Even before arriving at the exhibition venue, I wanted to hate it. I knew I’d hate it. The website alone is repulsive enough (don’t even get me started on the “graffiti” font), but imagine a large studio space filled with uninspired, derivative, tired and trite art (Haring and Basquiat were rolling in their graves this weekend), unapologetically braggadocious dealers (“Sorry, can’t talk. I’m closing 2 deals with some major clients right now.”), comically stereotypical faux-rich art collectors (“Here let me show you. I paid 50k for this last week!!!”), and droves of casual perusers whose first exposure to “street art” was this poor excuse of a money grab advertised to the public as “the first-ever global street art fair” that took place in West Hollywood over the weekend. That was “Street Art Fair International” in a nutshell.
When Mangchi released the album “Nega Mola” back in September, 2014, I downloaded it immediately and played it in my car over and over again. I couldn’t get enough. “Gook Boy” could easily be the personal story of struggle of the lead vocalist for the band, Steebeeweebee (@quangou). The music video for the song has been finally released with this press release:
From the warehouses and brothels of some mangled mountainside our hero Steve Lee scours the scorched earth searching for the one and only GookBoy: Peter Tong. You’ve seen him everywhere, wearing a mini-backpack, carrying way too many books, waving his long bangs that block his looks; with glasses that magnify his eyes and his eyes almost every time clogged with the membranes of mucus from tears shed earlier. You might call him a nerd; we call him the cure. This isn’t some sorry meditation, this is Mangchi- we’re goth, we’re sensitive and most of us are close to 40 years old if we haven’t already gotten there. Point being it’s never too late to love yourself and we mean more than touching. Don’t forget to fret and remember to remember that there is no one that can do anything for you. You have to work. And never stop.
Directed and Edited by Paco Raterta. Shot by Lulu and Jason Jaworski. Additional footage by Czar Campos and Paco Raterta. Special Thanks Christian Acuña, Genevieve Iñumerable, Vanessa Ulgado and Jessica Yang.
I know this doesn’t quite fit into the theme of the blog but it’s too good not to post. Animated films are art too, right? If this doesn’t instantly bring nostalgia to your heart, then you have no heart.
Museum-goers crowd around “American Gothic” by Grant Wood @ the Art Institute of Chicago
Recently, Artnet posted an article “10 Tips for Newly Minted Tech Millionaire Art Collectors” for overnight tech millionaires that are looking to park their money in art collections. Some of the tips Artnet provides apply to a collector at any level but I thought I could build a better “10 tips” list for us ordinary folks who didn’t get a chance to invest early in unicorns.
Let me preface the list with this: I have been a collector for most of my life, 7 years in art collecting specifically in which I’ve spent tens of thousands of dollars to fuel the addiction. As you could tell from the blog, my collection is largely based on street art, containing some familiar names like Craola (@craola), David Choe (@davidchoe), Faile (@faileart), Kaws (@kaws) and Shepard Fairey (@obeygiant).
Without further ado, here are my 10 tips for new non-millionaire art collectors.
1. Don’t treat your collection as an investment portfolio.
The thing that makes art collecting so sexy is the money, and it’s quickly becoming a popular asset class among the mega-rich. An index of fine art sales from 2013 showed a 10% average annual return on art funds since 1985. On a micro-level, if you visit art communities like Expressobeans, it’s not uncommon to find prints that sell for 2-3x retail only a few hours after release. With returns like that, who wouldn’t want to collect art?
The truth is, these data are completely skewed. Statistically speaking, you are more likely to lose money on your art investment than to see any gains from it. I’ve bought a lot of art, both prints and originals, that instantly lost money as soon as I walked out of the gallery with it. You, as a private collector, simply cannot command the same price as a gallery or an artist could, and they are the experts at maximizing their profits (Of course, exceptions like Eli Broad exist, who is opening The Broad Museum, which will basically be a rotating display of his billion dollar collection that will only grow in value with each showing). A Stanford study from 2013 found that art as an asset class “would not substantially improve the risk/return profile of a portfolio diversified among traditional asset classes, such as stocks and bonds.” With that said, read on to find tip #2 and more.
BDAB was started because we wanted to show another side of the street/urban art community besides just the commercial collaborations, new print releases, and sellout shows. We will showcase promising new artists from where you least expected, take you into homes of passionate collectors that have built real collections, and see what goes on behind the pristine white curtains of galleries. The last decade or so has been monumental to the development of the general art community, and we hope to be part of a lasting movement to propel the street art community to stand out among the crowd.
Next time, we will take you on a tour of Long Beach, CA, to take a look at how Pow! Wow! and a group of 14 muralists took over the city. Then we will head to Long Beach Museum of Art to view “Vitality and Verve: Transforming the Urban Landscape”.
