Don Thompson – författare

Why would a smart New York investment banker pay twelve million dollars for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock’ s drip painting No.5 1948 sell for $140 million? The first book to look at the economics of the modern art world, and the marketing strategies that power the market to produce such astronomical prices, this surprising and revelatory book explores the money, lust, and self-aggrandizement of the art world in an attempt to determine what makes a particular work valuable while others are ignored. Drawing on interviews with past and present executives of auction houses and art dealerships, artists, and the buyers who move the market, Thompson launches the reader on a journey of discovery through the peculiar world of modern art to reveal the source of Charles Saatchi’s Midas touch, and how far a gallery like White Cube has contributed to Damien Hirst becoming one of the highest-earning artists in the world.

'Fabulous and entertaining guide to the craziness that is the contemporary art world.' 'An incredibly rich, insightful piece of non-fiction that addresses the vast majority of questions you would ask yourself as a contemporary art enthusiast.' Understand the curious economics of contemporary art. Why would a smart New York investment banker pay twelve million dollars for the decaying, stuffed carcass of a shark? By what alchemy does Jackson Pollock’ s drip painting No.5 1948 sell for $140 million? This book sheds light on the modern art world and the marketing strategies that power the market to produce such astronomical prices; the money, lust and self-aggrandizement. Drawing on interviews with past and present executives of auction houses and art dealerships, artists and the buyers who move the market, Don Thompson launches us on a journey of discovery through the peculiar world of modern art to reveal the source of Charles Saatchi’s Midas touch, how far a gallery like White Cube has contributed to Damien Hirst becoming one of the highest-earning artists in the world, and much, much more . . .

Allison Walker is an enigma. It seems that the bright young owner of Rain City Yachts has another side to her personalityone irresistibly drawn to the field of medicine. Allison is diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder and committed to mandatory participation in a clinical trial at a prestigious psychiatric institute. But when she discovers her own misdiagnosis and the true source of her medical knowledge, she learns something even more disturbing: the institutes executives are hiding deadly side-effects from the FDA and Allison is the only patient left alive with enough knowledge to expose them.

Within forty-eight hours in the fall of 2014, buyers in the Sotheby’s and Christie’s New York auction houses spent $1.7 billion on contemporary art. Non-taxed freeport warehouses around the globe are stacked with art held for speculation. One of Jeff Koons’ five chromium-plated stainless steel balloon dogs sold for 50 percent more at auction than the previous record for any living artist. A painting by Christopher Wool, featuring four lines from a Francis Ford Coppola movie stencilled in black on a white background, sold for $28 million. In The Orange Balloon Dog, economist and bestselling author Don Thompson cites these and other fascinating examples to explore the sometimes baffling activities of the high-end contemporary art market. He examines what is at play in the exchange of vast amounts of money and what nudges buyers, even on the subconscious level, to imbue a creation with such high commercial value.Thompson analyzes the behaviours of buyers and sellers and delves into the competitions that define and alter the value of art in today’s international market, from New York to London, Singapore to Beijing. Take heed if your millions are tied up in stainless steel balloon dogs—Thompson also warns of a looming bust of the contemporary art price balloon.

Pereskazyvaya i analiziruya kur''eznye, porazitel''nye, shokiruyushchie podrobnosti, kotorymi tak bogata istoriya sozdaniya i kommercheskogo uspekha samyh znamenityh – i samyh dorogih proizvedenij sovremennogo iskusstva, uchenyj-ehkonomist Donal''d Tompson vystraivaet povestvovanie, kotoroe s pervoj do poslednej stranicy derzhit v napryazhenii ne huzhe inogo detektivnogo romana. No ne stanem speshit'' s ocenkami – v dannom sluchae, pered nami otnyud'' ne banal''nyj sbornik anekdotov iz povsednevnoj zhizni bogemy. Kniga Tompsona – luchshee, po mneniyu kritikov, issledovanie rynka sovremennogo iskusstva. Uvlekaya vnimanie chitatelya skandal''nymi istoriyami gromkih prodazh, poputno avtor raskryvaet sami principy funkcionirovaniya art-biznesa, obychno skrytogo ot glaz prostyh smertnyh. Kniga Tompsona – unikal''naya vozmozhnost'' proniknut'' v zakulis''e mira aukcionov i art-marketov, dilerov i galeristov, hudozhnikov, ch''i gonorary ischislyayutsya semiznachnymi ciframi i tekh, kto lish'' karabkaetsya k vershine, – togo mira, gde iskusstvo poyavlyaetsya na svet i gde ono obretaet cenu.

Osen''yu 2014 goda posetiteli n''yu-jorkskih torgov "Sotbis" i "Kristis" za sorok vosem'' chasov istratili na priobretenie proizvedenij sovremennogo iskusstva 1 700 000 000 dollarov. Nekotorye loty srazu zhe posle pokupki otpravilis'' na svobodnyj ot tamozhennyh poshlin sklad v porto-frankovoj zone – razdeliv uchast'' milliona drugih proizvedenij iskusstva, v ozhidanii vygodnoj pereprodazhi tomyashchihsya na podobnyh skladah po vsemu miru. Odna iz pyati sverkayushchih "Sobak iz vozdushnyh sharov" Dzheffa Kunsa byla prodana na aukcione za rekordnuyu summu, na 50 % prevysivshuyu predydushchij rekord ceny dlya proizvedeniya nyne zhivushchego hudozhnika. Kartina Kristofera Vula "Apokalipsis segodnya" – chetyre strochki chernogo teksta na belom fone – ushla s torgov za 28 000 000 dollarov.EHti i drugie fantasticheskie istorii iz povsednevnoj zhizni art-rynka analiziruet v svoej knige "Oranzhevaya sobaka iz vozdushnyh sharov" ehkonomist i avtor bestsellera "Kak prodat'' za 12 millionov dollarov chuchelo akuly" Don Tompson, priotkryvaya zavesu tajny nad tem, kak opredelyaetsya i menyaetsya "cena iskusstva" v goryachih tochkah sovremennogo art-rynka ot N''yu-Jorka do Londona, Singapura i Pekina.

Although Time may be that Heraclitean river no one can step into twice, it''s not really linear. Rapids churn in some places and it scarcely flows at others, almost stagnant. And the current often sideslips into eddies that circle indefinitely. At least Time seems to function like that as it flows through the memories of a long life. The Eightieth Year, although in the form of a journal comprising numbered entries for fifty-two weeks, follows the river through all of those variations, allowing memory to float downstream like a stick, accepting both whitewater and quiet pools, diverted into eddies as they come. No need any more to hurry.