“Do You COLLECT Art?” - Nicholas Dawes

Nick Dawes: 0:00

Someone asked me the other day how do you define success and in being an artist, I said, make a living. Make a living, being able to support a family from your income from this field, being able to send kids through college and make a living.

Laura Arango Baier: 0:15

Welcome to the BoldBrush podcast where we believe that fortune favors the bold brush. My name is Laura Arango Baier and I'm your host. In this episode, you will hear some amazing tips from Nick Dawes who is the Chairman and CEO of the salmagundi club, New York's oldest artists Club, which was founded in 1871. He also has over 40 years of experience in the Antiques and Fine art auction business. Apart from his successful career as an auctioneer and appraiser he is also a part time associate teaching professor at Parsons School of Design New York's oldest artists Club, which was founded in 1871.

Nick Dawes: 0:48

My name is Nick doors. Currently, professionally, I'm an auctioneer. I'm a Senior Vice President at Heritage auctions in New York City with the third largest AUCTIONEER in the world. For much of my professional life I've been in or around the fine art auction business. I'm also a teacher part time, which again, I've done for most of my professional life. I teach at Parsons, School of Design, part of the New School University. And I do other things I'm my nonprofit world is consumed by salmagundi club in New York. I'm chairman and CEO of salmagundi, and have been for two and a half years now. I've been on the board prior to that. So salmagundi is a big part of my life too.

Laura Arango Baier: 1:38

Since not many people are familiar with what auctioneers and appraisers do. We asked Nick to explain a little bit more about what his job really entails.

Nick Dawes: 1:48

I work in the fine art auction business. What does it mean to be in that business? I'm an auctioneer. So I do the actual handling of the gavel from the podium, which is a very old fashioned way of selling things. My main job is really finding property to sell at auction. But all large fine art auction companies also have divisions to do appraisal work. Praising of course means valuing something, not authenticating it but valuing it. And there is a conflict of interest. If you think about it between being an auctioneer, someone who sells something. And being a valuer or an appraiser, someone who says what it is worth, the auction companies get around that by having a separate company. So I will do appraisal work for Heritage auctions, or heritage appraisal company. But beyond that, I've been an appraiser in one sense or another for many, many years. Well, before I joined heritage, which I did about 12 years ago, I ran my own business from the 19, early 1980s. And that included doing appraisal work. I'm currently on the board of the AAA the appraisers Association of America, which is the largest and we think the best organization that focuses on appraising art and objects. So creating is a part of my life to professionally and otherwise. Another nonprofit that I get involved in is the antiques roadshow for PBS, which is a very popular show many millions of viewers every week, one of the most popular shows, in fact, in the history of television, if you look at the BBC version. And I do that as a volunteer for WGBH TV in Boston that produces the show, and I've done that since the show began in the United States in 1996. So I have a lot of exposure through that I have over 100 taped episodes of me being the appraiser goes back a

Laura Arango Baier: 3:56

long way. I think both artists and people in general alike have all been curious to know how exactly appraisals work.

Nick Dawes: 4:05

How does how does appraising work? Well, it's a good question in the world of fine art at least to art and objects and you can appraise anything you can appraise a building you can appraise a you know the steamroller or hospital bed. But in the world of appraising that I work in the appraisers primary job is to first of all define what the client wants, because there are different types of appraisal, and then to define what we call the scope of work exactly what needs to be done to achieve that plant objective. And to make the appraiser zone credentials qualifications very clear. So a typical example might be a client who wants to appraise something for insurance purposes, they own an object, or perhaps a collection of art, and they want to keep it and they want to insure it to protect it. So an appraisal will be called, we'll go and see it, we'll look at it. And typically the appraiser works within their own area of specialty, or will employ as a kind of subcontractor, another appraiser is a special because I'm not an expert in, let's say, Picasso prints. So if I was asked to appraise a collection of Picasso prints, I could run the appraisal, but I would have an expert, be the actual appraiser, I can do the paperwork, and I can present it and so on as a qualified appraiser, I have the credentials for that qualification. If it was something within my own area of specialty, I could do it to myself. But that's one example doing an appraisal for insurance purposes. And there are several others. It's common, for instance, someone might want to sell property, perhaps as part of an estate. But in order to do that, legally, they may need to have an appraisal done as part of the Estate Settlement. This is not an insurance appraisal, someone selling something, they need to find out an idea of what they could expect if they sell it. And we present what's called a fair market value. So this is a different level, you can appraise the same object for insurance, or fair market value. And typically the fair market value is, is quite a bit less it maybe half as much or even less than the surance price. Not necessarily but typically it is. And then there are other a few other examples of why people need appraisals that an appraiser can step in on. But it's important to make the point that an appraiser is concerned with the value of the object, not the authenticity. an appraiser does not authenticate an object, they may assume it's authentic, and make assumptions on it and include that in the appraisal document. But that's another area that that is not the appraisers domain.

Laura Arango Baier: 7:11

So when it comes to appraising, we wanted to know exactly what it is that appraisers are looking for. And what is it that makes a piece valuable in the first place?

Nick Dawes: 7:21

What determines the value of anything, what determines the value of a work of art or anything? It's actually very simple to value is determined by two things supply and demand. And we all learn this, we learn this in economics one on one, supply and demand determines the value of anything that applies to a Picasso painting, or any object in the realm of art and objects. It's that simple. Now, if you want to talk about nuances in value, it's the primary kind of barometer for what something is worth any art market is the auction business. The auction market tells you whether something festival has a following enough for people to actually buy it or not. And then we'll give you an idea of the various trends in that particular category are things doing better than they used to or not as good as they used to, or still the same. So the auction market is very, very carefully monitored by all appraisers, and by anyone in the art business. And it's relatively easy to monitor it these days, there are several websites, databases that can be subscribed to you have to pay typically. And they're comprehensive. And they'll tell you the results of a given artist or perhaps have given object, you know, what's a Tiffany lamp worth, or what is the work of Picasso worth. And they'll charted over several years and different auction companies large and small, and so on. So you can look at what we call comparables in the in the appraising and auction business and use them to help determine your values. But it really comes down to supply and demand. And when you're doing appraisal work, and you see these comparables, and you say, Oh, here's an object, you know, here's a painting of this size by this, this kind of this medium, and this kind of subject by this artist painted in roughly the same time. And look, we can see 10 of them sold over the last 10 years. And look, the prices have gone consistently up. You can say up well, this person is doing well. You might look at a similar run of events and the values are going consistently down. And this is not uncommon. And you can say, you know, this values is not what you'd expect it to be today, or you know, not what you want it to be compared to what it was 10 or 20 years ago. But how does something get until that scale in the first place, how does something get to be valuable enough that it has what we call an auction record? I'll start by saying that the overwhelming majority of artists, and I don't know the percentages here, but I would be surprised if it's less than about 98%. And when I say artists, I mean, people who are actively creating art, painting, let's say, or some sculpture or printmaking, or whatever, fine art, and trying to sell it, the overwhelming majority of these people do not have an auction record, and probably never will. And this may be discouraging if you're listening to this as an artist, but let's talk about that. That's the reality. And by the way, you can apply that kind of math to just about any creative field, how many musicians will ever be on the charts, if you like, or all will be known, or will get some kind of following beyond what might be a very small, local following? How many writers will be able to publish? Do well sell their work, make a living? And by the way, that's how I shot someone asked me the other day, how do you define success. And in being an artist, I said, make a living, make a living, being able to support a family, from your income from this field, being able to send kids through college make a living. That's what most people want to do. That's what Pablo Picasso wanted to do. I'm sure that's what every great artists of the past that's really what they wanted to do. When they started out, and they wanted to make a living. That's why you study a field and you work into it. Most artists are not going to make a living. That's a fact of life. And by the way, like most musicians, and most writers, I don't believe it's entirely related to how good you are, how talented you are. We all know immensely talented artists, or musicians or writers or other creative individuals who don't sell their work and can't and don't make a living and never will. And then we see people when we say work guy isn't very good at all. But you know, look at him, or look at her. They're making a fortune, you know, so how do you get to be that guy compared to? Well, yes, of course, some of its talent. You can say that person that you know, the best singer I've ever heard the best, this the best that they're the best band you've ever seen. This is the best painting you've ever seen. And so they deserve that. But bear in mind, you're creating something if you're an artist, especially painter or sculptor, printmaker, you're creating someone that arguably, and this is an argument we've had at salmagundi club, nobody needs, okay. People need food, they need clothing, they need shelter. They don't need paintings. Paintings unquestionably enhance your life, they, they improve your quality of life and the quality of life all of your nearest and dearest. But you don't need them. So you're trying to sell something that people don't fundamentally need. So how do you get on that scale? Coming back to that? Well? How do you get to be you know, on the pop charts, a lot of it, I think, is being in the right place at the right time, there's a degree of luck involved. But marketing is essential. You're not going to get anywhere, if you sit back and hope hope that people will come to you to buy your work, you've got to take it to them. And this is not an easy thing to do. You know, if you're an actor, a musician, you have an agent or writer. If you're creative in those worlds, you have an agent, you have somebody unless you're very, very lucky, you're not able to do it yourself. You have an agent to make the introductions for you to work out your agreements, your contracts to to get you on this to get you in this area to promote you. And you pay that agent, and it's an investment if it pays off. Artists need the same thing. You need an agent. Now, there are very few people walking around out there whose job is artists agent, because it just is not a lucrative thing. But there are plenty of people who are gallerist. The Gallerist is the artist agent. And these days, The Gallerist does not have to be someone with a gallery on Madison Avenue or you know, on a major thoroughfare, big brick and mortar presence. Those people are great. If you can convince those people to represent you as your agent. You're more than halfway there. And again, you will be one of the two 3% of people who can, you can achieve that. But you can do a good deal of this with an agent who is maybe less visible In terms of the built environment, but equally or maybe even more visible in terms of the virtual environment that the metaverse is where we are all going, and there's no question that this is where art and art history will be bought and sold in a much bigger way than perhaps with the possible exception of cryptocurrency, anything else in the metaverse. So I see the metaverse as a massive opportunity for artists, if you understand it, and it's already showing itself in the world of NF Ts and a few other things, and NF Ts, by the way, are not necessarily some mysterious thing that you can buy a nobody under it pretty well understand that stood right now the ARB. And they're not necessarily an entity, though they may be an attachment to something, you buy a particular object, a real object, and you might walk by an NFT of the same thing. It's it's a. But this is a fascinating development, which cannot happen unless you understand it. And you cannot necessarily hope to understand it unless you have an agent of some sort. Who can take your hand and guide you through the metaverse.

Laura Arango Baier: 16:16

We were also curious to know how artists can bring value to their work and attract the proper clients since art is still being sold hand to hand in real life.

Nick Dawes: 16:24

How do you bring value to your work? How do you attract clients in the first place? Once I say I think a large part of that will be up to your agent and attracting the agent is the first thing by proving to them that you can think and act commercially. But here's the thing, an artist, let's talk about a painter, a sculptor and artist really doesn't need many clients. Many artists in history have been very successful. Make good livings. With one client, you you can get away with having one patron, if you're really lucky, and you're in the right place, and you convince that person now that patron might be the state of New York, or it may be the federal government, or it may be some billionaire who lives on Park Avenue. But one patron can do it. In some respects, it can be more difficult as an artist if you have a lot of patrons, because you may have to, you know, who do you give your best work to. And if the one patron thinks you're giving your best work to some other guy, then you know there's a conflict. You don't need many patrons, you can make a very good living from one to handle. So think about what people want. I think a lot of artists will create something and then try and sell it. My advice is to sell it before you've created it. And what I mean by that is you can attract people much better I believe by telling them that they can have some hand in the work. You meet somebody you meet somebody who is looking for art. Well what kind of art Do you like? Well, I like this like that, what kind of place do you have to put the art well come and see it, you know, this is where I want to put a painting, I can create a payment for I can create them for you. I can work on commission if people pay a lot more for something that they commission and then they will offer a Realized work already buy a new untested artist. Commission is an excellent way to find a patron to create a long term relationship with a patron. Especially again, if it's a perhaps a, you know, an institutional Patreon or commercial patron, a big corporation that wants artwork in their new offices, and you're the artist, you're not going to show up with 100 paintings and say, Hey, let's try and find a place to put them, you're going to create the work to fill the space. This is I think the way to do it. Someone wants to I'm in the antiques business more than I am in the painting business. Someone once told me many years ago that when I was an antiques dealer, I said a good antiques dealer doesn't have any inventory. Because inventory has stuff that you can't sell, and good antiques dealer can sell everything. I think it's much the same with artists. I meet artists who have painted hundreds, maybe 1000s of works, and have them all in storage and have them all somewhere. And I think they're never going to sell them. And I think they know that we all know that. And there's reasons why they do this, that they're painting for all kinds of reasons beyond commercially trying to make a living. And that's fine. Same reason people play the piano at home and sing to themselves. That's fine. It's wonderful. It's there. reputed. But if you're creating things with the objective of selling them, I think you're approaching it to a certain extent the wrong way. Unless you've got to that point, sure, if you've got on the spectrum, and people are looking for your work, then you keep creating. Bearing in mind, though, you're only as good as your last work. A band is only as good as its last album, if they don't, if you do something that your fans don't like, they'll turn off. And the same with painting. The President Jacob Collins was giving a talk the other day, here's here's, here's a guy who's who's one of the top artists in the country, certainly in his own realms, which includes portrait painter, and he said, being an artist is a very vulnerable thing, you create this stuff, and you put it out, and it's judged by the whole world, including your peers, fellow artists, and it's very, can be very, very difficult. That's another thing you have to put up with, you have to prove to whoever you're represent who's representing you, or wherever you're going with us, that you're prepared to take that you're prepared to take that kind of criticism, and you're prepared to, you know, to work through it,

Laura Arango Baier: 21:03

if necessary. This podcast is brought to you by FASO. If you're listening to this, it's safe to say that you're probably an artist. And you've probably struggled like most of us have to sell your work online using some random website building platform that isn't even made for artists. If this sounds like you, then check out faso.com forward slash podcast. Busso is an art marketing platform specifically designed for artists to help showcase your work. And not only that, it will also help you sell your work things to they're really easy built in ecommerce and marketing channels that help promote your work to over 48,000 collectors. On top of that, you'll also get access to marketing tips and help with your social media from top people in the industry. So if this sounds like a really great thing, and you want to take your artwork to the next level, and sell as much as you can, then go check out faso.com forward slash podcast BoldBrush but also like to give a huge thank you and shout out to Chelsea classical studio for their continued support in this podcast. If you're interested in archival painting supplies handmade with a lot of patients, go check out their Instagram at CCS fine art materials. Since Nick has a very knowledgeable background in selling successfully, we wanted to know a little bit about how artists can apply some of his tips or tools of the trade in a way so that they can sell their work.

Nick Dawes: 22:25

What's a good tip of the trade in terms of getting your work into a commercial area where it can actually generate money? Well, you need to look up the scale, you don't want to start selling your work at a tiny little run of the mill place or tiny auction or something with everything sells for 50 or $100, you can do that. And it's a way of generating a little income. And if you're happy with that's fine, but you need to aim higher. Try try and get your work into the top auctioneers. Now you might say well, I couldn't possibly get some I work at Sotheby's or Christie's you can there are charity auctions at these places where works by totally unknown, often very young artists will offer their work. And they offer it to a very, very large and very well financed and well qualified community through the brand name. The big auction is this is something to aim for look at who these auctioneers are supporting and charity events and get to know them. If you're an artist in New York City, for instance, how often do you go to Celebes or Christie's I asked this twice, I said, Well, I haven't been to those places, you making a huge mistake, if you don't go, it's an opportunity to not only see the best art in the world and touch it and handle it if you want to this opportunity to meet people who are on the front line of the art business. You need to know these people you need to network with people who are actually selling art at a high level, meet the gallerists. Go to the gallery and take a look. You know walk in, introduce yourself, tell them who you are. Or have your agent do the same thing. But aim high is the first thing I'm going to say.

Laura Arango Baier: 24:14

So how exactly can someone tell if you have a potential patron in front of you? And how can you convince them to buy?

Nick Dawes: 24:21

You got to meet a lot of people the more you network and how do you tell if the person you're meeting is a potential patron or potential buyer potential supporter for your work. I don't think there's an there's an exact formula for that you bring psychology into this. First of all, this is not psychology, but you need to figure out if the person can afford it. And to a certain extent that will be determined by where you are and who you're meeting. But these days with Google once you've exchanged business cards, you can learn a lot about the person you just met, but you can engage people in conversation and you can get a pretty good idea of their level of interest in art by asking some very Simple questions. I learned this many, many years ago when I worked in retail, and I was selling antiques and a gallery. And I learned the very worst thing you can say to a patron and walks in a potential customer is, can I help you? By the way? That's exactly what people say in just about every retail circumstance today, because they've never learned this fundamental thing. Can I help you? What do people say? They say, No, thanks. I'm just looking. And then immediately, there's kind of a breach between the two of you, you know that the conversation has ended. So think about how you're going to approach people, if you happen to have let's say, you have a little exhibition and someone walks in, you're selling your work. And your name is Mary Smith. And Mary Smith has an exhibition of her paintings somewhere, and someone walks in, you don't say, Can I help you? You say, Do you own a Mary Smith? Exactly those words? Do you own a Mary Smith? And what does it say to the client? It says, Wait a minute, we think about that it introduces the element of ownership. And this client says thinking about owning art. And the client might say, No, I don't. And then you've got a wonderful, well, here's your opportunity. Yes, I do, then that's even better. Well, fabulous. I'm Mary Smith, I am I'm whatever the answer is, you're in, you know, if you're not having to be selling your own art at the time, and you're at some event, some cocktail party, some things and whatever, do you own art not to like do you collect, never say collect? Do you own art, people start thinking about what they own, and why they own it. And that itself is a conversation worth having. Here's the point, if people want to buy art, they want to be entertained. You know, people spend time engaging with accountants and lawyers and bankers, they don't expect to be entertained by those people, they doing business with those people. And that's what they're doing all day long, throughout their job, or their office or whatever. Most people don't get entertained by the people that they come into contact with. If their own art and hang out with artists in some capacity, they want to be entertained. They want those people to be interesting and entertaining, they want to be able have conversations, that's one of the great things about salmagundi club, you can come here and he noted that we can sit in the bar or in the dining room, and you'll get invited into a conversation. And you will have conversations with leading artists, most of whom are really interesting people or people in the art world, people like that. That's why That's one reason people come here by the way, it's not because they don't come here for necessarily to look at art or, or to have dinner or when they come to talk to people. That's a huge part of the art business. The art business is a one level and extremely social world where people enjoy communicating with each other. And they end up buying things as part of the process, you know, but if you're not prepared to be interesting to be entertaining, we don't have that capacity, it's going to be difficult for you.

Laura Arango Baier: 28:04

Aside from using Do you own as a hook to get a potential buyer, we wanted to know if there were other hooks that artists could use to sell their work, do your

Nick Dawes: 28:13

own is a great opening line. But of course, every circumstance is different, I think it's good to ask the potential patron what they want, you know, they say if you're trying to make a deal, and in my business, my my primary job really is making deals with other people trying to make a deal, the ideal approach is to make first of all, you need to know what you want before you go into the deal. And in this case, if you're the artist, you want to sell this person something or get them to promote you or get them to somehow attach themselves to you. So that's your objective, make sure your objective is clear. And you figure out how to get to it. And the best way to do it a very successful formula at least is to make it their idea. So you can engage someone in conversation. What was it you like about what would what do you see, you know, and what and if they say, Well, I want this and I want that, and I've thought about buying this? That's a great idea. That's a great idea. Your your idea is a great idea. And by the way I can I can help you make that but I can help you get to that point. But if you turn the conversation to being the other person's idea, you see what I mean? And compliment them on the idea then you're off to the races. Any gallerist knows this any anyone in the realm of consumer behavior knows this. Artists typically don't.

Laura Arango Baier: 29:36

What if the potential buyer changes their mind? Or maybe they refuse to purchase your work? Is there any way to salvage the sale?

Nick Dawes: 29:44

You probably can't you move on? Plenty more efficiency. It's not an easy thing to sell somebody something they don't need, and you're not going to win every time by any means. Someone may not like you. They may not like the art that you create. They may not like your unit Know what you propose them, I don't like your prices. And by the way on that subject pricing is very, very important. People think well, if I, if I, if I, you know, charge very little money, people will buy it. And that's true to some extent, but no one will give it any credibility. If it's very low in price. If I charge too high, nobody will buy. That can be true, too. But if nobody's going to buy it for $300, then you're really in trouble, you might find that somebody will buy it for 3000, or $30,000. Because in the fine art world, depending on what level of it you're in, but I suggested at the beginning of this, that you aim high, aim as high as you can, there is much below$10,000, there isn't much below 25 in certain realms. So there's nothing wrong with putting higher prices on your art, in certain circumstances, you might get it. And if you aren't going to make a living, you need to put higher prices, it's very difficult to make a living selling things for $300. You can, but it's very difficult. But you know, that's a very tricky route. To a certain extent, you cannot put the big price on until you've already sold something at the big price. And that's the catch 22. But as long as you your expectations are not too high, as long as you realize how competitive this is, and how you if you do make a living, you're among the two or 3% who do even though everybody's trying, it's all about having the right expectations going in.

Laura Arango Baier: 31:30

Aside from not pricing properly. We also wanted to know what other big business mistakes artists tend to make. The biggest

Nick Dawes: 31:37

business mistake I see artists make is very simply not understanding the business world. They don't understand that if they want to bring the art into the business world that art is a product, it's no longer art. Of course, it's art in the same way that a chair is a chair, but when you bring it into the business world, it's a product.

Laura Arango Baier: 32:01

Aside from committing this business mistake of not understanding the business that artists are indeed actually selling a product. We also wanted to ask Nick for some advice on what artists can do or what artists should do in order to help them sell their work and make a living.

Nick Dawes: 32:15

One piece of advice I'd give to any young artists today is to brand yourself. I teach a class at Parsons and the students are mostly in a very high end design world of fashion design or something else. I asked the class at the beginning how many of you consider yourself a brand and I usually get out of 18 students I might get five or six. By the end of the class, I'll ask the same question and they all do. You have to be if you're going to be in a creative world, it's part of being interesting. It's part of being commercial, it's part of being able to sell yourself, you have to be a brand, not your art. You have to be a brand.

Laura Arango Baier: 33:01

Since Nick Das is the current CEO of salmagundi. Club, we wanted to ask him a little bit about the salmagundi club, how people can join and the great benefits that it brings.

Nick Dawes: 33:12

We are recording this at salmagundi, the oldest artists club in New York founded in 1871. We inhabit the oldest house on Fifth Avenue built in 1854. We've been here since we bought the building in 1917. It's a fabulous place. If you are in and around New York City come and visit us we are open to the public seven days a week at 47 that avenue. If you're anywhere else, please visit us at salmagundi dot O R G you'll find a lot of information, a lot of events and things seriously about joining joining our club is not difficult. You can do it online. It is not expensive. It is phenomenally cheap. In actual fact, especially if you live more than 50 miles away from the club itself. You get privileges all over the world in some of the best clubs in the world just by being a salmagundi. And so I invite you all to learn more about our club. And if you go to salmagundi dot o RG you will find my contact information there as chairman and CEO. I am at your service and always happy to answer any questions you may have.

Laura Arango Baier: 34:26

We at BoldBrush want to give a huge thank you to the salmagundi club and also to Nick das for sharing these incredible trade secrets and marketing tips that will be so useful for many artists. If you're interested in joining the salmagundi club, please go check out their website@salmagundi.org As Nick said, and also go check them out in person and sincerely consider becoming a member if you're an artist.