Art auctions -- a different viewpoint

[Mum2Mercury]

I attended not one but two art auctions on our recent cruise -- thoroughly enjoyed them!  I won a Miami Beach magnet, I enjoyed my free champagne, and I really like the free print they gave away at the end.  Anyway, I'm interested in art, and I enjoyed seeing the things and learning a bit about a few artists and techniques.  I was always a good student, so I took notes.  

 

Thoughts on the selling:

- People online complain that they didn't understand the rules of the auction -- that you don't take away the picture yourself that day, that you must pay more (on top of the big sale price) to have it delivered to your home.  I don't see how they don't understand.  It was explained to us, and it was written on our bid cards.  

- I was fairly well disgusted at their auctioning techniques.  It took me a moment to realize they were going UP in price, not down -- even when people don't bid.  Weird. 

- They move so fast that initially I thought a painting that was "passed" had passed from the auctioneer's hands to the new owner's, but then I realized that a "passed painting" wasn't bid upon -- and that seemed to be the majority of the paintings.  It's a less-negative word they've adopted to prevent people from realizing the majority of their paintings didn't sell.  

- This mystery bid business.  I didn't quite understand it, but no way was I going to get in on it, even if they say there's no commitment.  

 

They sold so little.  How can they stay in business?  

 

And in the end -- you'll be surprised because I am one of the biggest cheapskate skinflints on this board -- I bought something!  

 

Of course, the item I bought was from Amazon, and I purchased it after I returned home.  I wrote down author's names and paintings I liked, and Amazon offered many of them.  In a variety of sizes, in my choice of prints vs. canvas vs. wrapped canvas.  Some of the choices go as high as $89 -- free shipping too!  This is the best option for real people like me.  Retired school teachers don't buy art as an investment or to pass down to their children (who may or may not even like the painting), and my Amazon copy is just as "valuable" as Park West's copies; I can't wait to get it framed.  

 

I'll definitely attend more art auctions on future cruises, and I expect my attitude and choices will remain the same.  

Edited October 3, 2022 by Mum2Mercury

[shipgeeks]

Very interesting perspective!  And I loved your final comments.

We find the auctions very aggravating.  The room they are now using, on Enchantment, is one of the nicest public rooms on the ship, yet we never got to enjoy it, as the easels and prints were set up there for the entire cruise, blocking the windows, the lounge chairs, and any passageways within the room.  I hope more people read your post, and realize that there are options for acquiring art.

Your description of the bidding process sounds like a timeshare presentation that people are required to attend in order to pick up their tickets for a "free" cruise.  Ugh!

[Mum2Mercury]

I suppose things vary from ship to ship, but on Explorer the artwork had a "permanent spot" on ... Deck 4?  And they moved it to the Star Lounge for the auction, then moved it back.  

 

I don't understand how anyone would /could spend literally thousands on a painting they couldn't research /comparison price ahead of time.  

 

My adult daughter, an artist-forced-to-work-in-a-real-job, floored me:  She said INSTANTLY "It's all just money laundering."  I don't fully understand such things, but she might just be right.  

[NightOne]

27 minutes ago, Mum2Mercury said:

 

They sold so little.  How can they stay in business?  

 

 

 

Just takes a couple of suckers to get taken by their self-appraised art in order to make a pile of cash. 😉

[matj2000]

It is not really an auction.

 

It is basically just a sale pretending to be an auction

 

The vast majority of the art have hundreds of copies available the sell every cruise.

 

They just make everyone think it's a "one of a kind"...

 

 

 

 

[NightOne]

3 minutes ago, matj2000 said:

It is not really an auction.

 

It is basically just a sale pretending to be an auction

 

The vast majority of the art have hundreds of copies available the sell every cruise.

 

They just make everyone think it's a "one of a kind"...

 

 

 

 

 

They just fire up the printer 😉

[long4acruise]

13 minutes ago, shipgeeks said:

Very interesting perspective!  And I loved your final comments.

We find the auctions very aggravating.  The room they are now using, on Enchantment, is one of the nicest public rooms on the ship, yet we never got to enjoy it, as the easels and prints were set up there for the entire cruise, blocking the windows, the lounge chairs, and any passageways within the room.  I hope more people read your post, and realize that there are options for acquiring art.

Your description of the bidding process sounds like a timeshare presentation that people are required to attend in order to pick up their tickets for a "free" cruise.  Ugh!

Agree 100%. I find the company and all of their sales literature & invites annoying and avoid them at all cost!

 

You're correct about their location presence on Enchantment, where we sail from 1-2 times a year due to the port's proximity to our home. From a cruiser view, I dislike the fact they monopolize this nice space and window view.

[Mum2Mercury]

I did see a couple paintings sold at each auction.  My husband thinks the buyers are shills, placed in the audience to keep things moving.  I disagree, especially having seen a couple next to me make a buy -- an auction employee came over to verify whether they wanted the frame /where they wanted it shipped.  

 

Well, no, the format is that of an auction -- but I don't think I saw anyone bidding against one another.  Yes, they have hundreds of copies back at their warehouse, and that's what they send out to people's homes.  They explained that their "paintings" are copies; of course, they explained it fast and fancy, and someone who WANTED to be fooled could believe he was buying a "one of a kind".  

 

I have NO PROBLEM with buying a copy of a piece of artwork -- hey, I LIKE the stuff down at Marshall's -- but I'm not fooling myself about what I'm buying.  

Edited October 3, 2022 by Mum2Mercury

[neverbeenhere]

I encourage all passengers to go to the Art Shows and spend as much as they like. I also sell genuine art(?) by Neverbeenhere out of our suite during our cruises. Sales volume hasn't been all that good. But, I do offer complimentary cruise ship water if you come to peruse the art.

[Mum2Mercury]

Never Been Here, you are truly from the Land of Bad Comedy!  

 

: ) 

[VTSKIandCRUISEGUY]

We bought one item years ago. It was on the first day, no one was bidding, so they started offering a few items at really low prices to get some action going. We got a nice print for under $100, and it was probably worth $100-150 so it was worth it.

We've never seen anything worth it since, and we pretty much stopped going years ago. Not worth it, even for the free champagne.

 

Although it's probably correct that they often sell very little at the auctions, they sell quite a bit at their desks. Someone sees a painting, and they ask how much it might go for when the auction occurs. The "auctioneer" (i.e. salesperson) offers it at a special price before the auction. We see people buying at the desks a lot.

 

Regarding the buying of art online, it's amazing how many of their artists are exclusive to them, and it's hard to find them off the ships, unless you can buy second-hand on eBay.

 

Of course most of the art is absolute schlock (my opinion), and we can never figure out who the people are who look at this "crap" and say, "Oh my, I must have that high-priced poster of a dead dog smiling from heaven at the fairy looking over the waterfall!"

 

 

[alfaeric]

Virtually all of the "sales" take place before the auction gets underway.  So the auction happens to just look like an auction instead of an art sale.

 

And value is very relative- would I rather spend $500 and get a poster in my room or $500 in the casino and just see it go away.  I see people suggest that they had fun at the casino, and I just see it as a racket to take you money- the big casinos dwarf the big art places.   And looking at the costs of the spa, yea- if I need a massage, I can get one at home a lot cheaper than on board.

 

BTW, just look at many recent art documentaries- the value is mostly to make rich people feel more rich.  

[Lady Chew]

We have never purchased any of the artwork on a cruise, but we have attended several of the "auctions" just for fun (ie, free champagne for me, and Mr Chew liked to schmooze with participants & staff).  We participate in the guess-the-weight/etc contests.  Some of the so-called art is absolutely atrocious but some of it isn't too bad.  We have won a few free prints over the years.  Stick 'em in a little frame (we have quite a few that we have accumulated over the years from old school photos, etc) and give 'em to Goodwill.  Tax deduction!!

 

And we have always seen people from the auctions going through debarkation/customs carrying their wrapped artwork.  

 

I was just on Enchantment with a friend, and it was a little annoying having the artwork in main public areas, but the larger ships seem to have dedicated areas that don't take up too much valuable real estate.

[rudeney]

We've had fun at some of the art auctions.  On one cruise, we went to them each day they were held.  We noticed the first day, it was very slow-paced and easy going.  Often time, an item would bid up and then someone would win, but then they would say they had more copies, and would give them to everyone who bid at the next-to-last-bid price.  A few times, they just said everyone was getting it for free.  By the last day, things were fast-paced and prices would rise without bids, as you saw.  No way would I ever buy anything like that!

 

I also believe there are shills in the audience.  The first day, about the 3rd piece auctioned, was an original Peter Max - not a copy - that sold for $12K.  The couple that bought it just didn't strike me as people who would pay that kind of money for art.  We saw them later on during the cruise and they definitely did not act like people who would have $12K to spend on art.  But of course you can't judge a book by its cover, so maybe these people where just very frugal about everything else so they could afford art.

 

It was that sort of thing that we found entertaining.  We also went home with a bunch of "free" posters that cost us $35 to ship them all.  They were just slightly pushing frames and mounting, which were very expensive.  A few of the prints we took to Michael's or Hobby Lobby and paid less than 1/3 of their prices to frame.  I did make one purchase at an auction.  It was a pencil drawing of Mikey Mouse, hand created and signed by the artists (one of Disney's animators).  I had seen these for sale by Disney for well over $100.  They caught me looking at it during preview and agreed to sell it to me for $100.  So when it cam up for auction, it opened at $100, I bid, and then it was immediately sold.  That one did not require shipping - I came and collected it on  the last day of the cruise.  

[Brittoni]

We legitimately bought a piece of art at an auction maybe 6 years ago on a rccl cruise.  As mentioned above It was pre arranged before we sat down at the auction.  We didn't even get the joy of bidding, the sales agent did that.  The auction was a sham.  We were excited about the purchase, then the story begins.

 

The art dealer was a company called park west.  To finish the sale we had to return at the end of the cruise and fill out paperwork.  Which was okay but the person from park west was very rude, which was unexpected, but humans are humans and this one was probably tired and overwhelmed. Now the fun...

 

The waiting began, the art work arrived at our house 9 months later.  Which in that time I took a new job in a new city.  We called park west every couple of months to check on it as we were told on the ship it would arrive in 2 to 3 months, then when the move was happening every i called few weeks, then every day.  They could tell us nothing, no idea where it was.  Nor stop its shipping.  We thought the new owners of the house would have a piece of art show up and hang it in the dining room where we thought it should go. "Honey look, it belongs right here on this wall."

 

Randomly, It arrived the day before the movers did no notification, we literally opened it and sealed it back up put it on a truck. Which we thought was funny.  "Look at that beautiful painting, where is the tape?"  Then it got lost in the move, which we thought was quite funny, (after it was found) like we were destined to not have this painting.

 

Eventually it hung on the wall in the next house. We moved again, it got lost again, no kidding.  Once more it was found.  Besides this painting's need to run away It's a stunning piece.  I am looking at it now, just to be sure it hasn't escaped.  We bought an original, it's striking.

 

Funny thing is, we bought another piece day after the cruise from an art shop in Florida.  We had that one reframed by the dealer, packed, shipped to the same house and it arrived in 2 weeks.  Both are oil paintings but only the Florida one smelled of oil not the cruise ship one, but by the time it arrived it was getting pretty old i guess.  🤔

 

We believe the one bought on the ship is real, and we will never sell it, so it is real, darn it!   We love it and was worth it in the long run. For no other reason than it makes for a wonderful story of provenance.

 

Although, we have never bought anything from park west again.

[HicksRA]

Never gone to one of the art auctions..

Cheap champagne gives me a headache..

[edrussell]

Having never been on a cruise before Jan of this year and really knowing nothing of cruising I had no idea this was a thing.  To those that have been around cruising this may sound odd but I really never paid any attention to what goes on a cruise ship.  About my only notion was perhaps a movie.  

 

Fast forward to our first cruise on Enchantment.  In the centrum there is art hung all over the place.  Now before we took our cruise we did lots of watching youtube etc and had seen mention of these auctions.  The 'art director' saw me on day one and approached offering free 'champagne' etc to attend one of the auctions.  All of sudden it hit me, people actually do attend these things and do buy this art.  They wouldn't take up so much valuable space if they didn't.  I was gobsmacked seeing it person!  Needless to say we didn't attend any auction and are not planning on it.

 

100% to each their own, but I don't cruise to buy artwork or buy gold chain by the inch.  Now I am not judging in any way those who do.  Some of the impulse buys in a shop or on a promenade I can understand, but buying art on a cruise?  Nope, lost on me.

 

[Mum2Mercury]

9 minutes ago, edrussell said:

Having never been on a cruise before Jan of this year and really knowing nothing of cruising I had no idea this was a thing.  To those that have been around cruising this may sound odd but I really never paid any attention to what goes on a cruise ship.  About my only notion was perhaps a movie.

Cruise ships host all sorts of events -- read your daily ship newspaper (or app), and you'll know what's going on. 

[yogimax]

On 10/3/2022 at 4:48 PM, Lady Chew said:

And we have always seen people from the auctions going through debarkation/customs carrying their wrapped artwork.  

 

 

We have bought several "take offs" as they are called.  This is the best deal as they come with their frames which are sometimes just as expensive as the art.  You also can inspect the art and frame to check for damage.  In essence, you are getting the frame for free and have no shipping expense.

[mugtech]

Some of the classes were informative, once we saw a Dali/Disney video. Got a dozen free prints, skipped the free champagne and read a book during the "auction".  Will not be attending in the future.

[matj2000]

On 10/3/2022 at 11:22 AM, NightOne said:

 

They just fire up the printer 😉

 

To be fair, they are not just a cheap copies.

 

They are high quality Lithographs

 

Numbered and signed.

[Mum2Mercury]

5 hours ago, yogimax said:

We have bought several "take offs" as they are called.  This is the best deal as they come with their frames which are sometimes just as expensive as the art.  You also can inspect the art and frame to check for damage.  In essence, you are getting the frame for free and have no shipping expense.

Yes, don't underestimate the cost of a frame.  

4 hours ago, mugtech said:

Some of the classes were informative, once we saw a Dali/Disney video. Got a dozen free prints, skipped the free champagne and read a book during the "auction".  Will not be attending in the future.

That kind of art class interests me, but -- if I'm not into it -- I'm probably not going to stay. 

6 minutes ago, matj2000 said:

 

To be fair, they are not just a cheap copies.

 

They are high quality Lithographs

 

Numbered and signed.

Amazon's copies are also good quality lithographs.  

I don't know that they're numbered and signed, but since I only buy art for my own enjoyment /not for an investment, I'm not going to worry about it.  

[neverbeenhere]

As for the tax deduction… in the good ole USA, it would be dependent upon FMV. So, I have to say a copy machine, free print and a used frame might equal zero(?) 

[matj2000]

10 minutes ago, Mum2Mercury said:

Yes, don't underestimate the cost of a frame.  

That kind of art class interests me, but -- if I'm not into it -- I'm probably not going to stay. 

Amazon's copies are also good quality lithographs.  

I don't know that they're numbered and signed, but since I only buy art for my own enjoyment /not for an investment, I'm not going to worry about it.  

It is the same thing as what they sell on the ships.

 

Some print up a lot of copies.

[gmerick]

I have bought several prints.  Park West sells from their own catalog.  They are the only source for their artists outside the secondary market.  As such it is hard to assess investment value to the auction product.  I've paid about $150 each for the 8 prints I've bought, and I bought them just because I liked them.  They were shipped to my home in very nice tube containers.  The prints are exactly as advertised.  I've spent about $250 each to put a very nice matted frame on each print.  I'm very happy with the art work, but it was definitely not an investment.  I liked the shipboard gallery, I liked the low pressure sales, and the artwork is appealing to me.  So far, $3000 in home decor, and I like it.