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  • Boom

  • Mad Money, Mega Dealers, and the Rise of Contemporary Art
  • By: Michael Shnayerson
  • Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
  • Length: 16 hrs and 38 mins
  • 4.6 out of 5 stars (39 ratings)

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Boom

By: Michael Shnayerson
Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
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Summary

The meteoric rise of the largest unregulated financial market in the world - for contemporary art - is driven by a few passionate, guileful, and very hard-nosed dealers. They can make and break careers and fortunes.

The contemporary art market is an international juggernaut, throwing off multimillion-dollar deals as wealthy buyers move from fair to fair, auction to auction, party to glittering party. But none of it would happen without the dealers - the tastemakers who back emerging artists and steer them to success, often to see them picked off by a rival.

Dealers operate within a private world of handshake agreements, negotiating for the highest commissions. Michael Shnayerson, a longtime contributing editor to Vanity Fair, writes the first-ever definitive history of their activities. He has spoken to all of today's so-called mega dealers - Larry Gagosian, David Zwirner, Arne and Marc Glimcher, and Iwan Wirth - along with dozens of other dealers - from Irving Blum to Gavin Brown - who worked with the greatest artists of their times: Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol, Cy Twombly, and more.

This kaleidoscopic history begins in the mid-1940s in genteel poverty with a scattering of galleries in midtown Manhattan, takes us through the ramshackle 1950s studios of Coenties Slip, the hipster locations in SoHo and Chelsea, London's Bond Street, and across the terraces of Art Basel until today. Now, dealers and auctioneers are seeking the first billion-dollar painting. It hasn't happened yet, but they are confident they can push the price there soon.

©2019 Michael Shnayerson (P)2019 Hachette Audio
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Brilliant

Full of mispronunciations, but otherwise completely riveting and totally compelling. Maybe because I know so many of the art world players! Brilliantly well researched. Loved it. Another chapter please!!

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A good overview

A good overview of most of the biggest galleries and their key personalities around today and how they got to where they are.

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Great read

Informative and enjoyable, very good book to get started learning on the market. Recommend it

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Some interesting anecdotes, too much megadealer

Started out well, quite interesting as a market history but too hagiographic on the megadealers

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1 person found this helpful