International studio (50.1913)

The Lay Figure

The lay figure .• on art
AT AUCTION.
“Is there any possible means of arriving at
the real value of a work of art ? ” asked the Man
with the Red Tie. “ Has any work a sort of
natural price which one ought to expect it to fetch
always and as a matter of course whenever it is put
omthe market ? ”
“The value of an article is what it will fetch,”
quoted the Plain Man; “ the value of a work of
art is the amount that the man who wants it is
prepared to give for it.”
“You mean that it has no fixed value, that the
price which can be obtained for it is purely a matter
of chance,” said the Man with the Red Tie; “ to
decide definitely what it is really worth is then
impossible.”
“ Oh no! there is no impossibility about it,”
returned the Plain Man. “The saleroom provides
the standard of prices for all works of art. What
a work will fetch at auction is its real value; no
test could possibly be more fair, I think; there
can be no doubt about that.”
“Why do you think the auction test is so in-
fallible?” asked the Art Critic. “ Why should it
settle the question so surely ? ”
“ Because in the saleroom the men who want
any particular work are able to compete one with
another and by competition to fix its value,”
answered the Plain Man. “ An auction is a sort of
consultation of experts who understand the market
demand and who arrive at the price by agreement
among themselves.”
“Then how do you account for the extraordinary
variations in the prices of works of art which are
sold at auction ? ” broke in the Man with the Red
Tie. “ If your committee of experts have settled
the price once and for all, if they understand so
exactly what it ought to be, why should it ever
fluctuate ? ”
“ Because no experts can ever fix the price of
anything,” laughed the Critic; “ or at all events
cannot fix it so that it will be taken as immutable
by the public. There is no such thing within the
range of possibility as a definite and certain price
for any work of art.”
“ Do you mean that its value is always a matter
of chance, and that there is actually no standard by
which it can be measured ? ” inquired the Man with
the Red Tie.
“ I think you are confusing value and price,”
replied the Critic. “ The value of a work of art
may be something beyond calculation, and yet under
166

certain circumstances, or under certain unfavour-
able conditions, it may fetch but a trivial price when
it chances to be put up for sale.”
“ Don’t play with paradoxes,” sneered the Plain
Man; “ stick to practical matters and look at the
whole question from a common-sense point of view.
If a work of art will only fetch a trivial price on
the market, it follows as a matter of course that
its value is trivial—that is settled definitely by
economical laws.”
“ On the market! ” cried the Man with the Red
Tie. “ But which is the market price, I would very
much like to know—that which the artist originally
obtained for his work or the larger or smaller amount
paid for the same work at some later date in the
auction-room ? ”
“Neither, I think,” said the Critic. “The artist
may have originally undervalued or overvalued his
work, he may have been unlucky or lucky in his
sales, so his price affords no criterion. But equally
he may be unlucky or lucky in the auction-room
record, so there again the price obtained for his
work settles nothing. There is, I tell you again,
no such thing as a fixed market price, a certain and
steady appraisement of value in pounds, shillings
and pence.”
“ Then whether you get a good price or a bad
one is purely a matter of chance,” sighed the Man
with the Red Tie.
“And all dealing in works of art is a mere
gamble in which nothing is certain, and anything,
may happen,” added the Plain Man.
“ That about sums it up,” agreed the Critic.
“Unlike other commodities, works of art have a
sentimental value, which is something quite different
from their intrinsic value, and this sentimental value
is enormously affected by fashion and other momen-
tary considerations. The saleroom test is entirely
without meaning, because it merely reflects the
sentiment of the day; and it is wholly without
significance because it is affected constantly by
pure chance. If two or three rich men, who all
happen to want a particular work, are bidding one
against the other at a sale, that work will fetch a
fancy price ; but that same work might be sold for
a very small sum a few weeks later if it were put up
in a room full of men of moderate means. Artistic
productions go in and out of fashion too, and their
price varies accordingly; and if their value were
only what they would fetch they would not be said
to have any value at all because it would always be
varying. Plow can you set up any fixed scale of
prices ? It is all chance.”

The Lay Figure.