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The market reception of ‘new connoisseurship’: The impact of recent advances in art scholarship on the selling and buying of early Flemish paintings

par Radermecker, Anne-Sophie ; [et al.]
Référence Nederlandsch kunsthistorisch jaarboek, 69, page (339-372)
Publication Publié, 2020-01-01

Article révisé par les pairs

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Résumé :

This paper empirically investigates the economics of the new connoisseurship and its market reception over the past decades. Auction prices of fifteenth and sixteenth-century Flemish paintings sold between 1946-2015 are used to assess the buyer willingness to pay for each attribution qualifier. Data are extracted from the Hislop’s Art Sales Index and analyzed through statistical methods and in the light of art historical evidence. The first part of the paper retraces the evolution of the market for Flemish paintings, with a special focus on attributions, to demonstrate how salesrooms rapidly recovered new connoisseurship output. Comparative statistics for each kind of attribution (for lots sold and their value) are brought to show the gradual correlation between the level of authenticity and the price paid for each attribution qualifier. The second section argues that the quest for authorship can be viewed as a relative paradigm that depends on several parameters. The monetary value given to autograph and non-paintings tend to evolve over time (corollary to the evolution of new connoisseurship) and fluctuates with the reputation of the masters, and that of auction houses. This crossover study contributes to our understanding of the relationship between connoisseurship and the current reception of authorship. It reveals the great value that market players still give to the artist’s hand, despite the deep change in mentality that has occurred in the academic field.