The atmosphere of antique stores is unmistakable. Most of the time, you can hear in the background soft classical music or arias, while you browse through a catalogue and carry on a conversation with your favorite antiquarian. The ambience contributes to the three-sided relationship of the owner of the object, the antique dealer, and the buyer. The relationship takes hold with time and like any long-term relationship, it ends up being, in most cases, profitable for everyone. I have always been a subscriber to customer loyalty, whether it’s a question of the brand of mineral water I consume or the merchant with whom I like to exchange a couple of words. It is a lesson I learned in childhood.

The antique dealer is an individual I met some years ago, in the burbs. I sometimes spent my afternoons after school in the vast apartment of Ms. S, long since passed away, both she, gracious apparition, and her dachshund by the name of “X.”

Ms. S, who came to Bucharest around 1900 from the region of Muscel as a young literature student, had been one of Mircea Eliade’s lovers. This love story, which I regret not to remember in more detail, was penned by hand in a dedication by the author on the sleeve of one of the later editions of Maytreyi.

I was fascinated by the personality and stories of the young Ms. S, and earning in turn her trust, I had the freedom of a child to wander throughout her house. I knew its business, I knew its visitors. In this small universe, I was somewhat frightened by a male individual who peered askance at me every time he came and I was the one who opened the door for him. He was the Antique Dealer.

Polite, seeing the weakness of the lady for me, he made no comment, and I, frightened even more by his frozen silence, took refuge in the house. Yet there were meetings that I attended. They negotiated several objects from the house of Ms. S, who was apparently burdened by the costs of such a big house, left deserted after the death of the husband, of the child…

Little by little the books of "the doctor," the furniture of the living room, the Murano lamps and the decorative objects left that house.

Never however did Ms. S carry on discussions outside her home or with more than one individual from the same category (antiquarians). Her sole visitor for acquisitions was the individual about whom I told you above.

I understood subsequently the value of such a relationship. Basically, it was lasting, discrete, punctual. The owner felt safe, she did not risk predation, and he, the Antique Dealer, had the confidence of the entire octogenarian generation of an old Bucharest neighborhood.

The same type of customer loyalty gets created in antique stores as far as the buyers are concerned.

The role of the Antique Dealer here is to sell in turn his goods to a knowledgeable clientele (read “collectors”) whose tastes and interests (if he knows his business) he already knows.

In their turn, the collectors depend upon the antique dealers, since most of the time they are quasi-anonymous and they ask for the discretion of those who rummage for them. Furthermore, they don’t have the time to develop the direct relationship with the owner, and they must trust the eyes and ears of another. And, traveling from one antiquarian to another, you can’t be sure of the object that you are purchasing… and the price is most of the time higher, and you don’t need black holes in your budget.

We will soon have the occasion to make a few appraisals of the antique shops in Bucharest or elsewhere.

Until next time,

T.C. & E.

The One-Eyed Turk

At a recent painting auction at Artmark, among the works was also the One-Eyed Turk by Camil Ressu, at a price estimated between 12,500 and 18,000 euros, sold to the first bidder for 12,500 euros. On the other hand, another work, Country Road, by the same painter, was sold for 1,000 euros over the maximum price estimate.

Without claiming to be a connoisseur, I can only say that, in my opinion, the One-Eyed Turk is by far underestimated (kudos to its happy owner) and the Country Road just barely justifies the price for which it was acquired, and this only because it is a work of Camil Ressu. The discussion I want to start here is whether indeed the bid at the minimum price, of 12,500 euros, was randomly made by someone, or was it a knowledgeable move? Why sold to the first bidder? Why was there not more bidding?

If we study the painting closely, it makes a shocking impression. With an eye closed, sick, blind, in the other the Turkish man focuses his entire personality. The shabby caftan, brown and cold like the coffee grounds heated on the sand in traditional Turkish fashion, the subject’s folded hands and crossed legs, the empty table at which he sits, but especially, I return to the stern look with which the Turk welcomes you, all these have nothing beautiful, nothing attractive. And yet you want to talk to him, to be seated by him at the table, on the unoccupied chair. The open terrace in front of which you will sit gets lost in the undulating landscape of hills, with the mosque, the olive trees and the houses of the village.    

Could such a work be purchased by chance? The answer is certainly not; such a painting can only have its place in the collection of a connoisseur.

The collector born into wealth will choose simple works, visually harmonious, banal, "easy." He bid for the Country Road because: 1) it is Ressu; 2) it is classic and chromatically correct – a road with a vanishing point, lights and shadows applied “by the book”; 3) it has majestic trees and a familiar landscape, with red-tiled roofs. Easy thus from an aesthetic point of view, such a work does not pose existential questions.

Where a collector born into wealth goes wrong (since she does not have the flair of a traditional collector, which would allow her to see the cycle of a minimum of 50-60 years of an object) is first of all the choice of objects for which she bids – she enters the painting market without understanding its subtleties; then she allows herself to be carried away by the adrenalin-pumped competition of “bidding” – in other words, she does not know when to stop; anyway, she has a minimal understanding of the investment itself – she wishes security for her capital, but she obtains the opposite effect and will slowly and surely waste her wealth in at most 10 years (after that, she begins to understand).

How much need, however, does the market have of such collectors? They are, without doubt, a reality and are among the most courted individuals. The art seller desires new treasures in her investment portfolio, betting on the fact that these future collectors, although initially totally uninstructed, buying on inspiration or with poor advice, will manage in a reasonable time interval (10, 15 years) to enter the market as buyers who are, if not professional, at least more careful about transactions. And more careful about transactions means choosing works that are atypical, uncomfortable, that make you turn again and again your eyes towards them to discover another nuance. These will attract large capital investments.

Here are the answers to the questions above. The connoisseurs are few, reason for which the painting by Ressu, titled by the auction house “The Faithful Client” (“The One-Eyed Turk” or even his proper name I believe are more likely titles that the painter would have chosen) was sold practically without bidding.

And you and I, when we meet the Turk, will have a long discussion (until then, possibly, we can look deeply into the landscape beyond our own window).

In the second episode of this story (2), I will choose an unsold painting, found still in the portfolio of the Grimberg Auction House, a work listed at an extremely reasonable price. A painting for smaller budgets, through the analysis of which I want to demonstrate the same thesis: the lack of instruction of those individuals new to the art market, the collectors born into wealth. And possibly, to influence some of their choices.

Until next time,

T.C. & E.

The first step towards browsing antique markets begins in our own families (this should have probably been the first article of the series). The bigger and wider spread our family is, the more chances you will have to find something in the attics, basements, caves, storerooms or houses of your cousins, uncles or brothers-in-law.

I remember the fascination created in my mind by a beautiful bluish, ceramic water pitcher, flaking, with an ugly male frog on its handle, ready to jump on you; the dusty goblet was lying thrown among other cast offs in the huge attic of my cousin’s house. When I grew up, I started asking her for it. Only then did the goblet, which came from the house of our grandparents, having practically no other value than a sentimental one, return to life. I think even now it decorates the garden of the same house… our paths have diverged and led each of us to a different place, and I have not seen for a long time either the attic, or the goblet…

However, it is certain my cousin did not give it to me, because she herself has been infected with the mania of collecting, and she worships our grandparents. As far as other objects of hers are concerned, even now we tease each other. And the passion continues a generation later.

Others, on the other hand, looked at me a little strangely when I poked my nose in the trunks, but they gave me, here and there, a little something. Sometimes even a lot, not knowing, for the most part, what to do with such objects.

The funniest story related to this was that of the gas lamps. Without being a collector of this type of objects, I was in the situation of buying gas lamps for the completion of a rustic décor. I found them, in contemporary ceramic, manually painted, in Cyprus. An obscure potter on the side of the road was still manufacturing such objects. The lamps were big, beautiful, delicately decorated, and they fulfilled the purpose for which I was acquiring them. But it turned out, once I arrived home, that they were insufficient. And so it was that, finding myself wandering among relatives, I began to ask… Little by little I collected gas lamps from all the houses through which I passed (less so from my mother’s who admitted that she had thrown them all out). And today I still meet a distant relative who tells me, as soon as she sees me: are you still looking for gas lamps? I had acquired a reputation…

In general, traditional objects are still well preserved in the attics and caves of country homes. And they are free! I remind you here that the great collectors had, in addition to valuable paintings, as a must, folk art: hand weaved rugs, goblets, bowls, furniture. A type of collection in fact accessible for anyone, and which can be started even today, is through small acquisitions of Horezu or Corund (Korond) ceramic. About this type of collections, however, on another occasion.

Until next time,

T.C. (The Collector) & E. (Escuteo)