Want to buy or sell a painting but aren’t sure how to do it? The Oldie’s exhibitions correspondent, Huon Mallalieu, has the answer
What a picture!
Sold! L S Lowry’s The Auction at Sotheby’s, London, 19th October 2021. It sold for £2.1m (£2.6m with buyer’s premium and fees)
IAN WEST
H
ow much time have you got? Picture-buying can take a minute – or a lifetime. Nearly 40 years ago, I wrote a book on this subject. Not a great book but, when I look at it now, it seems rather better than I expected. One of the more sensible tips for a tyro buyer was ‘The first person to turn to for advice when you are offered a picture is yourself. If you like it so much that questions of exact authorship, subject, price, condition and provenance are irrelevant, then no more need be said; go ahead and buy it. If not, you owe it to yourself to find out as much as possible before parting with your money.’ 26 The Oldie May 2022
There are almost as many reasons for buying any kind of art as there are buyers. Some need a painting for a particular space, others have a liking for a particular artist and still others more generally want to start a collection. Then there are those who think it might be an easy way to make money. After 60 years in the art trade, my old friend Julian Hartnoll has just produced what he supposes might be his last two catalogues. In an introduction, he responds to the question a dealer is so frequently asked: ‘What should I buy?’ – shorthand for ‘Will it go up in price?’ This annoys him because ‘It implies the questioner is looking on art as an
investment. My reply is consistent and must have bored my family sick: houses should be bought to be lived in and pictures should be bought to hang on the wall – neither should be bought as a form of investment. Buy what you yourself like and can afford. Art is not an asset; it is a source of pleasure and intellectual stimulation.’ Those who try to apply the methods of the stock market to making money from paintings rarely flourish. A small venture among the larger ways in which the late investor, asset-stripper and City dealmaker Jim Slater came unstuck in the mid-1970s was an attempt to create a market for the work of a Constable
