Things I missed while I was away

Nothing, to be honest. Away was perfect.

But here's some things I would have read if I had been near a computer:

In April this year I wrote about the British Art Fund initiative, which put up £5m for regional galleries to buy and display contemporary art from overseas. The five 'winners' have been announced: Bristol Museums; Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow; Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art; the Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne; and Birmingham City Museum with New Art Gallery, Walsall.

My fascination with art advisors (and anyone who uses the phrase 'starter Warhol') continues...

The Chronicle of Higher Education takes on the fine art Ph.D

And a [p]review of James Stourton's Great Collectors of Our Time. [NB: does anyone else find the Times Online site disconcertingly boppy?]

0800 ART

Never invited to the best dinner parties or after-opening Chinese restaurant soirées? Never fear - now you can get your hot art information over the phone.

APT Intelligence has gathered a roster of artists, curators and critic, and time-poor collectors can now book phone consultations with an advisor matched to their interests:

Our advisors/experts are actively involved in the young emerging art scene around the globe, covering established markets in the US and Europe as well as upcoming regions such as Latin America, India, China and the Middle East. No group of individuals is better positioned to comprehensively cover young emerging artists around the world. APT Intelligence provides access to this unique network of experts through phone consultations and customized tours.

Fees start at $350 for a half-hour. You'd hope the advisors have a nice phone manner.

Back next Tuesday

Best-of-3 is taking a short break - posting resumes on 14 August. In the meantime, treat yourself to some back issues:

Where are the art gallery blogs?

Irresistable: Florentijn Hofman's riff on giant inflatable art

Sharing the love: how much should the dealer's cut be?

Advice for collectors ... what's the deal with art advisors?

A better breed of art fair ? ... Gallery Weekend Berlin

Free tools for free lancers

Opening up access to collections: the Powerhouse story

Advice for collectors ... or not?

Two recent articles present very different takes on whether collectors should employ art advisors.

In the Business section of the New York Times, 'The Art of Buying Art, With the Help of an Adviser' looks at advisors from the services point of view. Good things about advisors include:

• they can educate you about art, and introduce you to new artists and galleries
• they can get you access to stockrooms and waiting lists
• they can do the legwork you're too busy for
• they can help you decide what to bid at auction
• they can 'mediate between a husband and wife on a big purchase' (quote from New York-based artist Marilyn Greenberg).

Meanwhile, in The Art Newspaper, 'The problem with art advisors' has a much less rosy view. Bad things about advisors include:

• they have 'Gucci clothes and that perfect hair, but there’s no passion for art' (quote from Berlin gallerist Guido Baudach)
• art fairs have made it much easier for them to approach art dealers, as dealers are 'on the floor and totally accessible' (quote from Glenn Scott Wright, director at Victoria Miro Gallery, London)
• there's a new and less respectable breed of advisor who 'go around crashing cocktail parties and shimmying up to people who just got a big bonus at Goldman Sachs' (quote from David Leiber of Sperone Westwater gallery in New York)

Okay - so far, so funny. But The Art Newspaper article does raise a more substantial issue.

There's a number of different ways that art advisors make their money. Not everyone is happy with all of them, and there have been cases where an art advisor has double-dipped without the client's knowledge. This is where the article gets interesting. Ways of making a cut include:

• being paid a retainer, usually related to the size of the collection being built, and the speed with which it is to be developed
• being paid a commission on each work from the gallery it's purchased from
• being paid a commission by both the gallery and the client.

So how about here in New Zealand? The gallery system here is still pretty egalitarian. There's only a handful of artists whose work you might not be able to purchase just by turning up at the opening with your chequebook.

Getting the really good stuff though, especially by older or historical artists, probably requires building a relationship with the right dealer/s. By and large, this isn't hard: the dealers here are a relatively friendly bunch.

In my opinion, the times you might want an advisor would be when (a) you have lots of money, little knowledge of New Zealand art, and less time (b) you're looking to buy on the secondary market, and you need someone to help you sniff out the work, and evaluate it or (c) when you want to branch out of the area you're familiar with and start collecting in a different period or media.

So - where to find one? Don't use the Yellow Pages. Ask around and get a recommendation from another collector (whose collection you admire), a gallery curator (whose shows and publications you admire), or an art dealer (who runs a business that you admire).