Do we want government ethics outsourced to an art dealer?
Do we want government ethics outsourced to an art dealer?
L o and behold, a New York gallery show raises concerns about D.C. influence-peddling and back-door White House bribes. Georges Bergès Gallery on West Broadway in Soho is showing the work of Hunter Biden this fall. Bergès, an established dealer, has struck an unusual ethics agreement with the White House. In response to concerns that influence-seekers will buy Biden’s work, Bergès has promised to keep the names of buyers and prices secret. No one except Bergès and the buyer, not even the artist, will know anything about an acquisition.
I haven’t seen Biden’s art, so I can’t evaluate it. Jerry Saltz, New York magazine’s venerable art critic, calls his work “generic post-zombie Minimalist illustration.” Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch. I see lots of new art in New York galleries. Most of it isn’t good. I’d say 99 percent of new art loses its spark after a few years, and its value. This isn’t a tale of our times alone. It has ever been thus.
I’ve read interviews with Biden about his art. He says he paints to cope. He likes the work of Sean Scully and Mark Bradford. He works on canvas, metal, and Japanese Yupo paper (a brand of synthetic paper). Sometimes he does collages. He likes bold color. I hope he focuses on small-scale work. Going big almost always means going bad.
Influence-peddling has dogged Biden fils for years. But I don’t follow politics too closely — something to do with Ukrainian energy moguls paying him $80,000 a month while Biden père was vice president. The younger Biden has no experience in oil, except, it seems, in oil paint. I heard something about Chinese money, too. I don’t know Bergès. Judging from his website, he’s a good dealer.
In June, Bergès told Artnet News that he’ll ask $75,000 for works on paper and $500,000 for Biden’s big oils on canvas. That’s a lot of money. I’ve written about big prices for the work of living artists. Thinking about how a museum buys art, I’d say paying half a million for a painting done six months ago is unwise. Among private collectors, it’s anything goes. Mr. Market determines the price.
The standard gallery commission is 50 percent of the final price, though that, of course, is a negotiated thing. Variables include volume, how hot the artist is, and whether or not the money goes to a nonprofit. Bergès and Biden have a contract. Has anyone seen it?
That only the gallerist will know who bought what and the amount of money exchanged isn’t possible. A low-paid gallery assistant will know who’s looked at what and what’s sold. The owner, after all, isn’t the one sticking the red dots on the wall and the list of works for sale to note what’s available and what’s gone. The bookkeeper knows. The art handler knows. He or she packs the thing.
Are they all signing confidentiality agreements? Is the gallerist? Are the buyers? Their families? Their accountants? Their cleaning ladies? Guests in their homes, or at least those who can read a signature on a painting? Has anyone covering art news seen a confidentiality agreement? Has anyone asked to see it? If Bergès is getting the standard 50 percent commission, does he have much incentive to police against inflated offers?
I know what omertà is. It’s a notion foreign to the art world, where people are blabbermouths. Only in the auction houses are mouths sewn shut.
The gallerist Bergès, alas, is now in politics. Influence-peddling is a crime. Accomplices are criminals. Do we want government ethics outsourced to an art dealer?
It’s sad and surprising to see the art press look the other way. “He’s on my team” is the reason and an altogether bad one. Though Biden’s an artist, I doubt “artists of the world unite” figures in anyone’s thinking. Art reporters and critics, or at least the good ones, chase a juicy story without fear or favor. Otherwise, they’re shills and hacks. Substitute “Ivanka Trump” for “Hunter Biden,” and cries from the art press — and, for that matter, the entire contemporary art world — would shatter glass.
I have a soft spot for people in recovery. We’re all broken, and we’re all sinners. Hunter Biden has led a very messy life. That’s par for the course for artists. If he’s gotten out of lobbying, lawyering, and far-flung business deals and is truly committed to life as an artist, he’ll meet a better class of people.
That said, the ethics deal the White House has struck with Bergès won’t work. It’s a fig leaf. I think Hunter Biden should sell his work as does George W. Bush, another political celebrity turned artist. I have actually seen the Bush wounded-warrior paintings and don’t think they’re very good, but the money goes to charity.
By all means, use Bergès as a dealer, but give the money to an established charity focused on art as therapy for dementia sufferers and their caregivers. Arts & Minds is the best. It’s in New York and works through museums. Or P.S. Arts, which supports arts education for children. It’s based in Los Angeles, where, I think, Biden lives.
Or wait until President Biden leaves office to sell art. It’s the price of fame.
It’s not unique for a presidential child, brother, brother-in-law, or ne’er-do-well, way-back cousin to cause a stir in the art world, but it’s rare. When Margaret Truman, an aspiring classical soprano, got a dissing from the Washington Post music critic, her father, a furious President Truman, gave him a piece of his mind.
“Some day, I hope to meet you,” Truman wrote to critic Paul Hume. “When that happens, you’ll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below.”