What's Really Going on at the Top of the Art Market

https://news.artnet.com/market/kenny-schachter-on-art-market-314342?utm_campaign=artnetnews&utm_source=070615daily&utm_medium=email

(...) A day before the Christie's day sale, I had a call from a fabricator that was repairing an artwork of mine that the artist who had “made" it had refused to put back together again, after initially agreeing to do so. No doubt, it was owing to the fact I put another work by the artist into the Christie's auction, thus his refusal to repair was recrimination for my deaccessioning. Just prior to the sale I had an urgent email from Christie's apologizing because “an external contractor knocked against the work and scratched through the anodizing."

The house still wanted to keep the work in the sale but as a result they agreed to purchase the piece outright at the mid estimate should it not sell or make less than that figure.

As there turned out to be little or no interest in the work, the act of creative destruction proved a gift. Lesson learned: If you auction anything you are unsure of, ask for it to be installed in the no man's land by the elevators (...)