When it comes to making a choice whether to invest in gold and silver bullion, or to invest in coins or art, investing in art is quickly becoming the favorite of many for an enjoyable portfolio diversifier. With some good taste and business sense, buying a favorite piece of work will eventually become a life-long investment to enjoy every day. There are many types of investors and collectors in the art world, with those at the forefront spending millions of dollars to enhance their prestige, ego, and status-all combined with a passion for collecting well-recognized names of art work. But what many do not know is that anyone with a love of art and a desire to invest can also join this field of investment.
According to the Mei Moses Fine Art Index, compiled by two professors at New York University’s Stern School of Business, “the greatest opportunity for growth in art values comes when investors suddenly focus their attention on a hot new sector or name.” Their findings show that over the past 50 years, stocks have returned 10.9 percent while the art index has shown an annual 10.5 percent, yet from 2001 to 2005, art investments have beat the stocks out in investment returns.
Collecting art for investment purposes is much more enjoyable than gathering stocks with a flick of a button or mouse to bring nothing in return but money alone. Mark Palmer, president of a Columbus-based financial advisory firm, the Joseph Group Inc., says, “Don’t buy antiques or invest in collectibles just for investment purposes, do it because you enjoy the subject matter. It’s value as an investment is more of a by-product.”
Regardless of why an art investment are made by the investors, financial advisers and analysts are reporting that art investments are now very much considered another serious form of alternative investments on an international level. One overseas example is the country of the Czech Republic, with ceiling-high prices now being spent at their art auction houses in recent years. A 1921 piece of art work by Josef apek , a Cubist Czech artist, sold for 9.3 million Czech crowns, demonstrating a growing trend for the Czech Republic and surrounding countries for art investments.
This adds to the fact that last year, the Czech crowns increased about five percent in value, setting a record high against the euro and the United States dollar. Noticeably, many of the these newly developing entrepreneurs of Czech art consider their art purchases as solid investment strategy, often becoming life-long serious art collectors who will only buy the best quality over time, adding to the field of art investments. The drop in the financial markets and also the capital markets has been at the front of this raise in art investing. Additional alternative investments found art investment as a serious adversary to more traditional methods, especially from 2001 to 2003. Even though art occasionally comes down slightly in value, it it still selling above normal in the auction houses to make give rise to a new trend.
On-line Internet auction art sales have become extremely popular over the past couple of years, allowing for art sales of less valuable or less popular art work, which gives the developing artist a way to move up. Another option for on-line art sales is for a buyer to view the art at the auction house, and then go on-line to research and buy the work. Traditionally, the highest price of original art works and masterpieces are sold only through the auction houses, but a wide majority of newer works, limited prints, and reproductions are sold on-line. One example is the Greenwich Workshop, an on-line art gallery which offers high quality and affordable art to just about anyone who desires quality work.
GreenwichWorkshop.com was first established in 1972 by David P. Usher, father of the present owner of the art gallery. Located in the suburb of Greenwich, Connecticut, within a storefront office, the art business pioneered an original idea of quality signed, limited edition prints. These prints were reproductions as high of quality as the original works of art-an entirely new concept of the time. Thirty-six years later, the business still promotes these early tradition of quality, innovation, and inspiration as they did in the beginning.
A major player in the Greenwich Workshop’s art gallery is June Carey, an upcoming artist whose philosophy is to paint where she wishes to be. Coming from the heart, her paintings at Greenwich Workshop bring to the world feelings of love and warmth she has put into her work since 1982 when she began painting full time. A gentle and kind association with places such as the northern wine country of California, her work is an asset to any art invester’s portfolio who loves landscape and work that reaches beyond the canvas. It is easy to see why so many people are buying the work of June Carey, who also has work in the American Visions Art Gallery, Inc., on-line art gallery. Not only are the art investors buying what they love-it is because she is painting what she loves. It is hard to go wrong there. Very few art investors are investing in a piece of artwork based on its monetary value alone, hoping to make some money. An aesthetic emotional connection is usually made, and that is worth more than money anytime.