Comprising a list of the world’s richest living artists is hard. Why? Because artists don’t really want you to know how much they’re worth. Think about it. At a gallery, set prices are only revealed if buyer interest is shown. When a piece goes up for auction, you get a feel for the artist’s value via their estimates, but only when the hammer goes down can you even fathom how much an artist and their works are actually worth. Numbers big and small are recorded, but what about all the other transactions? What about the private commissions, corporate sales, trading for favors, or straight up cash money transactions on the DL?
Unlike the Sunday Times Rich List which is comprised of estimates measured from identifiable wealth that includes land, property, art and shares in publicly quoted companies, this list focuses on artists and guesstimates made on how much they earn from actual art sales.
Although John Baldessari, Ed Ruscha, Kaws, Jose Parla, Barry McGee, Fernando Botero, Claes Oldenburg, Banksy, Nan Goldin, and Gilbert & George make lots of dough, it’s not enough to get on this list. Not even super polymath Bruce Nauman (who’s currently #1 on the Artfacts.net list, with Damien Hirst is #29), Julian Schnabel (having lots of real estate and making films doesn’t count), Brice Marden (he owns a huge chunk of SoHo and other property), Sean Scully (like Johns, Marden, and recently deceased Freud, Scully is one of the very few living artists to have a retrospective at the MOMA and MET), and Frank Stella (who can command almost a cool $3 million for certain works) made it.
These are folks who draw most of their earnings directly from art related venture. As for who dictates on how much these artists are worth, that’s some 1% conspiracy… #occupyartstreet.
Written by Joy Yoon (@Joy_Yoon)
Check out The 15 Richest Living Artists.
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David February 3rd, 2012 at 02:48 PM
I feel like Ai Wei Wei should be in there somewhere...guy is a visionary and he has had a few big payouts.
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Renato Castillo February 4th, 2012 at 05:18 PM
After looking at all the images I just have a hard time comprehending how someone be it wealthy or not could justifiably pay millions of dollars for a post modern abstract expression piece from a living artist? Honestly for the money you would spend you could honestly recreate the work itself by yourself. People I think often buy into the cult of the artist rather than the work itself. It seems odd that the world of contemporary art is only appreciated by value. (which find odd as most artists often fail to gain notoriety or relevance) Its odd though that in order to appreciate modern art one has to be educated, honestly to me I just see a stream of colors while ascetically pleasing ultimately is just that...a random stream of colors valued at one million dollars. Expressionism is a B.S. movement because it ultimately takes the artist desires and replaces them with the viewers. It is nothing more than a clever ploy to over think and over value works that 8/10 people would never pay more than $1,000 for. All i'm saying is that anyone on this list (except chuck close) would never have the technical merit to reproduce a Rembrant or Dürer. Make art accessible, and for the sake of Jesus Motherloving Christ please please please perhaps modern art will embrace some facet of realism!
Khalid April 29th, 2012 at 11:18 PM
It's an investment. Imagine how much it'll be worth once the artists finally croak.
jamie florance February 8th, 2012 at 07:49 PM
He got paid in stock options for the mural at the Facebook HQ. They go public and boom. 200 million.