Accurate and correct evaluation of the artwork’s present-day market value and potential art dynamics is the cornerstone of an art professional’s competence. You need to know what determines the value of art to understand whether you’re paying a fair price and have a generally fair deal. Here is a guide to the main value-setting factors you should consider.
What determines the value of art? Key factors
When you face the need to evaluate an artwork or determine whether it’s fairly priced, you may rely on the following aspects.
Artist’s popularity
The artist’s name and reputation in the art world mean much in the artwork’s evaluation. An art object of the same size, medium, and with a seemingly similar subject may cost dozens, if not hundreds, of times more or less than the object you’re evaluating because of the artists’ different standing. Fashionable contemporary artists who everybody knows and works by Old Masters will be priced way higher than 95% of the rest of the art pieces available on the market.
Scarcity of artwork
The fewer artworks by a particular artist are currently available on the global market, the higher the price for each will be. Some works by the greatest painters and sculptors were lost, damaged, or stolen throughout the past centuries, so only a handful of surviving works are available for sale. Naturally, the collectors’ struggle for them gets fiercer as scarcity grows.
Artistic style
The trends and expert opinions in the high-end art community also determine the artwork’s value. Even rising stars within a specific popular art style may reap fair sums of money for their art if they hit the spot and capture the trend to address the highest demand among art connoisseurs. For instance, such a situation has been observed in recent decades with Abstract Expressionism, one of the most popular contemporary art styles that attracts high interest among art dealers and collectors.
Ownership and display history
Finally, you need to take into account the artwork’s recent provenance data. If it has been displayed at the world’s top exhibitions and art fairs or has been part of an important art collection, its price grows.
Knowing these factors will guide you in the process of evaluating any artwork. Now that you know what determines the value of art, you will find it easy to spot lucrative deals and avoid overpaying for art items. Use this checklist to master the craft of art evaluation and make the next step in the art world.