Affairs of the Art: Love, loss and power in the art world

(Paperback)

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Description

The reputations of artists are curious things, influenced by factors beyond the quality of the work. Affairs of the Art explores the role those left behind play in burnishing an artist's reputation after he or she dies. Through interviews with those handling the estates of artists including Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley, John Brack, Howard Arkley, Bronwyn Oliver, George Baldessin and Albert Tucker, as well as a raft of art dealers, academics, curators and auctioneers, Strickland traverses the strange alleyways of the art market, where power resides with those who hold the best stock, and highlights the sometimes heart-wrenching way emotion and duty intersect in the making of decisions by those left behind.

Reviews

"A lively and spirited book, accessible in its language, and generally based sound on scholarship. It is a provocative book that engages with a number of very sensitive and controversial issues and it is gratifying to remember that Strickland's first qualification was an honors degree in law." --Sasha Grishin, Canberra Times

Author Bio

Katrina Strickland has been writing about the arts for fifteen years, for six as arts editor of the Australian Financial Review, she is now deputy editor of AFR Magazine. Prior to that she worked at The Australian for eleven years, filling various roles including arts editor, deputy arts editor, national arts writer and marketing writer. She is a former World Press Institute fellow and joint winner of the 2010 Trawalla Foundation Arts Journalism Scholarship. She lives in Sydney.