Record Prices Concealing Tepid Market for Fine Art
藝術市場其實很冷清
By James B. Stewart

In November, a triptych portrait by the British modernist painter Francis Bacon sold for $142.4 million, a record for a work of art at auction. The next night, a silk-screen print, “Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster),” by the American pop artist Andy Warhol brought $105.4 million. And early this month, “Saying Grace,” by the American illustrator Norman Rockwell, sold for $46.1 million.
英國現代畫家培根的三幅聯畫上月以1.424億美元創下藝術品拍賣天價。次日晚間，美國普普藝術家安迪‧沃荷的絹布版畫「銀色車禍（雙重災難）」以1.054億美元成交。本月稍早，美國插畫家洛克威爾的「謝飯禱告」以4610萬美元落槌。

But despite the headlines and the hyperbolic enthusiasm of many auctioneers and dealers, the broad market for fine art is in the doldrums, according to experts who track sales data. Many works are selling near or below their low estimates or failing to sell at all.
追蹤交易數據的專家說，儘管許多拍賣商與交易商大肆吹捧，藝術市場整體而言卻十分低迷。許多作品成交價接近或低於最低預估價，甚至賣不出去。

As measured by the Mei Moses World All Art Index, a widely cited benchmark, the market for fine art declined 3.3 percent in 2012, and gained 2.2 percent through November, even with the recent record-setting sales. Strip out traditional Chinese art, the value of which has been surging for years thanks to the interest of wealthy Chinese buyers, and the performance would be much worse.
以受廣泛引用的梅摩全球藝術品指數計算，市場去年萎縮3.3%，而今年到11月底為止，儘管近日交易價迭創紀錄，也僅成長2.2%。若扣除傳統中國作品，表現更差。由於多金的中國買家有興趣，傳統中國作品身價近年水漲船高。

By comparison, the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index gained 13.4 percent in 2012 and is up more than 27 percent so far this year.
相形之下，標普500種指數去年上漲13.4%，今年更已上漲逾27%。

At Sotheby’s, where “Silver Car Crash” set a record for Warhol, another image of a car crash, this one in green called “5 Deaths on Turquoise,” sold for barely over $7 million. A Warhol portrait of Liz Taylor with a yellow background went for $18 million (not counting commissions), below its $20 million to $30 million estimate. And at Sotheby’s, another Rockwell with a religious theme, “Walking to Church,” sold for just $2.8 million before the buyer’s commission, below its $3 million to $5 million estimate.
在「銀色車禍」創下安迪沃荷作品拍賣紀錄的蘇富比公司，另一件以青色表現的安迪沃荷車禍場景作品「青綠色的5個死亡」僅以700多萬美元成交。他另一件黃色背景的玉婆伊莉莎白泰勒畫像以1800萬美元（不計佣金）成交，低於預估的2000萬~3000萬美元。在另一場蘇富比拍賣會中，洛克威爾的另一件宗教主題畫作「步行到教堂」僅賣得280萬美元（扣除買家的佣金之前），同樣低於預估的300萬~500萬美元。

But at least they sold. Sanford Robinson Gifford’s Civil War masterpiece, “Sunday Morning in the Camp of the Seventh Regiment,” which was on loan to the White House and had hung in the Oval Office for over 20 years, didn’t sell earlier at this month at Christie’s. It was estimated to fetch $3 million to $5 million.
然而至少它們還賣掉了。美國19世紀畫家吉福特描繪南北戰爭的名作「第7團營區的周日上午」借給白宮，懸掛在橢圓形辦公室已逾20年，本月稍早未能在佳士得拍賣會中拍出。預估價是300萬~500萬美元。

What explains the gap between perception and reality?
該如何解釋看法與事實之間的落差？

“What we’ve seen is that the explosive prices represent only a tiny, tiny subset of lots,” said David Kusin, a former Metropolitan Museum of Art curator who also worked on Wall Street and now runs Kusin & Company, a consulting firm in Dallas, Texas, that specializes in the economics of the art market. “They get all the press, but we’ve seen relatively stable hammer prices in most categories over the past few years.”
庫辛曾任紐約大都會美術館策展人，也曾在華爾街工作，目前是德州達拉斯專長藝術市場經濟學的庫辛顧問公司負責人。他說：「爆炸性價格只代表極小部分，卻獲媒體高度關注。然而這幾年我們看到的是，多數類別成交價相對穩定。」

And just two categories have pushed up the averages.
只有兩種類別推升平均成交價。

“Postwar, contemporary art – artists active from 1950 to the present – which includes Francis Bacon, Jackson Pollock, has been doing extremely well for the past 25 years,” said Michael Moses, a retired professor of economics at New York University’s Stern School of Business and a co-founder of the Mei Moses Art Index. “And traditional Chinese art – works created before 1900 – has been doing even better.”
共同創立梅摩指數的紐約大學史登商學院已退休經濟學教授摩希說：「活躍於1950年代至今的戰後當代藝術家，包括培根和波拉克，25年來作品賣得極好。1900年之前創作的中國傳統藝術作品更夯。」

Mr. Moses said his data indicated that traditional Chinese art had gained a compounded annualized rate of return for the 10 years ending in 2012 of 15.5 percent. Postwar and contemporary art gained 11.6 percent. By contrast, old master paintings gained only 3.3 percent and American paintings just 1 percent. And the overall index gained 7.4 percent.
摩希表示，根據他蒐集的數字，在至去年為止的10年之間，傳統中國藝術作品的綜合年報酬率高達15.5%。戰後與當代作品約11.6%。相較之下，年代比較久的名畫僅3.3%，美國畫家的作品更是只有1%。整體指數上升7.4%。

Some find the whole notion of an art market to be distasteful. Michael Findlay, author of “The Value of Art,” and a director at the Acquavella Galleries in New York, said: “What I believe in is the social and aesthetic value of art. We live in a society where everything is so monetized, the only way people can talk about art is in terms of money.”
有些人認為，所謂「藝術市場」的觀念令人反感。現任紐約阿奎維拉畫廊主管的「藝術的價值」一書作者范德雷說：「我篤信藝術的社會及美學價值。當今社會一切向錢看。人們只能從金錢角度談論藝術。」

Like many art professionals, Mr. Findlay is a critic of the Mei Moses index, which doesn’t account for private sales at galleries like Acquavella. Mr. Moses acknowledges that his index has its limitations. By definition, it takes what are unique objects and combines them into broad patterns. The art market is “like real estate,” he said. “No two objects are exactly alike.”
梅摩指數不計入阿奎維拉等私人畫廊的買賣紀錄。如同許多藝術專業人士，范德雷對它也頗有微詞。摩希承認它確有先天上的限制。以定義言，它計入獨一無二的作品，再把它們結合為廣泛的類別。他說：「藝術市場有如房地產。沒有兩個物件完全相同。」

Mr. Moses urged collectors not to get swept up in the excitement of bidding. He said there were worse things than losing an auction for any one object. “the beauty of art is that there is a lot of it.”
摩希呼籲收藏者不要被競標的興奮沖昏頭。他說，有些事情比競標失利還嚴重，「藝術美就美在它俯拾皆是。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/07/business/record-prices-mask-a-tepid-art-market.html

Graphic：Art Market in the Doldrums
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/12/07/business/Art-Market-in-the-Doldrums.html

2013-12-24聯合報/G5版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS陳世欽譯 原文參見紐時週報十二版左