“IT'S CALLED GOSSIP AND OF COURSE IT'S AN OBSESSION OF MINE -ANDY WARHOL

Dealers have always offered clients a higher degree of discretion than the public space of an auction ever can. That has traditionally been their great asset. But let's be candid: Nobody in Dubai or Shanghai wants a pickled cow to gaze at musingly in solitude for the sheer beauty of its hindquarters. When today's clients buy such wares, privacy is the last thing on their minds. They are buying into celebrity. As Thomas Hoving, the former director of the Metropolitan Museum, once said: "Social climbing and art have gone together since Alexander brought Lysippas to his court, and before." As the market's top end begins to evaporate for them, contemporary dealers should reconsider the Duchamp-Warhol ethos of shock and celebrity that has come to dominate the art world. Perhaps it is time for dealers to start embracing what will save them: art valued on its merits without the hype.

-The Wall Street Journal
August 23 2008