Queensland Art Gallery Presscuttings Book 1 : Presscuttings, 1959-1962

PAINT BEYOND Continued from page 11 national finance as the franc, the lira or Did. This is not to say that there aren't any sincere, dedicated and talented artists any more -- there are. But they don't count. Neither do the ordinary folk who gaze with reverent awe at the paintings in Our museums and art galleries. The people who matter these days are the dealers. It is they who decide whether "Still-life With Apples" is worth only the C20 Gauguin charged fur PRICE it when he was pushed for the price of a drink back in 1801, or if they can reasonably go higher than the £104,000 the self -same paint- ing realised in Paris five years ago. They are the arbiters of artistic "fashion." (Al the moment, Rubens is "in," Landseer definitely "out.- Millionaires bow to their judg- ments, Impoverished aristocrats pander to their fancies. and all the time the most fantastic art boom in history goes on and on. Who are they, these little -pub- licised but powerful men who von - Page 12-Aultralasian POST, June 14, 1962 trot this Multi -million pound market? Well, there are 85 dealers of con- sequence in London, and London is the world art centre. But of the 85, the Big Three are Geoffrey Agnew, Leonard Koetser and Ed- ward Speelman. And behind this shrewd, urbane triumvirate are the two all- powerful saleroom dynasties of Christie's and Sotheby's - the im- placable ten-percenters of the line art world. Sotheby's have been known to sell £1,000,000 worth of pictures in a month. It is there that tall. bespectacled Agnew, quiet. and reticent Speelman and the restlessly energetic Koetser >woo .111.114.1 .1141 plat - 4.1131t1 nil tato PPUM pa am 11811111 c 'Jowl I us401) )1.ill.t.) JO ;JON lug! Inq Iloo JO 'IitIPIO r sum 411 1!.11.1,Itli V III PU tioi aq 41a 0008 ill awful 10.103 os JO 001, 'Ili JO,. pa '000'SL23 6u11eaJ9-P1o3" e of !fitly aip l0 ucliaeicipv ainpid warn' stet 4o 3)!ad .141 4°134 saaleap 4.4e isa661q aq4 to omi Aq aineq DNiaa la 4, JOAO iseqfroi Rising price **THIS "Old Master," Van Eyck's Madonna and Child, bought by the National Gallery of Victoria for £31,800 in 1922, is worth £250,000. bring off coups which shatter price records almost every time they bid. It was there that Koetser outbid Agnew to buy Rubens's "The Ador- ation of the Magi" after a fantas- tic duel which ended with the auc- tioneer's gavel falling for the last time at £275,000. It was there, too, that Agnew lifted an almost imperceptible finger to end the bidding for Gainsborough's "Mr and Mrs Robert Andrews" at £130,000. Britain can't begrudge the sales- men of Christie's and Sotheby's their pickings. Commissions in the U.S. and on the Continent are even higher - and that's why the world experts prefer to do their dealings in London. To Agnew, Koetser, Speelman and the rest, art is Rig Business. So big, in fact, that they can even afford to keep a few paintings of their own. Koetser puts it this way: "First and foremost, I love pictures. I analyse them down to the last brush stroke." Impatiently waving aside a man who was trying to sell him an in- surance policy, Dutch -born Koetser explained his own philosophy of fine art and fat cheque books. "I don't bother with the small stuff. Nothing much under £700 here. I work hard and eat well." He can afford to. His ow?: private collection includes a Van Goyen worth £24,000. According to Koetser, few of London's art dealers are really on ton of their jobs "(Junk., myself. hey Ore not artists." he ranIrtined "I studied at the Slade sellout of Art and my mother and father were artists be- fore me." How does his own work compare with the paintings he sells? "You can say I'm a lousy artist," he sighed through his cigsr smoke. "But I know my business." Snapped it up He certainly does. The more conservative dealers call him brash and cocksure, but he has discovered more fakes than any man alive. He put the art world on its ears six years ago by exposing a Francia in the National Gallery. Then he spotted a tiny 10 inches by 12 inches panel called "The Shrimr Girl" and snapped it up for 1251 guineas He had recognised it a masterpiece by Frans Hals. paint. rr of "The Laughing Cavalier." I was worth £30.000. On another occasion, Koetser it reverently shattered the dignifie. calm of Sotheby 's by standing In in the middle of a sale of Olt Ma,l,r, ;Ind declaring of one 0 them -tr. IV, modern The "Old Ntast..r" rnie.:tiu Was bought in at E350 In the international art under world, there are more fake paint logs circulating titan there ar spivs to sell them. An American dealer once claim