In a valiant attempt to downplay the loss he suffered from bad timing, Polsky focuses on the allure that the constantly changing market holds for him. Its shifting seats of power fascinate him in the extreme: gallery owners no longer dominate as auction houses call the shots; people rush from one international art fair to another in search of the next big thing; old-time dealers like Polsky reinvent themselves as "financial art advisors" and connect owners of particularly desirable artworks with auction houses hungry for saleable inventory; advisors recount stories about Wayne Thiebaud's Bakery Counter to entice collectors to part with collections (bought for $500 in 1962 to hang over a couch, the painting sold for $1.5 million in 1998). The scene is crazy, sexy and never boring for Polsky, even if it is more about doing business than loving a thing of rare beauty.
The stratospheric prices works bring at auction also obsesses Polsky; his mania is so infectious that readers might stare at paintings bought for a few hundred dollars and wonder, "What if these are like David Rockefeller's Rothko?" Rockefeller bought Mark Rothko's White Center (Yellow, Pink, and Lavender on Rose) for $10,000 and sold it at auction in May 2007 for $72.8 million. Timing, even for a Rockefeller, is everything in the art market.
Polsky, who still shivers at the thought of having sold his Warhol early for a piddling $375,000, resorts to schadenfreude to keep his sanity amidst market madness; he casts a jaundiced eye over current art-world denizens and regards them as petty, jealous and egotistical (but, of course, never dull). In a particularly sardonic mood, he writes, "Although it was summer, there was certainly no moratorium on ridiculous art-dealer behavior." And, God bless him, the stories of bad behavior are as beautiful as the paintings that got away.--John McFarland
Shelf Talker: A sardonic guide takes readers on a dizzying, dishy and fascinating tour of the recently crazy market for contemporary art.