Kobel's
Art Weekly

Kobel's Art Weekly 47 2025

Paris Photo at the Grand Palais seems to be making the same mistake as the big corporate fairs, according to Emil J. Sennewald in the Handelsblatt: "The “Emergence” section, once again housed in the galleries surrounding the Grand Palais, also seems distant. Perhaps the lavish VIP lounge should be moved out of the Hall of Honour to make room for the youngest artists. Because that's what galleries and fair management are focusing on: “We are in the midst of a real generational change,” emphasises Anna Planas. In galleries, institutions, among artists and in the public, a new generation is emerging for whom photography has broken free from its attachment to the representation paradigm in the digital transformations that have become part of everyday life. “Photos no longer have to depict,” says the curator, “they are becoming more important as material and objects.”" Freddy Langer looks at the major developments in the medium during his tour of the fair for the FAZ: "There are cracks appearing in several areas of the photography market. Since the question of the durability of colour prints has been hanging like a sword of Damocles not only over the works of Becher's students – hardly any of whom are represented at this fair – the concept of “longevity” is also gaining ground in the photography scene. [...] But the digital sector is at the forefront. Screen versus paper will be one of the questions of the future, without even considering durability. Photographic art is on its way to merging with the electronic world. The possibilities are endless."

Paper Positions is a meaningful addition to Vienna's (already overcrowded) art fair calendar, according to Werner Remm at Artmagazine: ‘Paper Positions is a truly successful conclusion to Vienna's exhibition calendar, and we can hope that the trial balloon of an art fair for paper, launched last year, will take a permanent place among the art fairs in the federal capital in the future.’ Regine Müller provides a reason for this impression in the Tagesspiegel: "19 galleries are from Austria, 14 from Germany. With a total of 50 per cent international galleries, Paper Positions is significantly more international than the other sales exhibitions that take place in the Austrian capital throughout the year, after the two Viennese contemporary art fairs, Viennacontemporary and Spark Art Fair." Even the ORF television news considers the event worthy of a report.

Sabine Spindler takes a look at the offerings of Germany's most prestigious charity auction for the Handelsblatt: "It's not hard to guess who the favourite is at this year's PIN auction, which will take place for the 23rd time on 15 November to finance projects at the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich and the Museum Brandhorst and to support acquisitions. A small pink bear is currently causing a stir at the auction preview in Munich's Pinakothek der Moderne. Entitled ‘I am jetlagged’, the allusive figure from Paola Pivi's celebrated bear series reclines on the floor, half weary, half youthfully cheeky. With an estimated value of €46,000, it has been made available by the Parisian gallery Perrotin, commemorating the most successful Pinakothek exhibition in 2025.

In the FAZ, Ursula Scheer considers a golden toilet bowl, the eye-catcher of the upcoming New York auctions, to be a fitting symbol of the current situation: "As part of the opening auctions for the autumn high season, the toilet is to be offered at the material value of the day, i.e. around ten million dollars. The successful bidder can also pay with cryptocurrency, which is likely to attract the nouveaux riches from the blockchain world [...] So there is sure to be a stir at Sotheby's first “Marquee Auction Season” in the Breuer building, during which the auction house is pulling out all the stops to take advantage of the upturn in the art auction market, which was in the doldrums in 2024. The auction house aims to raise between $863.6 million and $1.18 billion from 18 to 21 November in a total of nine live auctions of modern and contemporary art, significantly more than last year. Sarah Douglas from Artnews has taken a detailed look at the rest of the New York auctions on offer

The new owner of Artnet and Artsy, Andrew E. Wolff, gives an insight into his plans in an interview with the Observer: "Young, aspiring collectors—those that are so vital to a healthy and growing market—want to be part of a permissionless network. They want to discover art and transact in an open and transparent marketplace. These themes align well with what we are doing at Beowolff Capital through Artnet and Artsy. We want to give collectors the power to participate in social networks in order to discover what art they like, what it means to them, how to value it and how to enjoy it with others. And we are providing our business partners with the software operating system that will enable their clients to do so in a safe and transparent ecosystem." So far, so reasonable and positive. But then things get wild: ‘Technology is inherently disruptive. When used as a force for good, it can be a catalyst for democratisation. It can equalise access to goods and services. It can connect people and drive globalisation. It can liberate buyers and sellers from transactional friction and illiquidity. It can educate by giving everyone access to the same data and the tools to interpret it and generate insights and opinions. It can create new media for human expression and metaphor.’ It sounds as if the dot-com boom at the turn of the millennium, the discussion about Web 2.0, the NFT hype and the enshittification https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification of the internet never happened. And then come phrases straight out of the AI industry's bullshit bingo: ‘We're creating a symbiotic commercial ecosystem, starting with Artsy and Artnet, which creates a new kind of intelligence for the art market, one in which insights and transactions reinforce each other and increase the velocity and power of both. We are supercharging our complementary, industry-leading businesses with shared AI tools that deliver next-generation products and better serve collectors, galleries, and artists alike.’

Masterworks offers shares in artworks starting at £14, making it something of an art fund for everyone. However, as with many art investment offers, not everything that glitters in the company's online brochures may be gold, as Zachary Small researched for the New York Times: "In just eight years, it has become one of the art market's biggest buyers. Its collection of 500 artworks is now valued at more than £1 billion and its platform has drawn 70,000 investors. ‘No art investing experience? No problem,’ the company's website has advertised. [...] Some art market experts, though, suggest that the company can be too optimistic in its marketing of artworks, a practice that understates the potential to lose money, especially for art market rookies. [...] Until recently, the company's website had claimed that nearly a million investors ‘were building a better portfolio with us.’ Actually, the number reflected not investors, but people who had registered on the Masterworks website and were perhaps thinking of investing. When asked about it, the company replaced the term investors with ‘users,’ one of several instances when the company adjusted language after a New York Times inquiry. The flowery return forecasts of almost all providers of art funds and fractionalised shares in works of art usually have little to do with reality, and the business models often have a limited life expectancy. If the number of employees stated by Masterworks, 230, is close to the truth, the company alone would have to have annual personnel costs of at least in the mid double-digit million range. With an inventory valuation of one billion dollars, which the author also considers debatable, it would be difficult to generate a reasonable return for shareholders.

In Berlin, the CDU appears to be doing CDU things and merrily clinging to its old ways. Robert Kiesel set the ball rolling in the Tagesspiegel: "Berlin's former Senator for Culture, Joe Chialo (CDU), is alleged to have awarded several million euros to projects against anti-Semitism under pressure from leading CDU faction members. This is what Green Party MPs accuse Chialo of after inspecting the files. The funds are said to have been released by Chialo himself at the end of February.‘ In the taz, Hanno Fleckenstein, Erik Peter and Anselm Mathieu added: ’Other funded projects, on the other hand, are not yet known even to experts. A closer look reveals a remarkable clique: some individuals, names and projects appear multiple times. In addition, some recipients give the impression of being letterbox companies – not to mention their presumed lack of competence in the field of combating anti-Semitism." Daniel Böldt, Christian Latz and Anna Thewaldt made some hair-raising discoveries during their research for the Tagesspiegel on the recipients of the funding. Robert Kiesel gives the floor to rejected candidates from a jury responsible for project selection in the Tagesspiegel. Bernhard Schulz comments on the Senate's reaction in Monopol, shaking his head: "If it was meant literally, this is surprising insofar as rules for the allocation of public funds have always existed and do not need to be newly coined in the cultural sector. But of course, in the aftermath, smoke screens are apparently being set off, and Wedl-Wilson, who is very familiar with cultural funding from her biography, is proving herself to be fully up to speed with politics." The whole thing is reminiscent of infrastructure projects in Sicily in the second half of the 20th century.

Oh yes: the huge Anselm Kiefer behind Friedrich Merz's desk in the Chancellery is hanging there thanks to Walter Smerling, explains Niklas Maak in the FAZ (paywall): "Unfortunately, Smerling laments, sponsors have been unsettled by the negative and inaccurate preliminary reporting in the press, and some have even pulled out. As a result, the Bonn-based foundation's presence in Berlin will initially be limited to a winter scene in the Chancellery.‘

Actually, after the first two sentences of this dpa news, there is no need to read any further: ’The painter Gerhard Richter (93) remains at the top of the “Kunstkompass” ranking as the world's most important artist. The Cologne-based painter has held the top position unchallenged for 22 years now.‘ But in the next sentence, the Handelsblatt shows what state-of-the-art high-performance journalism is capable of: ’“It seems inconceivable at present that any artist will ever catch up with Gerhard Richter at the top of the Kunstkompass ranking,” says journalist Linde Rohr-Bongard, who compiles the ranking." And links part of the name of the creator of the ranking with the share price of the industrial gas manufacturer, which happens to have the same name.

According to Artnews, Hauser & Wirth is in trouble with the British tax authorities over the sale of a work by George Condo to Russians: 'According to proceedings at Westminster Magistrates Court, the gallery, together with Marylebone-based art shipping company Artay Rauchwerger Solomons, are accused of making the 2021 work titled Escape from Humanity available to Alexander Popov. [...] Court documents allege that Hauser & Wirth made the artwork available to Popov between April 2022 and December 2022. The UK government made it illegal to provide luxury goods, including jewellery, art, cars, and antiques valued over £250 ($330), to individuals connected to Russia in March 2022, when it announced a ban on exports of high-end goods."

The Cologne gallery Philipp von Rosen has closed down, I report at Artmagazine.