Interview with Thomas Olbricht (Quicktime-Video)

Interview in Deutsch (Quicktime-Video)

The passion of the art collector

Collecting is a passion and -or- the compensation of a lack, like Sigmund Freud says. Which lack it is will be a sheltered secret of every collector. Except the coldish, calculated collector who always takes a side look to the art market and the upgrading of the possessed art work. There are collectors who really collect art as a pleasure of collecting and who are neutral to whether an art work is a financial investment. Their purchases are intuitive and some of the collectors make the collecting of art their purpose in life. But there are some more causes to buy art. According to Christina Karasek´s book: “Make artists? Aspects of the art-market.” there are six reasons:

1. financial interest

2. decorative needs

3. show a group membership

4. aesthetic experience

5. experience different views of life

6. art sponsorship

John Issacs. Thinking about it. 2002. Weiterlesen… »

Interview with Harald Falckenberg (Quicktime-Video)

The private collector

Collecting is a passion or according to Freud a compensational act – to be traced back to the detachment of a child from ist mother. And when the time of cuddly toys is over the grown up child can collect stamps or in the best case art. A private person collecting art, for which reason ever, has a big advantage over an institutional collector. The private collector can follow his intuition, trust his gut feeling. He doesn´t owe an explanation even if he decides to purchase subversive art: obscene, pornographic, violent – mind you - in an artistic context.

The collections of private art lovers are often more thrilling and versatile than the collections of some bank corporations or companies which certainly would not have discovered Jonathan Meese. Although courageous buyers are not always able to estimate quality, they are an extraordinary important part of the artmarket.

Keith Haring. Untitled (Nuclear Sex Series). 1981.

Harald Falckenberg, lawyer and private collector, lives in Hamburg. In his 6000 sqm exhibition space and warehouse there are genuine treasures of modern and postmodern art. Joseph Beuys, Keith Haring, Gerhard Richter, Nam June Paik, Martin Kippenberger, Jonathan Meese are just a selection of the artists whose art works are owned by Falckenberg. At 50 he started to collect and he is certainly not going to stop it anymore.

The infantil artist Weiterlesen… »