn’t get how we were going to accomplish the task of compressing the visual space of the gallery that would become a visual burst of color and three dimensional form into a controlled two dimensional square when viewed on the video monitor.

I didn’t have to understand I just needed to build the triangle wall and prepare the gallery for the installation. I was an experience carpenter and exhibit builder I had worked on numerous conceptual installations. John Coplans http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Coplans was the Director of the Institute and he liked Conceptual Art and installations. I had worked with artists like Vito Acconci http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Acconci and Robert Morris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Morris_(artist) and many others on their installations and Buky’s  request was simple and right in line with what I did all the time.

So, I got to work building the triangle wall, two by fours, drywall and mud. With the triangle wall up and the first coat of mud (Plaster or Joint Compound) applied and drying Buky said it was time to start installing the video camera. The process of mounting the video camera seemed to take as long as it did for the mud to dry. After careful positioning of the camera, Buky began taping, not with the camera but with tape. He taped a grid on the TV monitor where the color bars would appear when we were finished with the painting. As he did that, I applied another coat of mud to the wall.  The day was done, I worked late to finish the wall and coated it with primer.

In the morning is when things got interesting maybe even mind blowing. We began to plot out the positions for the painted stripes that would cover the floor and walls of the gallery. Buky working from the monitor directed me to the points in the gallery that would be our references. Wild lines radiating out from a central point running across the triangle and all over the gallery compressed the 3D space into 2D on the TV monitor. Even without the color applied, I could now see what was going to happen. We began painting the stripes of the color bar on the floors and walls. Hours later, a multi-colored square appeared on the TV monitor. After adjusting the light and the camera all the viewer could see on the TV monitor was a color bar. The gallery space though was a dynamic combination of sculptural form and color.

The viewer participated in the installation by walking through the gallery space while viewing himself or herself on the TV monitor. As the viewer walked through the gallery, they would appear to disappear behind the triangle wall and reappear as they walked past the wall. On the TV monitor, it looked like the viewer was walking through the color bars disappearing and reappearing through an invisible triangle shape.

What Buky did was define the three dimensional space by showing the abstraction of two-dimensional perspective that the camera sees and artists try to duplicate when they draw. What was so mind blowing is that the two-dimensional references now existed in real three-dimensional space? The viewer could now interact simultaneously between the two dimensions and see or experience the visual and perceptual abstractions that were taking place. Buky was explaining three-point perspective http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perspective_(graphical) in an interactive setting that was cutting edge and in real time. Buky would have blown Masaccio’s mind. Masaccio the renaissance painter is credited with the invention of scientific perspective or three-dimensional perspective. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaccio

Color Bars wasn’t the last time I assisted Buky. A year or so later I was President of the Student art League at the University of Akron. The Student Union wanted to fund an art exhibition. They wanted something current and innovative; they wanted something that would rock. I discussed the request with a professor of mine Don Harvey. He suggested I call Buky to see if he would do one of his installations in the Student union. Even though I had developed a good friendship with Buky during our time working together, I thought he would never agree to do an installation. We had no budget to speak of, just expenses and a very modest stipend, hardly worth a major artists time, in fact the money we had was hardly worth anybody’s time. But I called Buky anyway and he immediately said yes. He said he had a piece in mind and would call me with the details later.

Buky called and wanted to know if I could get some logs, I could. I had a little firewood business and had plenty of logs, but he wanted log rounds of different sizes and lengths. I can do that I told him. Buky showed up as planned and I showed up with a truck full of assorted logs. I got to haul all of the logs up to the second floor of the Student Union while Buky surveyed the space. Well that was my job I certainly wasn’t the brains and I was young. If I had, had any brains I would have gotten volunteers from the Student art League to carry all of those logs upstairs and then back down after the exhibit ended.

Buky explained what he was going to do, this time I had an idea of what he was talking about after working on the Color Bars installation.

He arranged the log rounds according to the random shapes and sizes. He explained that he was going to paint random yellow lines across the logs to create a divided rectangle on the TV monitor. A similar installation can be seen in this video narrated by John Hanhardt Whitney Film and Video Curator 1974-1996.

Watch Video Here: http://blog1.videoart.net/?m=200706

During the building of the installation, Buky pestered me to show him slides of my Senior Show. I was intimidated, I felt self-conscious about my work, after all, here was a Master who I respected and admired. What if he said my work was crap what would I do?

So after we finished work on the installation we went over to the school of art. I got my slides. Buky and I went into the art history projection room. I loaded my slides into the projector and reached the moment of truth. I clicked through the slides one by one; Buky was silent and studied each one intently. I thought, he thinks my work sucks but that wasn’t the case. He was genuinely interested in the work and wanted to know why and how I had made the decisions I had made creating the work.

I had built three zig zaging steel walls in the gallery and poured coke slag against the sides of each walls. The slag like little hillsides sloughed down the sides of the walls and spread across the floor. I used the coke slag a by-product of making steel as a natural element in the installation. As the slag sloughed down the sides of the wall, it created a natural path. As would dirt or rock as it sloughs off a hillside or riverbank. However, I had neat paths sweep up between the steel walls, paths where people could walk.

Buky asked me why I had created these neat paths. I told him that the gallery director was concerned that people might trip on the rock like slag, so I made the paths to put the director at ease.

Buky was silent for a moment; I could tell he was thinking about what he would next say. He was very intent and very direct, he said, “Don’t make excuses, make decisions and understand why you make them and take responsibility for those decisions. Never do that again, never let anyone force you to change your mind about your decisions or your art”.

His advice stuck and it was some of the best advice I was ever given. What Buky explained was that I had made what would have been a great artwork just good by allowing the director to influence my decision-making. The decision to create paths instead allowing the material to take its natural form altered my intent my idea my art.

Buky was a sincere friend a friend who will tell you the truth and stand by you he was a true mentor. That was the last time I saw him. He went back to New York and I went to Graduate School. He later returned to Israel and I moved west. I don’t think that Buky ever really received the credit he deserved for his pioneering work in video in America. He was truly a Master and he was a visual genius. Buky broke new uncharted ground in the visual arts with his work. He was a giant among his peers and has earned his place in history and he was a friend, I will miss him even more now that he has passed.

Visit Buky Schwartz website:  http://www.bukyschwartz.com/main.htm

Watch Videos of Buky Schwartz at work:  http://www.videoart.net/home/Artists/ArtistPage.cfm?Artist_ID=1431

Read more about buky’s life:

Video art pioneer passes away at 77 By Ellie Armon Azoulay

Sculptor and video artist Buky Schwartz passed away yesterday. He was 77. Schwartz was born in Jerusalem in 1932, studied at the Avni Institute in Tel Aviv, worked as an assistant to Itzhak Danziger and studied at Saint Martins College of Art in London with Anthony Caro. In 1965, Schwartz was among the founders of the local 10+ Group, along with sculptors Pinhas Eshet, Uri Lifshitz, Ika Braun and other artists, including Raffi Lavie and Ziona Shimshi. In 2007, the Tel Aviv Museum displayed a comprehensive exhibition on the vivacious group, which held scores of shows throughout the course of its activity. More…http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1112390.html

The Artist and Debt, Annie Leibovitz Images and Nightmares

The Repo-man knocks at the door. “Let me in Let me in”! Not by the hair of my Chinnie Chin Chin is Annie’s reply to Art Capital Group. Today the old wolf at the door nightmare torments one of the most gifted artists in America; Photographer Annie Leibovitz who made a deal with a Company of Wolves with the hope of saving her home, her life’s work and her family.

Annie owes Art Capital Group 24 Million Dollars. To secure her 24 million dollar loan she used her real estate, her art collection and the rights to her artwork as collateral. Why she needed, such a large loan is at the heart of a story in the New York Times written by Allen Salkin about Leibovitz’s struggle with Taxes, Real Estate and Debt Management.

For Annie Leibovitz, a Fuzzy Financial Picture NYTIMES July31, 2009 by Allen Salkin.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/fashion/02annie.html?_r=1&ref=business

Annie’s struggle with debt was compounded by the recent deaths in the past five years of her long time partner Susan Sontag, the writer and her Father and Mother.  She also has children and recently added two giving birth to twins. At the same time of all of her personal issues, Leibovitz was managing the renovation of her three Greenwich Village properties, which alone was a source of enormous personal stress, controversy and a major financial impact on her personal fortune.

Who is Annie Leibovitz and how did she become a character in a nightmarish bedtime story?  In the beginning of her career Annie was I think simply in the right place at the right time combined with a genius talent to capture life on film. She became the staff Photographer for Rolling Stone Magazine when Rolling Stone was just another hopeful grassroots publication. Annie’s images dominated the cover with inside images of Rock and Rolls Greatest Artists. Her images sold copy and many believe were the catapult for the success for Rolling Stone Magazine. Along with fame came fortune and opportunity. Annie signed with Vanity Fair for a seven-figure salary estimated to be 3 million dollars a year with millions more in expenses for outrageously fantastic photo shoots where she made many of her trademark images. Annie was living the Artists dream of endless opportunity and budget to create her work.

Along the way, though she partied too much and developed a pattern of financial mismanagement. Just because a person is, an artistic genius does not make them good with money or debt management. Leibovitz’s ability to make money through her work offset her inability to manage money and debt until now.

Now is another moment of being in the right place but at the wrong time. Before Annie went to the Art Capital Group, who by the way is best described as a high end Pawnshop for the art worlds, Top Artist’s, Collector’s and Dealer’s, she arranged to sell limited portfolios of her work through the auction house Phillips de Pury. The auction that might have bailed her out fell short of the mark when the Art Bubble Burst in October of 2008. That left Annie in a real bind. She had spent millions on the renovations of her New York property and had to buy out a neighbor because of a lawsuit that added several million dollars to the cost. Then the taxman rang and wanted 1.5 million in taxes. With the economy and the art, market is shambles the wolf offered a deal that Annie gambled would save her.

Learn more about Art Capital Group and how it works.

That Old Master? It’s at the Pawnshop NYTIMES by Allen Salkin

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/24/arts/design/24artloans.html?fta=y

The fact remains that Annie Leibovitz has tremendous earning power and she may yet overcome this nightmare. Her photographic negative archive held by Getty Images is alone estimated to be worth 50 million dollars. That is why Art Capital is so aggressively after the rights to her images.

In fact, Annie still has time to pay them back because full repayment isn’t due until September 8^th, 2009. Never mind that fact Art Capital isn’t waiting they have filed several lawsuits against Leibovitz with the most recent this past week to gain access to her assets now. The prior suit was dismissed in part was to stop Annie from working for Getty Images because Art Capital alleged that it would make it more difficult for them to sell her Archive if she was working for Getty. The court ruled against Art Capital Group.

You may be saying to yourself that this story is outrageous and that Leibovitz is unique, but not so. In fact, in a city like New York where a one-bedroom apartment can cost a million plus she is in the small time real-estate market. When you combine renovation costs in New York City with the cost of property it is easy to spend a lot more money that you bargained for. I am sure that when Annie started this adventure the sky seemed to be the limit in the Art Market until the bust of 2008. Combined with the downfall of the economy and tight lending by banks Art Capital Group was in a great position to reap a profit.

Art Capital Group http://www.artcapitalgroup.com/Questions.html

The real enemy in this story is DEBT! Debt is the ball and chain that has hobbled Annie and it will do the same to you as an Artist. In fact, debt will stop you faster than a speeding bullet from achieving success as an artist.

Many artists are finished before they even get started because of debt. Yes, those student loans will sink you faster than the Titanic. You will find that the nice banker isn’t so nice and will tie you up in knots that you will struggle against for 20 years or more.

Even if you have overcome that obstacle and have achieved success, you still maybe burdened with the debt of a mortgage, car loan, credit cards and studio expenses like rent. All of the debt most American have, and when the economy goes south you still got that debt to pay back.

If this isn’t the reason most artists never make it; it has to be a close second and I don’t know what the first is. One thing I know for sure you as an Artist need to manage your money and debt in the most conservative way possible. Never count your chickens before they hatch. Pay as you go as far as you possibly can. And for god sake live in the Mid-West or Western States and stay off the coasts. New York City may be the Art Hub of the world but visit don’t buy.

You also need to understand contracts and the results of signing contracts not only with lenders but with galleries and dealers. If you don’t understand contracts then find someone who does like a lawyer so you can root out any fine print in the deal before you commit. You also need to use contracts when you are hired to do work or sell work so that your rights and the rights of the buyer or employer are clearly spelled out. What are the terms of ownership and who owns the rights to the image, painting or whatever?

The business of art is complex as is the business of money and they are equally the same. While your vision as an artist may be limited to your creative, genius the business of your art is all about the money and wolves are not endangered in the Art World environment.

Debt is food for the wolf and the wolf is always hungry and eager to make a profit or a meal out of your mistakes. Regardless of how outrageous your creative ideas are, keep your financial ideas conservative. The fact is most of us have to have steady paying jobs of some sort to just enjoy the basics in life, homes, cars, children. If you can limit your debt, you will in the long run enjoy more freedom to create your art.

If your lucky enough to make a lot of money spend wisely and pay cash when you can, never incur debt you absolutely do not have too. I know this isn’t what we have been taught but unless you want to be a slave shed the ball and chain of debt or better yet never let them shackle you to begin with. If you have to make a deal to get what you want be sure to very carefully weigh the all of the possible outcomes, good, bad and ugly. Is the risk worth the possible payoff?

I guess the other side of the story is as artists we all like the live on the edge. Risk seems to feed our creative nature. Somehow, we need to keep the benefits of life on the edge and maintain some control over our financial security. When economic times like today come the balance is tipped and we are, always going to have days like these sooner or later. Therefore, we have to plan for the reality while we are creating the impossible dream.

As for Annie, I am confident she will emerge from this crisis and continue to be successful. Art Capital will continue to find wholesome meals and Annie will earn more money in the next year than most of us will earn in our lifetime even after the wolves feed. She will also earn some profound lessons and they will serve her well as will the lesson of her bedtime story. When the Wolf came a Knocking.

So you want to be a Visual Artist, The Real Truth About a Life in the Arts After Graduation!

As you spend your summer dreaming that you will be the next Picasso or who ever your favorite artists is, if you even have one. Here are some truths about Art Schools and a life in the Arts you need to know before you begin your education, your career.

First not all Artists are created equal. Artists come in all shapes and sizes and create in every conceivable medium. There are painters, sculptors, printmakers, ceramists, glass blowers, graphic designers, computers animators, photographers, filmmakers, those who work in multiple mediums, and those who invent new mediums. The list is endless and changes continuously with the advent of technology and interest related to the societies and time we live in and our personal experience. Just get on the internet and look around at what artists are doing all over the world. A life in the arts can be a great adventure depending on your perspective toward art and your point of view.

Many of you have been told that you have real talent for drawing, because you draw all the time and that you should study art.

Maybe you even paint or sculpt, take photographs or made a movie in high school. Maybe you are good on the computer and you have made some animations with Photoshop.  Regardless of what talent you have or what idea you have about art or what art is or isn’t, you are headed to art school.

Most Art Schools are not I repeat Are Not going to prepare you to make a sustainable living as a visual artist after graduation. You are going to have to sell a lot of what ever Art you make to earn a living.

You will hear a lot about the MFA programs you need to get into after you have your BFA. In fact, you may spend your junior and senior year in a four-year college building your portfolio so you can apply for a MFA program. Why? So you can teach Art to earn a living.

That is why your professors are standing in the classroom or studio teaching you art. They could not or have yet to make a sustainable living from their artwork. That does not mean they do not have talent and skill, it is just a real, fact of life in the art market.

In fact, less than 5% of all visual artists make a living from the art they want to create, their personal art.  To earn the salary of an art college professor making $40,000 a year you will have to sell about $100,000 worth of art every year. Whatever you hope to earn after graduation add 60% and that is your target goal for yearly sales. Even the best of the best art schools are bullshit when it comes to post graduate earnings and job placement for the visual artist who has pursued a traditional career in the arts.

Don’t let the “that’s not really art” line of bullshit derail you from pursuing new technical innovation either. Today art is far more than drawing, painting, sculpting, ceramics, textiles and photography. I listed photography last because photographers hear that photography is still not really art, still today after nearly 200 years after its invention.  You will hear the same about electronic art mediums too. Art can be created with anything, any medium your creative mind can conceive from garbage (that’s real trash from the dump) to megabytes and anything else you can lay you hands on.

Check out Chris Jordan’s work “Running the Numbers” http://www.chrisjordan.com/

Now when you and your parents are sitting in the guidance office with an academic adviser and they tell you how great the schools job placement is for the traditional visual artist. Call BULLSHIT.

If you are talking to an adviser at the Art Institutes of America, (they have city names in front of Institute like the Seattle Art Institute) or whatever city they are located in call BULLSHIT twice. Schools from Harvard to the Art Institute of (you fill in the blank) are there to sell you an education. They will sell you on what you believe you want to buy and for as much money as they can get out of you or your parents.

The question you have to ask right now, is what you are buying worth the price. Again, another Fact of Life you need to learn right now before you rake up a big bill or worse yet a big debt that isn’t worth what it cost you.

I guess if your parents are willing to pay the bill for you to pursue your dreams then go for it. You won’t have the burden of excessive debt to subjugate you to a life of poverty.

If you have to barrow money (student loans) to go to school you really, need to think about what you are buying.

You cannot discharge student loans in bankruptcy. In fact Federal Subsidized students loans can dog you until the end of your life if you default. The government can and will seize your income tax returns, your property, your pay check and they can prevent you from obtaining federal employment and prevent you from getting any type of home mortgage that has anything to do with government lending or guarantee programs.

Defaulting on any Government loan can create a life of financial and economic nightmares that just won’t go away until you pay the money back.

So you better be prepared to earn a living that will allow you to pay the money you barrow back. That is another reason your professor is teaching. He or she spent $100,000 plus to get an MFA and off to work they go because I owe I owe as the seven dwarfs sang as they went to work in pursuit of their dreams.

Art is still burning in your blood like a fever that just won’t let go.

This creative fever is the torment that all true artists endure. I can tell you that if Art and a creative life are truly in your blood then there is nothing you can do except give in and pursue a Life in the Arts. It will never let you rest regardless of what you do for a living.

In fact many Artists were side tracked into other professions like medicine, law, business and many others where they made enough money to retire and then pursued their art because of the fever that runs in the blood of a true creative.

How do you know if you are a true creative, well you will just know, the creative fever won’t let you alone. The desire will always be there, you are just a creative junkie.

Your creativity can be satisfied though in many different ways and that is what we are going to talk about now, Survival for Creative’s.

Regardless of what you chose Doctor, Painter or Art Program Director creativity is really a mental thing. Creativity is about ideas and taking those ideas and turning them into some form of reality. Combined with the mental or intellectual side of creativity is the physical part of what you enjoy doing. As Artists, we tend to work in mediums that we enjoy, like paint, pencils, clay the computer, whatever. We tend to focus on details of the medium that stimulate us. For some of us it is working in realism for others it is abstractions. Still focusing further, some of us love color, form, sunsets or intellectual problem solving.

What you have to do is figure out as an artist what elements of art you like then find a commercial application that fits your likes with as few dislikes as possible. This is your fall back job if you do not make it into the 5% margin of artists who are lucky enough to earn a living from their work.

Your fall back position could be the MFA and teaching, but MFA’s are a dime a dozen today and teaching may not be your second calling.

You need to research right now jobs in the creative fields that are in demand. Then make sure you get training in the one with the most employable opportunities you will enjoy doing for a long time or at least a job with the least objectionable insults to your artistic being, a job that will allow you to earn a living and pursue your dreams as an Artist.

Here are some tips on what your school needs to provide to you as a Creative as an Artist.

First, let me explain what I mean when I call you a Creative. I believe that we were born as Creative’s. We are a splinter group of the population as a whole and we just have creative DNA or spirit. When we take aptitude tests, we score dominantly on the creative side of the scale. We are also sometimes called intuitive thinkers but we can also be analytical by nature too. I think there are the “Creative’s” and then there is the rest of the population. Creative’s exist in all vocations and in all occupations. The largest numbers of Creative’s are drawn into the Arts because as a vocation the Arts satisfy our basic needs as creative beings. Painters, Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Film Makers to name just a few of the many vocations we dominate.

No School and No Teacher can teach you how to make Your Art. What they can teach you is a set of skills that will enable you to make your art. Your art is yours, you have to find your art yourself. A good teacher is a mentor that will help you find your way, will help you find your voice and teach you the skills you need to make your voice heard.

As a creative you need to learn as many skills as you can so you can turn your ideas into some form of reality for the non-creative’s.

Your school needs to offer a curriculum that helps you build a diversified set of skills, skills that will enable you to make art and a living.  One of the worst inventions of the academic system today is the core curriculum. Although this system might offer you a wide range of skills in traditional art, it may not offer you the skills you need to earn a living. Much of the core curriculum programs are too grounded in traditional skills to allow you the student to broaden the needed skills you will need to make a living.

Aside from learning how to paint, you need to learn some marketable skills like for instance computer graphic design. Don’t like the computer well get over it. You may not want to be a graphic designer but you are going to need solid computer skills to self-market your work until you make it and can afford to hire someone else to market you.

You are also going to need business training including courses in marketing because you as a traditional artist are going to be in business for yourself and you need to know business and the business of art.

You are also going to have to learn how to write so you need to take writing courses. You don’t like to write or were never good at it, well you still need to learn. If you are, still no good at it then get a good editor. You are going to have to be able to talk and write about your work. You may find as you mature as a creative that you really like writing. In fact, maybe you are dyslexic many artists are. You don’t write because it has always been hard and you failed in school, well that is what editors are for. Some of the most creative writers in history had really good editors to correct their English.

If you think, you might like to teach then take teaching courses in addition to the standard MFA course work because to teach in public schools you will need those education courses to be certified to teach.

My point is you have to go to a school that helps you build the skills you need to earn a living while you pursue your art career. If the curriculum is too restrictive to allow you to pursue a subset of secondary skills, find another school. At most, four-year schools you can always combine art with a minor in a related field that is of interest to you.

The more skills you have the better prepared you will be for the real world.

Here are some art vocations that have a high demand, pay well and may keep your creative genius alive and well. However, you are not limited to my list. Do your own research and create your own list of possible secondary vocations.

Arts Management and Development.

http://artsmanagement.net/

http://www.collegeboard.com/csearch/majors_careers/profiles/majors/50.0704.html

If you think you might like to manage an art organization like the NEA then an advanced degree in Arts Management might be for you in addition to your degree in Painting.

If you think you would like to raise money for the arts learn development because people who can successfully raise money are always in demand.

Museum and Gallery Management.

http://www2.lib.udel.edu/subj/muse/internet.htm

http://www.museumsassociation.org/home

http://www.aam-us.org/

If you like great art and want to work in a place that has great art look into museum and gallery management. You could learn to be a curator, exhibit designer, registrar, conservator or museum director.

If you like detail work you could become an art conservator or preservationist.

http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/

http://www2.lib.udel.edu/subj/muse/internet.htm

Today there is a real shortage of Painting Conservators and these jobs pay very well and require well-developed artistic skills. Conservators and preservationist work in all types of areas from architecture to film.

You could become and appraiser if you like studying artists and art as a hobby, combined with your desire to make your own art you can make a good living appraising art.

If you like working on the computer, then learn every professional Adobe program available. Savoy computer designers and Photoshop experts can earn a good living. In addition, learn how to build websites along with the most innovative skills need to be competitive today.

Again, my point is simple. Broaden your knowledge of the jobs in the arts and your skills. The more skills and diversification you have the better able you will be at earning a living. A broad range of skills will also open up new and unlooked for ways to make art, allow your creative voice sing, and be heard.

Some other things to consider

Talk to artists you know about their career. If you don’t know any go out and meet some.

Look for successful artists and not so successful artists where you live. Look in the phone book or on the internet. Call them up and ask if you can talk to them about a career in art or about their career in art. Artists are people and like to talk about their achievements just like you. The more artists you talk to about art and career the more you will learn.

Go to museums and galleries, in fact volunteer at your local museum or art organization for anything. You will find out a whole lot about art organizations.

If that doesn’t work call up the curator and ask for a interview to talk to them about a career in museum management.

Call anybody in any arts position you want to know more about and schedule an interview. This is not an interview for a job. This is an interview for you to find out about a job or vocation. You are the interviewer, ask them what you want to know about what they do for a living and how they got their job. Find out about their background, what lead them to choose this vocation. Have your questions ready when you call. I bet you find some visual artists working in every imaginable place in the arts you look.

Yes, your high school guidance counselor should have told you to do this and so should have your college academic advisor. Just remember they are in the business to sell you an education. You get what you pay for so buyers beware. Also, remember you are the customer and you are going to pay big money for your education so you had better buy the education you need and want.

One other thing you can do as you study art or an arts related field is look for internships. Find out if your school offers assistance with internships as part of the curriculum. Internships will give you hands on experience that you can use on a job resume once you graduate. Take advantage of every opportunity even if your not sure its for you because you will learn something of value and find out what you really like and dislike to do for a living.

Before you barrow all that money be sure you are going to be armed with a diversity of jobs skills when you graduate that will enable you to earn a living and pay back those student loans.

A Life in the Arts is a wonderful thing for Creative’s so use your creative ability to get the life you want. Good Luck.

The statistics that colleges hate to share

http://moneyfeatures.blogs.money.cnn.com/2009/07/12/the-statistics-that-colleges-hate-to-share/

Art Job Resources

http://www.artjob.org/cgi-local/displayPage.pl?page=index.html

http://art.nmu.edu/department/AD_Career-Jobs.html

http://www.artinfo.com/job/

http://www.nga.gov/education/internvol.shtm

http://www.rfag.org/Education/Apprenticeships/tabid/235/Default.aspx

http://www.communityarts.net/training/archivefiles/apprenticeshipinternship/

• Art and the” Man Made Continent of Trash”, a Photographer’s Fantastic Story.

I was in Seattle visiting my son and his girl friend and while waiting to go out and take in the sites of Seattle while they ran errands I read about Photographer Chris Jordan’s Photographic series “Running the Numbers One” in the Seattle Sunday Magazine. Jordan uses images to create matrix designs based on the numbers of things. An image of two large breasts popped off the page in juxtaposition to a detailed image of Barbie Dolls arranged in patterns that make up the larger view of the breasts. Jordan used 32000 Barbie Dolls to depict the number of breast augmentations preformed each month in the United States. When I got back to Montana I looked up Jordan’s website and found another one of his Fantastic Number Stories,

• “Gyre” 2009 by Chris Jordan, an image of a Great Wave made out of 2.4 million pieces of plastic that represents the amount of plastic that enters the world’s oceans every hour.

The image, made from plastic debris collected from the Floating Continent of Trash in the Pacific Gyre, is part of, Running the Numbers II, Portraits of Global Mass Culture another photographic series by Chris Jordan.

http://www.chrisjordan.com/

• The Pacific Ocean Gyre contains a floating continent of Plastic debris estimated to be twice the size of the Texas.

I first read about the Gyre in a story about Captain Charles Moore who was on his way home from a sailing trip, from Hawaii to Los Angeles when he decided to cut across the area, little traveled by seaman on his way back to California.  Moore explains the Gyre as a Spiral that moves in a clockwise rotation created by ocean currents. The natural spiraling current traps debris and holds them in place. Moore estimates that plastic started showing up in the 1950s and has grown to an alarming size, thousands of miles across. The plastic floats submerged just below the surface of the water, undetectable from satellite images because of the reflection caused by the water.

• Garbage had historically broken down in the oceans until plastic came along.

Every year this new man made material increases its presence in the ocean and the Trash Continent in the Pacific Gyre grows. When I read the story, images of Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty flashed in my mind about how the twisting currents of the Gyre worked on this manmade continent of trash. As I read more about the Pacific Gyre the more captivating, its relationship to the idea of entropy and natural systems is to me. This continent of trash is an unforeseen result of human behavior at work in the natural system. Un-natural materials discarded in a thoughtless manner now have grown to unimaginable levels that are affecting the eco system and sea life.

This Man Made Structure, this Continent of Trash is not only an extension of Smithson’s ideas about entropy it is at the center of the Chris Jordan’s idea of Global Mass Culture. Jordan helps us put into perspective the volume Global Mass Production through his imagery.

• As an artist I am struggling with the concept of such a large structure whose mass rotates in a natural form, the spiral.
  

But by reflecting on whirlpools and eddy’s in the river where I live I can envision such a fantastic structure created by the forces of nature. The image of such things takes me back to the late 1970’s Robert Morris installations where he used cotton fibers to create seas of cotton waste from the textile industry with mirrors calculated to continuously, reflect the surface into an infinite image of volume and mass. Morris was part of a group of process artists. (Process artists were involved in issues attendant to the body, random occurrences, improvisation, and the liberating qualities of non-traditional materials such as wax, felt, and latex. Using these materials, they created eccentric forms in erratic or irregular arrangements produced by actions such as cutting, hanging, and dropping, or organic processes such as growth, condensation, freezing, or decomposition.) These ideas seemed radical in art, difficult to adjust our thinking too back in 1970s and 1980s. It clear now that the minimal and conceptual ideas of artists like Morris and Smithson is a reflection of the natural systems at work in our earth environment. Unintended or manufactured the only differences are intent; the results are mirror reflections of the outcomes, like Morris’s fiber and mirror installations and Smithson’s Spiral Jetty. Chris Jordan helps us to understand the Numbers by bringing perspective and Volume to the size of Global consumption.

• Out there off the coast of the Untied States in the middle of the North Pacific Ocean the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is the result of a random occurrence of the accumulation of man made materials creating a New Continent of Floating Trash; a Floating, spiraling continent of Our Own Making; which will exist for an immeasurable measure of time.

Jordan’s Photographic images illustrate the fact that this new continent is sure to grow in mass and volume daily. It will grow unlike the Hawaiian Islands that Captain Charles Moore sailed home from, created by volcanic activity. Our New Continent will grow because of Human activity directly related to Global Mass Consumption without thoughtful contemplation of unintended results and because of our inability to understand the abstract ideas of volume and mass, our lack of understanding the numbers.

Links About:  The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch

Capt. Charles Moore Ted TV

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/capt_charles_moore_on_the_seas_of_plastic.html

Chris Jordan on his Photography Ted TV

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/chris_jordan_pictures_some_shocking_stats.html

Chris Jordan Website

http://www.chrisjordan.com/

Man Made Continent of Trash a Fantastic Story by David Eubank February 2008

http://davideubank.wordpress.com/man-made-continent-of-trash-a-fantastic-story/

Want to have some fun use Google Earth

http://earth.google.com/

Just type in “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch” and see the size of our new continent and where it is located.

OBEY I am not a Crook, digital montage by David Eubank

A very well written article by Steven Heller on the Art of Shepard Fairey and the controversy of the transformative factor in art and copyright law.

Long live Dada!

Shepard Fairey is not a Crook, by Steven Heller

!! READ THIS !!

]]> http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/04/24/a-controversy-of-transformation-and-shepard-fairey/feed/ 1 davideubank iam-not-a-crook-fairey http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/big-art-big-theft-the-lawrence-b-salander-indictment/ http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/big-art-big-theft-the-lawrence-b-salander-indictment/#comments Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:20:09 +0000 davideubank http://davideubank.wordpress.com/?p=665 ]]>

Big Art Big Theft;

The Lawrence B. Salander Indictment

Lawrence B. Salander of O’Reilly Galleries LLC was arrested on a 100 count indictment. Below, is a news release from the New York District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau about the case?

The indictment outlines how Salander built one of the most powerful art empires on fraud and deceit while he lived life as large as any Wall Street mogul did. Salander’s built an empire built based on illusion and manipulation of those who trusted him. He has pled not guilty to all charges. I predict that if Salander goes to trial that it will be the first time the secret details of how the Big Art Market functions will come to light and we will all learn the truth behind closed doors.

Link to NYC District Attorney Website

http://manhattanda.org/whatsnew/press/2009-03-26.shtml

DISTRICT ATTORNEY – NEW YORK COUNTY

NEWS RELEASE
March 26, 2009

Contact: Alicia Maxey Greene
212-335-9400

Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau announced today the arrest and 100-count indictment of former art gallery owner LAWRENCE B. SALANDER and the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES, LLC for stealing $88 million from investors, owners, and a bank.

The defendants, SALANDER, 59, and the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES, have been indicted on multiple charges of grand larceny, securities fraud, scheme to defraud, forgery, criminal possession of a forged instrument, falsifying business records, and perjury against SALANDER. The crimes charged in the indictment occurred between July 1994 and November 2007.

The investigation leading to today’s indictment revealed that SALANDER, the manager and co-owner of the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES, defrauded 26 victims resulting in the theft of millions of dollars. SALANDER stole from his victims in two primary ways: he sold artwork not owned by him and kept the money; and lured investment money in fraudulent investment opportunities.

Investors in this case are individuals or entities that paid cash in exchange for an ownership interest in a work of art. Investment deals were presented in two ways, as a pre-sale or speculative investment. In pre-sales, SALANDER represented to an investor that a work of art had already been sold to a buyer who needed time to pay. SALANDER told the investor that he could purchase a percentage of the work based on SALANDER’s actual cost and then share a corresponding percentage of the sales price when it was paid. For example: SALANDER would claim that he purchased a work of art for $500,000 and had a buyer who agreed to pay $1 million in the future. SALANDER offered the investor a 50 percent interest in the art work for $250,000 with the assurance that upon receipt of the purchase price the investor would receive his initial investment plus an additional $250,000 as profit. In a speculative investment, SALANDER offered an investor the opportunity to purchase a work of art with him at cost, and thereafter SALANDER would sell the artwork at a greatly increased value and they would split the profit.

The fraud in each investment opportunity occurred when SALANDER did not own the work of art he offered for investment in whole or in part, or he misrepresented the actual terms of the investment. The misrepresented terms included: inflation of the purported cost (cost fraud), the sale of greater than 100 percent interest in a single work (oversale), the fabrication of the existence of the pre-sale (ghost investment), failure to pay the return when the money came in on the purported investment, or the misrepresentation of the amount payable to the investor (fraudulent retention).

For example: Renaissance Art Investors, LLC (RAI) was one of the gallery’s largest investors. RAI paid SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES $42 million at closing for approximately 328 Renaissance works of art.  As part of the deal, RAI, which was put together by the Schupak Group, a merchant bank owned by Donald Schupak and his son Andrew Schupak, simultaneously consigned the works back to SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES to market and sell. The $42 million was paid based upon SALANDER’s representations of the deal. However, SALANDER misrepresented almost every aspect of this investment including the cost and source of the works sold. For example, SALANDER claimed to have purchased the majority of Renaissance artworks from private dealers and estates mostly throughout Europe, yet the investigation revealed that he actually purchased a large number of works of art from public auction houses throughout Europe and the United States. SALANDER also intentionally withheld from RAI the reporting of millions of dollars in sales of RAI artworks after the closing of the deal and failed to turn over the proceeds of the sale. To support his misrepresentations, SALANDER provided RAI with forged invoices, fraudulent cash disbursement entries, falsified internal documents reflecting source and cost data, and falsified monthly inventories.

Owners of art as used in this case are individuals or estates that own works of art and consign them to the gallery for sale, exhibition, or appraisal. Upon the sale of artworks at agreed upon prices, the owners were to receive the balance of the sale price minus the commission owed the gallery. The majority of the estates are the heirs of prominent 20th Century American artists, including the estates of Stuart Davis, Ralston Crawford, Elie Nadelman, Louis Kahn, Giorgio Cavallon, George McNeil, Suzy Frelinghuysen and George Morris. The thefts from this category of victims occurred pursuant to unauthorized transactions including: sales below owners’ authorized prices, sales of artwork not delivered for sale at the time of the transactions, the use of the artworks as investment vehicles for third parties, or the use of the artworks to satisfy debts owed to third parties. These transactions were completed without consent from, notice to, or payment to the owners.

For example: in the case of the Estate of Stuart Davis, SALANDER and the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES sold over 50 Stuart Davis works of art consigned by the estate. The evidence showed that a majority of those works were sold without authorization at significantly reduced prices and without notice and payment to the Davis estate, a theft totaling over $6.7 million.  Altogether, the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES failed to produce or pay for 96 Davis works of art consigned to the gallery by the estate after repeated demands for the return of all works.

The bank in this case is the Bank of America from which SALANDER applied for a personal loan for himself and his wife, Julie.  In support of his loan application, SALANDER offered certain artwork as security and provided documents to establish that his wife owned that artwork.  In fact, several pieces were never owned by LAWRENCE SALANDER nor Julie Salander, but were owned by other individuals, including John McEnroe and the Estate of Dr. Alexander Pearlman. After previous offerings of collateral were rejected, these false filings enabled SALANDER to obtain a $2 million loan.

The investigation further revealed that SALANDER used the stolen funds for two primary purposes: to finance his self-imposed mission to corner the market in Renaissance Art, and to support his extravagant lifestyle, which included travel by private jet within the United States and to Europe, a lavish party for his wife at the Frick Collection, and the purchase and maintenance of his Manhattan townhouse and 66-acre estate in Millbrook, Dutchess County, New York.

He co-founded SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES in 1976. In 2005, the gallery moved from its original location on 79th Street to a five-story building located at 22 East 71st Street. He continued to control the daily business practices of the gallery until it closed in November 2007, pursuant to the filing of an involuntary Chapter 7 bankruptcy case.

The indictment charges SALANDER with 14 counts and the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES with 13 counts of Grand Larceny in the First Degree, a class B Felony, which is punishable by up to 8⅓ to 25 years in prison; each defendant with 10  counts of Grand Larceny in the Second Degree, a class C felony, which is punishable by up to 5 to 15 years in prison; 3 counts of Grand Larceny in the Third Degree, 5 counts of Forgery in the Second Degree, and 5 counts of Criminal Possession of a Forged Instrument in the Second Degree, all class D felonies, which are punishable by up to 2⅓ to 7 years in prison; 6 counts of Securities Fraud under the Martin Act (General Business Law §352-c(6)), 1 count of Scheme to Defraud in the First Degree, and 55 counts against SALANDER and 53 counts against the SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree, all class E felonies, which are punishable by up to 1⅓ to 4 years in prison. SALANDER was also charged with 1 count of Perjury in the First Degree, a class D felony, which is punishable by up to 2⅓ to 7 years in prison.

Mr. Morgenthau thanked Detective Mark Fishstein of the New York City Police Department Major Case Squad for his assistance in the investigation.

Deputy Bureau Chief Micki Shulman and Assistant District Attorney Tanya Apparicio of the Frauds Bureau presented the case to the grand jury under the supervision of Frauds Bureau Chief Michael Kitsis and Deputy Bureau Chief Jeannette Molina and Chief of the Investigations Division Patrick Dugan.  Investigators Jeremy Rosenberg,  Jack Patterson, Siobhan Berry and Reginald Barometre assisted in the investigation under the supervision of Chief Investigator Joseph Pennisi and Deputy Chief Terence Mulderrig.  Others involved in the investigation included Investigative Analyst Yiyang Wu, and Trial Preparation Assistants David Lamb and Daniel Biller of the Frauds Bureau, and Financial Investigator Jay Liang supervised by Frank Puma, Chief of the Financial Crimes Bureau. IT Analyst Selena Ley and her supervisor, IT Deputy Director Steven Moran, also assisted.

Defendant Information:

LAWRENCE SALANDER, 5/29/49
Deep Hollow Road
Millbrook, New York

SALANDER-O’REILLY GALLERIES, LLC
22 East 71st Street
New York, New York

Investing in Big Art big gains or big losses another Secret Revealed

Tonight when I opened my Google News, there it was, another dirty secret made headlines. This time New York Art Dealer Lawrence B Salander indicted on the charge, he stole 88 million dollars from Art Investors, Collectors and Artists that consigned work with his upscale New York Gallery.

Art Dealer Is Charged With Stealing 88 Million

By James Barron New York Times, March 26, 2009

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/27/nyregion/27indict.html?ref=nyregion

Seems Mr. Salander sold the same painting to more than one buyer and that he used artwork that he did not own as collateral to barrow money. He also defrauded Artists who consigned work with his gallery. The article by James Barron is a more complete picture and I am sure that as this case goes to court more information will come to light. In fact, the real figure may be closer to 100 million according to Barron’s sources.

It just makes me sick when these kinds of things happen to artists and art collectors who are our patrons. We as artists go to galleries for representation because we need help marketing and selling our work. We need to make a living and we want collectors to collect our work. Then to be Ripped Off or to have our patrons Ripped Off is just plan Bad Business for all of us. I am not suggesting that Mr. Salander is representative of the art market as a whole but he does represent the bad side of a market fraught with risk.

As I have said many times before “Do Your Homework” before you buy, invest or consign your artwork to anybody. But how do you guard against someone like Salander. He is a Dealer who is established and appears to be respectable and has been around for a long time. I guess you just have to dig harder and use your gut intuition as your guide. If a deal is too sweet, beware. It is a deal probably too good to be true.

Barron’s NYT article says that someone with the investigation attempted to contact Robert De Niro Sr. about his paintings and his connection with Salander but that he didn’t return the phone call. Mr. De Niro Sr. Died in 1993. He is the father of actor Robert De Niro.

I was confused when I read about De Niro. I had exhibited several of his paintings in 2000 as part of an Abstract Expressionist Exhibit. I knew he had passed away. De Niro Sr. was part of the now famous group of painters the Abstract Expressionists.

Maybe they were referring to his son who is trying to recover 12 of his Dads paintings.

As it turns out Salander is accused of stealing 12 of De Niro Sr. paintings that had been consigned to him. Read the Article

http://www.nypost.com/seven/11202007/news/regionalnews/deniro_demands_pop_art_239232.htm

About Robert De Niro Sr. Abstract Expressionist 1922-1993

http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/2005-06-20-deniro_x.htm

http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/de_niro_sr_robert.html

About Lawrence B. Salander

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/lawrence_b_salander/index.html?inline=nyt-per

Bloomberg News

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=a.95n8ZwIPv8&refer=muse

]]> http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/03/27/investing-in-big-art-big-gains-or-big-losses-another-secret-revealed/feed/ 0 davideubank salander080331_1_560-723304 http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/03/21/americas-cultural-treasures-on-sale/ http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/03/21/americas-cultural-treasures-on-sale/#comments Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:40:58 +0000 davideubank http://davideubank.wordpress.com/?p=655 ]]>

Americas Cultural Treasures on Sale

• A Bill in the New York Legislature Would Regulate the Sale of Museum Art Collections. If the Bill passes, it would make it illegal for a museum to sell parts of their collections to cover operating costs.

New York Times-related article

Bill seeks to Regulate Museums Art Sales

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/18/arts/design/18rege.html

Link to a copy of the Proposed Museum Bill

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/arts/03182009-bill.pdf

• The Question

Can or Should a Museum be allowed to sell parts of its art collection to cover operating expenses?

This is not a new question today just because many museums find themselves facing financial deficits in today’s economic crisis. It is a long-standing question has been unanswered by the law. Most Museums operate under a voluntary code of ethics that governs their decisions based on the principles or standards set by the industry. But the code of ethics has few teeth except shunning by other intuitions and professionals in the field and the code does little to stop un-sound or un-ethical practices.

Quoted from NYT article by Robin Pogrebin

“The two notions of deaccessioning and debt have to be de-coupled,” said Anne W. Ackerson, the director of the Museum Association of New York. “It seems that when some institutions get into financial trouble, they look to their collections as a way to get out.”

“Deaccessioning to pay the bills is strongly condemned in the museum world. The Association of Art Museum Directors, a national group, strictly prohibits the sale of artworks to cover anything but the acquisition of art. The group imposed sanctions on the National Academy for its sale, advising other institutions not to collaborate with or make loans to the academy”.

Link to the Museum ICOM Code of Ethics 2006 Document

http://icom.museum/ethics.html#intro

• An example of the problem is the case of Brandeis University. In January, they announced that they would close the Rose Art Museum and sell the collection to balance their budget.

The management of Museum collections is a difficult task fraught with many obstacles and often occurs behind closed doors out of the publics view. These often-secret deals are the very issue of the proposed law. When a decision such as the sale of the Rose Museum collection becomes public a lot of attention is focused on what is happening and why. Donor’s like the Rose Family get upset and as word spreads other donors out there in the world start to ask important questions about their donations to not only the museum in question but to museums they support.

Rose Art Museum To Be Closed

http://media.www.thejusticeonline.com/media/storage/paper573/news/2009/01/27/News/Rose-Art.Museum.To.Be.Closed-3599143.shtml?reffeature=recentlycommentedstoriestab

Rose Family Condemns University

http://media.www.thejusticeonline.com/media/storage/paper573/news/2009/03/17/News/Rose-Family.Condemns.University-3673802.shtml?reffeature=recentlycommentedstoriestab

• Every museum regardless of size or type has the problem of collection management.

Every collection has as in the case of Art Museums, Artworks that do not severe the scope of their respective collection and exhibition programs. Often artworks come into collections as donations past and present that have no real importance to a museums focus. These artworks are often just stored if they represent a direction, the museum may develop in the future. Sometimes the artwork fits the museums mission but is in a condition that prevents it from being exhibited until the artwork can be stabilized through preservation or restoration. Other times the artwork is simply not of value to the collection because it just doesn’t fit current or future plans of the museum. In that case rather than just store the artwork museums opt to deaccession or sell the artwork to another museum that has a collection the artwork would be a value too. Or they sell it to a collector if there is no other buyer.

Sometimes artworks are traded if a trade meets the needs of both parties. Some museums will loan artworks to other museums that need the artwork to exhibit with their collection in exchange for restoration or preservation when they cannot afford the cost themselves.

When work is deaccessioned, sold the money is ethically spent to either buy new artwork that meets the collection needs of the museum or used to pay for the cost of preservation of existing important artworks in their collections.

A museum that has a good collections management policy will create deeds of trust that governs the accessioning and deaccessioning of artworks. These documents are legal and binding and require that Museums make good and solid judgments when choosing artworks for their collections. But in the case of many older institutions and also new ones these agreements were not or are not part of their policy and artworks were accessioned into collections for a plethora of reasons. Often the reason was political to keep a major donor happy. Fifty years later, when the donor is long gone the museum still has the artwork and has little or no use for it today. As the organization, the museum matures and develops a sound; collection management policy, they still have the issue these types of artworks, these gifts are still in their collections. The deaccessioning of these treasures must be, dealt with in an ethical manner to preserve the purpose and function of museums as a whole. This is where the law can help museum professionals manage their collections and their Boards of Directors or at least their decisions.

• The dynamics of a Board change continuously and I think is the most difficult part of managing a museum or for that matter any corporation private or non-profit.

Attracting and retaining good Board members is an art and requires skill, hard work and above all Strong Policies. Boards can act in ways that are disastrous and harmful to the organization with out proper regulation, rules or by-laws that govern their behavior legally. Perhaps we can create a new term “The AIG Factor”! The rules that govern museums and other organizations established in their corporate structure vary widely.

• In the case of the Rose, the Director was informed of the decision to close the museum and sell the collection after the decision was made.

The Director had no say or input into the decision making process. In some organizations, this would not be the case, but even under the best of circumstances, the Board of Directors may in fact have the last word. They can just fire the Director who opposes their decisions.

Today many organizations are challenged by the current economic crisis. It is important to remember that there is always going to be good economic times and challenges in the future. Museum’s are here for the long haul and museum professionals have to protect the integrity of their institutions for the greater public good. Too, allow boards simply to sell off the collection assets when the going gets tough is not realistic long-term management.

Like in the case of the Rose, once the museum is gone it will be gone for good, as will be the treasure in your local art museum if it is sold.

In this instance, the Law if created would only govern New York State. I think it is time for a national uniform set of laws to govern the public trust. I have certainly understated the complexity of the problem and an issue here, what I have attempted to do is simplify a very complex and real problem that is widespread and concerns every art museum in the nation.

• What Happening in your Art Museum?

Do the Arts need a National Bailout?

http://davideubank.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/do-the-arts-need-a-national-bailout/