It gets even crazier — there are people literally buying new paintings at higher prices to inflate the value of existing holdings. So let’s say you buy 3 Vassarely’s @ $200k each (or insert semi-hot artist here). You wait 4 years and have someone else buy a 4th Vassarely piece for 3x that price point. Now you use the inflated value for that single piece as a comp for the other 3 pieces that will then be donated. Art market reps basically find ways to facilitate these types of things.

This is why you always see wings of museums named after rich folks.