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Art Investment Guide

Second only in size to the US market, The UK art and antiques market is worth well over £4 billion a year, and holds a global share of some 26% of the world’s total art sales. In terms of volume, the UK is the largest marketplace for art on the planet.(1). In 2005, the index covering sales of old masters showed growth of 18.8%, while the similar index covering post-war and contemporary art rose 8.3%. Over the past five years, the average annual returns were 3.1% and 17.7% respectively.(2). That’s a better return than investing in stocks and shares.

Buying art can represent a fantastic long-term investment opportunity. In order to help you make an informed decision on the art you buy through The Art Ministry website, we have put together some key considerations to bear in mind when selecting work from our galleries. With over 25 years’ experience in the art market, our team have followed the same steps to ensure all work available in our Online Store is fairly valued.

1. Buy what you like

It’s important to trust your own taste when buying art. Our aim in providing this collection is to offer artwork for every budget that adds interest to your home or office, a talking point that enriches your environment and lifestyle. Great art needn’t be expensive, and buying artwork should primarily be an expression of your own personality. Like stocks and shares, the value of artwork can go up or down, so it’s crucial you buy what you like and can afford. Ultimately the true value of art is in the pleasure or feelings it evokes. The more people that find it appealing the more demand increases, which inevitably increases the value.

2. Do your homework and understand the value of the work

When you view a piece of artwork to buy, pay attention to detail. If you look into the way it has been physically created, how much time it took and the journey the artist went through in producing the piece, you will come to appreciate the skill of the artist and the effort involved in making the work. When it comes to value, don’t be taken in by the medium either. For example, oil paintings are in general more expensive than watercolours, but the latter can require more skill to achieve the desired impression.

The more artwork you look at and the more background information you obtain on various artists and how they work, the more you will learn what you like and why. Comparing the merits of a work with other artist’s work will help you determine the inherent value in any given piece and assist your buying decision. If you want to know what similar work has sold for, use a source like The Art Sales Index, which has catalogued art prices since the 1950’s, or the Mei/Moses Fine Art Index, which tracks various auction price indexes and compares them to the stock exchange to gauge relative performance.

The comparative merits include:



The artist’s exhibition history

The nationality of the artist

What country the artist works in

The medium the artist uses

The size and dimensions of the piece

The price their work has sold for in the past

3. Buy from a reputable dealer

Only buy artwork from a reputable dealer. The best ones will provide extensive background information on the artists in their portfolio, giving details on how they work and what inspires them. Knowing the artist’s passion might also help you find a work that is right for you. Click here to read ‘About the Artists’ at The Art Ministry.

Reputable dealers will also provide a ‘Certificate of Authenticity’ with all original and limited edition artwork sold. This will be signed by the artist and proves the work is 100% genuine and has been accurately valued. These also include the following information:



The title and visual description of the artwork

Edition numbers and collection details

Materials and techniques used

Size and dimensions of the work

The copyright holder

Distributor details

Release date of the artwork

Printer’s details if relevant

Comments from the artist

Notes on caring for the artwork

Sources:

1. The House of Commons Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport (Sixth Report)

2. ‘Is it just art, or is it investment?’ by Joe Bolger, Times Online 17th April 2006, quoting figures from the Mei/Moses Fine? Art Index

If you require more assistance with buying art from our website, please to contact us, alternatively, feel free to browse our to view the work of all our artists.

Looking for tips and advice on art and design, visit our blog.

Iranian art as a complex and ambiguous art received changes in the history. It follows the Iranian spiritual feelings. Iranian art has a simple shape and it is far from European romantic and gothic periods, however, it is full of complexity and word play the complexity of Iranian art is the product of three geographic and historic factors. The first factor is orientalism about which Herbert Reid said: it has conceptual layers. The second factor is mixing with Islam around 1400 years ago and finally, connection western

world (because of Iranian special geography which was interrelated with Europe either by diplomatic relationship or by invasion. There for, Iranian art includes the beliefs of oriental art, Islamic art and western art.

Orientalism

Iranian art

Islamic art

Relation with western art

Delineation of each art’s territory is not easy. His relation between Iranian art not only in surface level but also in deep artistic concepts is combined. It is a unique combination which concepts are combined. It is a unique combination which was declared to the people of the world as Islamic. Iranian art unfortunately, the complexity of Iranian art caused one dimensional look at this art in the history. Because of lack of special methodology for understanding the hidden and fundamental concepts of Iranian art, it was always superficial. Undoubtedly, moving toward knowing of Identity of Iranian art needs complete study. The first step here is the review of mutual relation of different arts within Iranian territory. This book tries to explain Iranian art as a parallel in a collection. This book defines 3 main stages. The first stage is collecting different art as a descriptive art. In this stage different books have reviewed and the information of them is taken.

In this stage even some of the text have presented without change from different book.

In the second stage it was attempted to describe the unique model for comparing of different arts. By the charts. These charts are the collected on the base of historical times and the recognizing of artistic characteristic. And is formed like a chart. These charts are given in the end of the each chapter as an abstract.

In the third stage, the writer is trying to compare and deduce the basic concepts of charts that are reviewable as a basic principle of Iranian art theory.

Undoubtedly, the third stage that is presented in the end of this book is the only first factor of editing the principle of theory in the Iran’s art stage. The completing these theories and understanding the theme of Iran’s art as a complete form need to specialized researches in any artistic stage.

2-1 the problems of research

Because the theories sources of Iran’s art were limited and in this limited space of science, the most part of the researches have done by non Iranian researchers the editing and deep knowledge of Iran’s art is very difficult. The problem of using these artistic sources is presented in three Stages.

In the first stage, Iranian researchers usually have collected information without any editing of research method. In this stage the most information transformed from oral speaking to writing. The focus of attention of Iranian researchers is on the work itself it’s characteristics this factor cause the reasons of formation and creation of one work to be less displayed. There fore, it is impossible to analyzing the art’s substructure

In the second stage foreign researchers have collected works by editing the model of research. But unfortunately, the dominant thinking on the historical division is based on the west history. The difference of understanding history caused the very valuable works of second century to be less important.

Third stage is one dimensional look at art history: the third problem for achieving the historical encyclopedia of Iran’s art is non adaptation of different arts and their method of impressiveness on each other. This caused the effect of arts on each other to be less important.

3-1- the method of research

Because the achievement of art encyclopedia needs deep looking, the main center of historical reviewing in this writing is attention to analyzing history. Descriptive history is only presented in the end of each part as a table.

In editing of this collection two hypotheses is the center of collecting studies.

1) The impressionable of art in the field of socio culture

2) Time coincidence of different artistic varieties in these different arts.

The general model of this division is based on the conceptual division of art in which arts divide into general field that is visual arts and dramatic arts. But in the details of this divisions, did not observed the seven art model and the focus of attention is the main arts of Iran that is drawing, music, literature (poem)

The second point in the historical reviewing of art encyclopedia as the knowledge of historical indexes of that art. Arts are analyzed as a form of historical art until can review weak and strong point of each art. Because of this method of research, each art have historical principles and special swaying times for example, while Mongol attack had much effect on drawing art, the Alexander attack on architecture art.

The third point in this system is the collecting of information. Because of the vast scope of historical geographical art of Iran, some of the works have remained out of Iran and the more information has collected as a library. But in collecting of information have been tried that the information sources to be approved by several sources. Until we can refer to them this method of collecting information caused that the information to be valid. But in any case, some of the information remains unanalyzed. The forth point in this writing, is non attention to philosophical meanings of art. It is mean that the writer did not like to define art and have not involved this book in philosophical challenges, there fore undoubtedly; some of the presented works is not artistic works by the view point of audiences. As a matter of the fact that this works play a role in historical evolution of Iran’s art, they have been reviewed.

4-1- place territory

One of the problems of editing this writing was non existence of definite place territory. It is mean that the country of Iran, because of special geographical situation, have not definite political border and even caused in the some of the ages the name of this country to be deleted from the broad world. In any case, what has been reviewed in this writing had been the world meaning of Iranian art that undoubtedly the main part of this works is not in political border of Iran in the most historical times of under study Iraq eastern part of the turkey, the south of Russia an common wealth countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan is in the creation territory of artistic art of Iran that in this writing we had paid to it.

5-1- time period

The historical period which is studied starts from the first civilization in Iran and continues up to the current century. Because of that fact we can survey two main historical periods.

a) Before the Arian immigration. It includes the Mesopotamians

  Civilization and independent civilization in Iranian current physical map.

B) after the Arian immigration: It starts from around 3600 years ago and in the end it forms the Medes civilization after immigration and presence of the three tribes, namely, Medes, Parthian and Persia in Iran. This country declared independence and formed Achaemenians governments as a cosmopolitan government.

Unfortunately, almost all academic research and studies separated the Iranians before and after Islam, However the compiler does not believe in that and call it a political separation which was defined and designed by Islam. In case of study of history the Iranian arts formation stages will be crystallized.

The World’s Best Art Consultancy

art-exchange.com unveils Release III of its art tool for designers

The Future Art Consultancy

Locating and placing artwork in a design project is arguably the most difficult part of the project. While some designers take on this task themselves, many enlist the assistance of an art consultant. One limitation of this approach is the consultant’s limited universe of artists. Most art consultants end up with a few “go-to” favorites.

Imagine an art consultancy able to directly access 10,000 artists, with technology capabilities aggregating art choices in a portfolio for emailing or high-resolution printing for presentations. Add the ability to correspond with clients via e-postcard including selected images. And finish with the ability to access framing options online thus enabling the designer to actually show the customer how the pieces will look framed.

Does It Work?

Can a website help you find art? Art-Exchange (www.art-exchange.com) is not a new website, not a new service, not a new company. It does, however, take a new approach to providing art to designers. And it has a new site design that Art-Exchange claims will make the service even more powerful and easier to use.

I spoke with Richard Gipe, President and CEO of Art-Exchange, to find out why he thinks his company’s service is so special. I asked him, “If you had to communicate Art-Exchange’s value to designers in a single sentence, what would you say?”

Here’s what he said: “If you want to access as much art as we have on Art-Exchange, you would have to go to 20,000 galleries, and you would have to deal with so many different sellers that the logistics would be overwhelming.” That sounds pretty good. But does the site work?

About Art-Exchange

Art-Exchange is a business service provider that specializes in solutions for the design trade. They can offer solutions to designers as an art consultancy, or they can provide solutions to art consultants to help them be more effective and efficient.

For the past five years Art-Exchange has been actively contacting artists to list their works on the exchange. Today there are approximately 100,000 different works of art created by over 10,000 different artists. Imagine searching 100,000 records to locate the perfect art solution. Nearly 60% of all the works are originals, and the remaining 40% is a variety of editions. All of these works are organized in a database, and a search engine locates works using any or all of the following criteria:

• Artist’s name

• Title

• Subject matter

• Style

• Medium

• Size

• Colors

• Price

• Orientation

Suppose you need oversized original works and price is an issue. Maybe you want only works with lighthouses. Or perhaps you need large public works. That’s how specific the search engine can be. And with the new design, if you enter several criteria and the search engine can’t find a work that matches all your criteria exactly, it will refer you to the works that match your criteria most closely, so that you don’t have to start over. As one of the new site’s designers said, “We don’t ever want to show nobody anything.”

Normally, designers hire an art consultant or visit multiple galleries or view print books to find the perfect art solution. That’s the old way of finding art. Now designers can look in one place and view tens of thousands of originals alone. This is the new way of finding art. Art-Exchange let’s designers search for all the art they need in one place. That alone has the potential to save time, but the website has some other very powerful features that give designers even more flexibility and power.

Powerful Features

One very important new feature is the Designer Portal. Art-Exchange has four different portals that members can use to enter the site. There’s one for retail clients, one for community partners, and another for artists and other sellers. But the Designer Portal is available only to designers. Once you enter the portal, you can search for the art you want, view images of the art, and immediately see designers’ wholesale pricing.

Here’s another great new feature: Portfolios. How do you keep track of the works that fit your client’s needs? You keep a portfolio. Designers can set up portfolios for individual clients, different locations, or just for future reference. It’s easy to save works to custom-made portfolios. And it’s easy to show the portfolio to clients—from anywhere in the world.

Another terrific feature is the Exhibitions section. Exhibitions include the works of around 200 artists and are compiled topically. Prior exhibitions, which are still accessible, include Realism, Landscape, Watercolor, and Impressionism. In order to have fresh ideas readily available for clients, designers need to be reviewing art all the time, and these exhibitions can help. It takes only fifteen minutes to view an entire exhibition.

Another feature that can help designers and clients work together—especially when clients have trouble describing their interests—is the Postcard feature. Clients can go to the website to browse for themselves. They can view an exhibition, browse by artist, or do a search. When they find something they like, they can send images to their designer using electronic postcards.

Soon, Art-Exchange will even offer the ability to create Custom Frames online so that clients can view the artwork in different frames and choose the one they like best.

Full-Service Art Consultancy

Art-Exchange goes far beyond just the website, however. They also provide full-service art consultancy. They have a full staff of qualified art consultants who can do as much or as little as a designer wants them to. Anything a typical art consultancy does, Art-Exchange will do. If a designer works with an art consultant already and wants to maintain that relationship, Art-Exchange will even work with his or her current art consultant.

How to Access the Features and Benefits of Art-Exchange

Go to www.art-exchange.com and visit the Designer Portal. Log in as a designer and learn about how the service works. You can easily search for art, access their full-service art consultancy, or guide your favorite art consultant to Art-Exchange. A subscription is free. Art-Exchange is paid by the sellers on completed transactions; so they only get paid if they’re helping designers find the right art, for the right job, at the right price.

When asked what he would most want to communicate to designers about the company and the service it provides, Gipe said, “I want the members of ASID who place art to try the art consultancy service at Art-Exchange, and if they’ll give us 10% of their trust, we’ll earn the other 90%.” If you’re a designer or an art consultant, it’s worth trying. Does it work? Is it really whole new way of finding art? Yeah, that’s what it is. And for designers, the world of art will never be the same.