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Comment by _nedR | Hacker News Reader

Art is supposed to inspire our inner eye for beauty. Seeing the 450 million dollar price tag, i feel an unusual amount of anger, disgust, revulsion at the ostentatiousness, excesses and brazen corruption of the rich and of the fine art world. I feel more disgust at this than i would at the usual gaudy, blingy excesses (like gold-plated cars and mansions) of the tasteless wealthy. I suppose good art can also seek to inspire these feelings, even if the price tag has only cheapened the actual artwork in my eye. I wonder how the millions of the poor, nameless, talented artists around the world feel about this.

A portrait of Jesus Christ of questionable origin and authenticity being sold by a Russian fertilizer magnate for 450 million usd. Says quite a bit about the times we live in, Doesn't it?

edit: Sorry for my salty tirade; Just sharing a viewpoint.

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> Art is supposed to inspire our inner eye for beauty

These paintings were only painted because exceedingly wealthy families commissioned and collected them. If it were up to people like me and you, there'd be no art to inspire people in the first place.

> I wonder how the millions of the poor, nameless, talented artists around the world feel about this.

This community wouldn't exist if it weren't for the hierarchy of the art world.

> If it were up to people like me and you, there'd be no art to inspire people in the first place. Art would still exist but some master pieces wouldn't exist. I agree that patronage has allowed artist to produce magnificent art piece but is not the case for all masterpieces.

You only have to casually witness the art world - even just at a local level - to see that speculation by wealthy buyers sustains it, and also, that it costs a lot to produce art as a professional. So maybe without patronage some level of art would exist, but it wouldn't exist as a community without people ultimately paying a lot of money for work.

Furry porn producers would continue to make a mint though.

The fact that patronage can be good for the Arts is not in question but if you do a search for great artist that die in poverty and unrecognized during their lifetime you will find plenty of very famous name.

My rapid search brings me El Greco, Claude Monet, Johan Sebastian Bach, Franz Kafka, Johannes Vermeer, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Vincent Van Gogh from http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-now-famous-artists-died-ignomi... ; I think it wouldn't be fair to consider them minor artist.

Art co-exist with society for more that 17,000 years if you consider Lascaux. It doesn't make sense to reduce Art to profitable or bankable Art.

To produce Art can be expensive and can be cheap, without money you will not produce beautiful marble statue or Faberge eggs but Art doesn't do be expensive.

Keep in mind that much of the art you and I value exists because of these wealthy people. The middle-class doesn't want art. Even if it does, it can't afford to pay an artist the rates he commands.

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