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There is a reason why the art 'space' is divisive and why money distorts many things.

In Episode #504 of 'Meanderings', Juan & I discuss: the book by Magnus Resch titled '100 Secrets of the Art World', tight‑knit gatekeeping at the high end of the market, how control of information shape what gets seen and sold (often more than artistic merit), parallels to other status markets such as watches/supercars, why 'better' often defaults to 'more expensive', where marketing can overshadow craft yet many collectors still buy for love and to support artists and why the truest encounters with art might still be found in small local galleries rather than at Art Basel.

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Timeline:
(00:00:00) Intro
(00:01:52) Defining the 'art space'
(00:03:38) First impressions: elitism, provenance and pretence
(00:09:04) Gatekeeping: cabals, galleries and New York
(00:12:06) Parallels with cars/watches: scarcity and status
(00:15:27) Art Basel anecdote: committees, control and quiet coups
(00:20:02) NFTs, provenance on-chain and collectibles vs art
(00:22:22) Popularity: storytelling, marketing and money
(00:27:38) Quality heuristics: effort, complexity and the 22blue painting22 problem
(00:32:38) Boostagram Lounge
(00:34:00) Misconceptions across niches: calisthenics, hand balancing, circus
(00:39:03) On labels and assumptions: steroids, fitness and nuance
(00:44:04) Finding the essence: local galleries, pure enjoyment
(00:48:06) Would creation persist without cash?
(00:53:56) Purity at the base, distortion at the peak
(00:55:27) Housekeeping and support links; live chat banter 

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[00:00:05] Kyrin Down:

Welcome everyone to another episode of the mere mortals meanderings. We're live here on Sunday December 7. It's 9AM in the morning. You've got Kyrin here. Juan on the outside. And today we're talking all about secrets.   We're divulging the secrets   of the art world. I can't tell anyone. So I've got one hundred secondrets of the art world, everything you always wanted to know about the arts, but we're afraid to ask. That is in fact, very untrue.   There is not that much to actually know from this book.   And I certainly wouldn't be afraid of asking this. I feel like much of it has already been told. But   that's a little primer for you there. I've  

[00:00:44] Juan Granados:

this book I read I read quickly through it. I skimmed through it for the last maybe three or four minutes. Yeah. And I'll even get you to read out or or I'll read out some of the things in it. So I would have probably read four pages and gone,   okay. I'm done. I don't think I would have read that. Yeah. Okay. Cartagio. Yeah. And I I think that's a fair enough, You like one of those words.   My impression is a book where you might pick it up, open it to a page, read it, go, ah, cool. Whatever. Mhmm. Put it back down. Yep. Sure. Yeah. It, a table what is it like a table book? Cool. Yeah. Coffee table book. Something that's there. You maybe read one thing. It's kinda like you pick it up, you just open it to a random page, view it, put it back down. Don't don't read it like a normal book. Now just to preface this conversation, because there's a couple of things  

[00:01:28] Kyrin Down:

I wanted to not talk about in this.   So if I just go to topic for next week will be about what I've learned from the art world plus a book of the mini secrets.   And   I want to talk about the art space.   Yep. Not art itself rather than art itself, or rather than the economics of art, because those are both things that I'm actually more interested in. But the art space   is   a I don't know. There's a couple of couple of thoughts have been run through my head of that. And this book   highlighted it well. So just a primer for you one, if you had to think about the art space in general. So this is just like the collective   artistic world. What would you what are some initial impressions that you have of it?  



[00:02:17] Juan Granados:

I would say it's very tight knit at the top. Like it's very, very tight knit in terms of who   makes the moves and the conversations.   I would say that's a space that's much more about   social,   you know, social acceptance as it is to the objective acceptance of the art in itself.   Providence like huge providence,   particulars, I guess the art scene. So if you are in the IT crowd or in the IT group, then for sure the providence will provide you well, if you're not, then you're stuffed.   Bit of an elitist. Pretentious. That's the way I'm looking at it. A bit elitist, pretentious, I guess. A little bit of all that sort of mixed into one. And here and   are you talking art world though? In all that that I was saying I'm thinking   real life paintings because   I don't know if that applies so directly to digital  

[00:03:12] Kyrin Down:

art art art. Including digital art sculptures and   performance   art.  

[00:03:19] Juan Granados:

Okay. Yeah. All all of that. Yeah. And  

[00:03:22] Kyrin Down:

probably drawing more of the line at like, okay,   probably not dance, even though you can kind of consider that an art form,   or circus   artistic  

[00:03:33] Juan Granados:

but yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Thinking more of a bit a bit of pretentiousness for sure. Yeah, yeah. So  

[00:03:42] Kyrin Down:

there's a weird thing that happens when people talk about   spaces.   I find it a strange word to use, like, it's the art space. And   I guess, like,   I've been trying to learn more about the economics of art in terms of as an investment.   And then also as a,   I guess, like a cultural thing or something that I can indulge in. And it's been a little bit fiftyfifty on my part. I'm going to leave kind of both of those for another episode, because   I'm actually reading a book   by the author of this and I should highlight this a little bit more Magnus Resch,   who is more like an economics.  

Well, his backstory was he got into the artistic world to I think it was actually to help pay   some like university loans or something like that.   Become a became a gallerist. So person who, like a middle grade, you want to call it? Yep. So artists,   buyers, and then he's the person who kind of connects them with his gallery.   And he was doing that for a while really struggled with it and was like, how do you actually make money in this world for not only as an artist, not as a gallerist, but also as a collector. And so then he got into the actual like data economics, hard,   more tangible things rather than the   very subjective, like, do I enjoy this piece of art? Or   what does this represent?  

So yeah, leaving those two aside, and talking about the,   that world in general. And   so this book, one hundred secondrets of the art world, I think, encapsulates   a lot of what this world is about. So you know, it's by artists by museums, auction houses, art fairs, art institutions,   biennials, I don't even know what that means. Art media gatherings.   Okay. Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Yep. And by curators, gallerists and collectors. So there's a whole bunch of names here, which probably means something to many people. The only one I really know is Larry Gagosian. I've heard of him before. And then a bunch of these art Tate Modern Museum of Modern Art, etcetera.   Met. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Correct. But have you heard of Zaha Hadid before one? I feel like I have. Klaus,  

[00:06:00] Juan Granados:

Bisonbach? This that the Zaha was like, that's the only name actually that I was like, oh, this seems familiar in some way. But the rest of the names I was like, okay, no, absolutely.  

[00:06:09] Kyrin Down:

So so this book essentially was like, I think he messaged all these types of people and was like, Hey, what are some secrets of the   art world?   And   I guess this could be   an encapsulation   this book of   the art world or art space in general.   And I think maybe we'll focus that on the first part of this. And then afterwards, I can draw some comparisons to like other spaces or worlds because   I've   had a couple of experiences the last couple of days, which actually highlighted that. So you know, there's a whole bunch of   things in here.  

I'll read out one here from Josh Baer and the book itself is artistic in nature, like the the way it's set out, the typography,   is meant to be artistic as well. So   jumping to a random page here,   by Carter Cleveland, founder and CEO of Arts in New York. The biggest kept secret is ironically something Joseph Beuys said in plain stride, in plain sight. Everyone is an artist.   So you get a lot of like   vague vagueness with some of these things.   Here's another one more live off failure than off success.   What else do we have?   My brain retains faces, numbers, logins, passwords, but not visual images. ODA   And sorry, odd.  



[00:07:38] Juan Granados:

This is where the pretentiousness kind of came in a bit. And I'm Yeah, if I read that, like, separated from the art, if I'm just reading a random book, and I'm seeing some of this, it feels to me it's like latitudes without depth, right? Where it's,   it's fine if it's said by the original creator of the whatever sentence, like, you know, when you hear like a Marcus Aurelius or something like that?   Yeah, it's like, Oh,   I understand it.   When it comes from the original, but then when it's repeated by somebody else without any extra depth, it'll be like,   that's what it gives you a vibe of if someone like repeating something with no extra depth, no extra clarity.  

Yeah.  

[00:08:18] Kyrin Down:

Yeah. The biggest secret in the art world is that no one knows what's contemporary art.   Yeah, essentially,   things like that.   So there's a lot of   shallowness in this in which is like,   unless perhaps you really know the backstory of Adrian Chang, Hong Kong collector and director of K11 Art Foundation,   you're not going to really know. You can now find all the art world secrets on Instagram encoded in hashtags.   So   things like that.   Super unhelpful. There was probably like three things in here where I was like, Oh, that's actually an interesting insight. And typically, it was a longer passage where it was like, Hey, this is something that someone who is not from this world would would not   perhaps know. And so,   yeah,   one person was talking about the kind of,   I don't think they use the word incestuous nature, but certainly the   very interconnected   like there is some cabal   like behavior, particularly at the very top of the art world.  

And   if you go into some of Magnus's Resh's other works, he really talks about how the   the the art scene,   at least the economics of it is dominated by New York, if you want, like,   high prices   of sales and things like that, unless you're connected to like,   four galleries like things  

[00:09:46] Juan Granados:

in the artwork.   Well, it's not provenance. Provenance is proving where it actually came from. But but part true but part of the proving where it came from, I think maybe as a social status of like, yeah, if the, if the well known slash the connected,   places from an art space   and more so like physical stuff is where they go, oh yeah, those where you buy like your really, really expensive stuff,   then you're shit out of luck if you try to do it from another area altogether because you just don't have the connections and everything else. But I guess what I'm saying it to,   yeah, maybe not exactly just provenance. It'll be like the social connection that comes along with it, which I   honestly if it was like   the real secrets of the art world, that's what I wanted to see. So like I would have expected to see a line in there and being like, if you yeah, you have to be in these four whatever, you know, these six people. Yep. Otherwise, you're you're not making it. Yep. Yep. Pretty much. Yeah. And  

[00:10:44] Kyrin Down:

I think that's the   that's like the little gem that I got from this book, which was,   yes, there is a   there's a way to kind of   finesse your way if   you any one of those kind of like three main points, either the artist, the middleman or the collector   of finessing your way into   whatever it is that you want, whether it be access to   better pieces, because   I   haven't experienced this myself.   I would kind of like to try and see what it feels like. But apparently, you can go into many places and be like, Hey, I want to buy this piece of art, but they will not let you buy it. It's, you  

[00:11:30] Juan Granados:

know, price on the wall, you could get it. Well, you assume like, oh, this is for sale, right? Wrong. That's not that's not what's actually going on here. But again, but I guess the interesting thing for me, and if someone's listening to this and knows about art, so that that happens in cars, that happens in watches, that happens all over the place as well in terms of Okay, is it? Rolex, can you explain more about that? Paramount Peugeot,   Paganis, Bugattis,   forget it, you ain't buying it. Like you can go into a store and you can say, I would like to buy this and you'd like to buy that. And they go, Thank you very much, sir. You're not purchasing this. And again, the way to do it is that, oh, it's a bit secret if it makes it hard to get, it's what then ramps up the price of it. So Rolex is probably the most   well known slash easily enterable to the market, right? Because you can get watches there from $8 to $40 to $80.  

You cannot go into a Rolex store to buy it. Of course, they've got it out the back, like they can just pick it up. But the allure   of it is that they wanna oop, we gotta give you a couple of months. We need to make sure that you got it all dialed in. And so the the finessing of that game is they finesse you as a customer by making it a little bit harder to obtain. I was gonna go and buy an Omega watch just the other day. Right? And those are not super expensive.   They cost money. Could have bought it on the spot. I actually decided not to, if you wanna know the reasons, because I was like, to my wife, I was like, okay, I'm not going to take off my Apple Watch to wear these things like, I'm not going to wear it anywhere. So like So why haven't you? What's the point? I was like, what's the point of getting it? Like, I'm not a collector of watches.   But   in that industry, in that space, Audemat Peugeot as well, same thing. You know, you ain't getting it unless you talk to the right person and you go and see this. Or, in the case of a Porsche, like some of the higher end Porsches, you need to own four or five Porsches before you can actually go and get the top one. Same thing with Ferrari. But again, it's the it's the name, the illustrious thing behind it before you can even get it. That's also to do with retail factor. And I think in the art world, it might play out. But I have no clue about that in that they don't want to sell a car that's quite a lot of money to someone who will then flip it around really quickly because it devalues the name of the product. They would basically want to be like, no, we're not, they actually go in car spaces. We are not going to buy, sell you another hypercar no matter how much money you give us because if you resell it, it's gonna make our brand look bad. So, I don't know if in the art world they do that. Yeah. That that probably strikes true a little bit. Yeah. There's,   Like, if something gets passed on hands quite quickly a lot, it kind of devalues in and itself. But if it's like, oh, it's been held at the Met   for twenty years and whatever. Sure.  

Yeah. It's more value. So I I see that that,   that that happens in in other industries, maybe like adjacent to art as well in in the fact that it was like, they won't let you just pay for it even though the it's readily available. So there's aspects to that, I guess. Yeah. Yep. Yeah, I think that's really good point.  

[00:14:17] Kyrin Down:

A couple of other ones here. And this one I actually take more seriously because it's actually the former director of the Tate Modern. I feel if someone's like not still got skin in the game, they can they can open up the taps. Yeah. So he's like, until recently, the art world lift off lived off of secrets such was first and foremost a matter of control of information. Whoever controlled the information   was kind of in power with the advent of so many different players,   both,   dilettante,   dilettante   and professional   and not least social media. That era is now well over. There are almost no secrets left or better. They are shared in a second. What stays is the desire to control and the hunger for power, whether symbolically or financially,   I feel that probably describes like a nice chunk of the   art space.  

Which is Yeah, when you get into these   positions of, of   authority,   there is this   it is a power game. I think one of the people in this book had a pretty interesting story where he was like, I took over.   It was the Art Basel   director,   or one of the guys who did that.   And he was saying, like,   when I first joined,   I was given like, control of the direction of Art Basel, where's that going to go? How are we going to organize our events and things things like that. But there was this kind of like,   committee which oversaw it and he was wanting to take it in this kind of, you know, new   direction,   bit more off the wall, perhaps more locations, things like this. And this committee was like, No, no, no, you can't do that.  

And the   overall owner of   the art buzz, so his employer who also employed the committee was too scared to like, disband them or put his and, and like,   say no, no, this is the new guy. He's in charge, and you have to follow what he says. So the guy was like, Alright, well, basically what I had to do was like, when all the committee members were on holidays, when my boss was on holiday,   I drafted a whole bunch of things, effectively dismissing the committee gave it all to his boss's   deputy.   And this dude just like signed all of it. And then they all came back from holiday and found out they'd been fired, essentially.   So I was like, Okay, well, alright, this is the, this is the kind of things you don't really hear about the art world where it's like the   you, you think it's like, oh, okay, we're about exposing, you know, more. And this is from a gallery's perspective, you know, we we want like representatives   of different types of art and, you know, underserved communities or African American art hasn't been, you know, or African art hasn't been shown widely.  

But then there's all of these fucking other games, which are just like,   ridiculous.   Power control   sort of things going on. So I, alright, that's, that's a bit, that's a bit strange.   Another one here, who was,   in Ingvild Goertz,   I'm truly concerned where whenever famous artists are revered   to such an extent that an encounter with their works is devoid of critical opinion. Sadly, time and again, that is the case within the art world, which is also getting to I think a point where it's, you know, if you hear Picasso,   it could have been one of his like,   drunken   hazy shit as pieces of works.  

But it's if it's Picasso, it's like, dang, it's elevated. It's amazing.   Jump into it. So   yeah, there's, there's,   quite a few things in here. The funniest one I saw was this artist who   they basically were just like the biggest kept secret in the art world is like   everyone's a phony   Or like, there's so many like grifters and phonies, including   most of the people or like many of the people in this very book or something.   Damn, that's, that's a that's a bold one to,  

[00:18:13] Juan Granados:

to put into to write. I just think again, we're like, I don't know if the outright sort of brought it into a book, but   I would tend to agree in that   I feel like you read all these quotes and you have the conversations at a gallery, I would assume, and people are talking about   the artist   or what's being created on the painting and then illustrates this.   I do wonder if the phoniness   is that   underneath those layers,   there are, I'm sure, a few percentage that subjectively   do care about   the,   sorry, objectively do care about the art. They do think it is beautiful. It does express to them certain things and for that they value it.   But probably the hidden secret in that space   is that the real value is a subjective money. It's a subjective power. It's a subjective control. It's the manipulation   is the or if I've got this and I am viewed as a greater whatever.  

I almost got   someone debate me if I'm if I'm wrong on that from an art perspective, but I reckon the point in this is that if you really dug down and got the reality, most of them would actually say, oh, yeah, it's all about that. Like, it's so few and far between in relation to your images. I know this personally when it comes to our NFTs, right, from an artistic perspective. There's not a single one I own that I go, wow, that's beautiful and creates that. Shut the fuck up. Like, they're all just fucking investments. This is money. Like, it's to do with attention. It's to do with the security. It's to do with, well, it goes up if the attention and the eyeballs goes up and then monetarily it invests better or you're seen as like, oh, we held   a vFront Series one from the very beginning for mint. Oh, that's kind of cool. Right? Fucking the images and what you can objectively all you want. It's just like, it's simple. It's very easy. It's there's no crazy behind it.  



[00:20:03] Kyrin Down:

And there is a difference between what you're just describing and what I would say is   like the art space, what you were describing is tangential in that it's, it's like the medium for   the   artistic world in a certain sense. So you can have digital art. And if you're doing that via   NFT. So it solves the kind of provenance   problem, which is like, who actually owns this piece of digital art, anyone can have it in their house, but one person owns it   as like a stamp on the on the blockchain.   You can also do many other things with that ticketing,   you can do, you know, collecting, which is more what you're you're talking about with Gary Vee's VeeFriends.  

Yeah. I don't think he's ever claimed them to be art.   These are collectibles  

[00:20:54] Juan Granados:

in his mind. Yeah. I guess I can feel like, from the angle as well from like the indie art that I at least know or have seen.   I have a couple of art pieces around the house up on the walls. They are   cheap,   easy to acquire,   non like one of ones, they're prints essentially.   But then I've got a couple that are my daughter's drawings and they are   meaningless value for anybody else besides us.   And then there's like that is a very objective, like that is a value. It's the fact that it's done by my daughter, not anything else and no one else will value it for any other reason. I know personally people who've got art in their house that are,   I don't even know the names per se of the artists, but they are like very highly lauded pieces of work and they've got a lot of money.  

Some of them, basically, one I'm thinking in my mind, I'm like, I say, but he purchased them purely because if he purchased them, no one else has them because they're one on ones and they have physical things on the wall. And it's, it's the power. It's the, I control it. And he's got art group or not art group, but he's like   a like a Goomer or something like that, but Goi. And to this person to say, Hey, can we get this piece for them? And he has power in saying, No. Like, it's mine. Gotcha. Right. Does that is that value, you know, that in that again, I'm not talking about the value separately, but the art space is like I think   there's a lot of that boniness where it's actually that's the governing factor of that makes something a good piece   versus a art in itself.  



[00:22:23] Kyrin Down:

Yeah. So the   it I view the dynamics much as you would something like podcasting, which is   the   Joe Rogan episode,   Chris Williamson,   a mid tier and then, you know, probably us closer down to the bottom.   What is   the more objective   way of determining is this a really good episode?   There's certain things you can do where there's like, alright, the, you know, having a basic audio quality of some of some form   of the   perhaps   less   ums and ers   or randomness   or   if someone's drunk, and they're just   blabbering off some random shit, the topic   that is being talked about, you know, that   you can use some like, little objective metrics,   I would say, or   even that's kind of subjective in a way. But then what what makes   it really   popular in a certain sense, is a lot of things outside of it. It's the social media, it's the storytelling, it's the, you know, this guy has been doing it, Joe Rogan, they've been doing it for, you know, before it was popular, and   just pulled out so many episodes and got on enough interesting guests worked on the product as well, then it became very popular.  

So I kind of view that in the art world. And the same is like, there's no one particular, you can look at a piece on a wall. And   if you had everyone in the world evaluate it,   you can say, Yeah, it was good or bad.   And,   you know, it probably be 5,050   in any given sense.   But then it's the whole story behind of it. And   this is one thing I've noticed,   diving into, I suppose, and this is   getting now into the   digital art space. So like the niche of a niche, I guess,   which is,   there's just so much out there, there is no possible way that you can go through all of it. So how do you determine   to taste and what is good or not?  

When you're   watching sports, for example,   it's a little bit easier in a sense, because it's   alright,   these teams are   better than these other teams, and you can see it in the score.   And I guess like the score   for the art world has to just be money in terms of this piece is more highly valued. So therefore,  

[00:24:50] Juan Granados:

it's, it's better. It's better. Yeah.  

[00:24:53] Kyrin Down:

Which is a bit trickier, because then,   you know, someone could have   what is viewed as like,   you know, they put in an insane amount of time,   it is technically very difficult. They're the only one in the world who can create this particular like style of art or this particular   way of creating it.   But if they haven't just got the social media, right, if they haven't got like the marketing aspect,   they're they're irrelevant   and no unknown. I've been listening to a podcast called verse.   I think it's called verse talks. Let me bring it up. They changed the name of it midway through. So   I can't remember exactly   what it's called. Yeah, it's called verse talks. Now it used to be labeled something else. And   it's   a gallery, I guess you'd call it or a curators   of   digital art. So NFTs.  

And these people have been around for a while there's a couple of different   people in that.   There was this one dude who   I think was the epitome of jackass is how I would describe him. Okay. And   every   thing he talked about was either a complaint,   or you know how people sigh sometimes before they start talking.   And then it was like that the whole time every single time it was so hard to listen to him. Which is unfortunate because the other people I found really interesting and insightful and thoughtful. Yeah, okay.  

[00:26:24] Juan Granados:

So one person can make a big change on that. Yeah. Yeah.  

[00:26:28] Kyrin Down:

And I would describe   listening to all I probably listened to   10 to 20 episodes of their podcast now.   And I would say that   about half the time they would be talking about   market,   the and these were the ones who were really using the word space, the NFT space, the digital art space.   Half of the time, they were talking about the   kind of bullshit that you can use to see in this book, which is   the the games,   the   oh, this person's   on only popular because he's   already popular in a sense, and no one is really evaluating   their art on an artistic merit.  

You know, Beeple is a good example where they they're you get very conflicting views on like, is it actually art or is he just being a troll?  

[00:27:26] Juan Granados:

The artistic merit piece,   like, we not not that we know anything really in detail of it, but if I was to put quality to it, I'd go,   how complex is it?   How much effort was put into putting a particular detail? Sometimes I see   reels of, you know, an artist that does really fine drawing with pencil. And then when you step back, it's like this crazy hyper realistic looking thing.   That to me, I'd go, wow. There's a there's a lot of quality and complexity and skill and effort that goes into making   that.   And I would value that. That would be really valuable versus   the typical blue painting. Yeah. Just purely blue with a white line and it's worth a ridiculous amount of money. Again, when I do that, I go, maybe there is complexity in there of some kind I don't understand. But for the most part, it doesn't seem as complex   as this or as much of effort. And so   art from   a how I would see it from a quality perspective   is that but I wouldn't lie in saying that part of the story   of either the artists or the art piece would change dramatically what I think about it. So it could be   mediocre.  

But if you find out that it was a   14 year old girl that drew this painting in the middle of a war and they did it with spare bits that they had to create it. Okay. Obviously,   influences behind with the story, but I would say it still sticks to the art piece in itself.   But I just, I doubt that that is the majority. I doubt that's even beyond 5% of what's happening in the majority of the art space   and the art space. Again, getting back to the phoniness, it's just on how do we exploit, control, use the power, manage, whatever, so that it influences and that can be retain more money, to attain more control, to have more people go through the gallery, whatever.   That still seems like it would be the Trump thing that it would do.  

To give you an example, I've been thinking of swapping around the podcast setup that we have here, where,   you can't see it on the camera right now, but the couch would be on the opposite side against that wall. Okay. And this table here that we've got in front of us that has our lights and cameras would be here in the middle, actually, which is not sort of placing. Right? But it actually makes it so that the background is is white wall and we've got all the light because we currently have sort of a left facing light coming through for us. Okay. And it would just make it a little bit different in terms of its light proposition. But the one thing I've wanted and I've looked at this in the past on and off a lot of times is an art piece. In fact, so Karin can probably see it, an art piece right there. So it would be sort of behind us. Sure. If you're seeing this podcast right now, there would be an art piece behind us. So it would be like  

[00:29:59] Kyrin Down:

three meters by?  

[00:30:01] Juan Granados:

Like any RPs would probably be three meters wide, a meter long. I would want it to be three meters wide and a meter tall and basically in size.   For me, if I was looking for something like that, again, my value would be okay, something meaningful,   something quite fun. I would say I've looked at getting an art piece done or in particular,   but it's hard to want to I almost want to just find something as opposed to ordering something to be made. Right? And so to me, I go, okay, that's because it's personable. I don't care. That's gonna be resolved. It's not for anybody else.   But I think that that is the I don't see that as being the   general way that people approach art in the art space. Yeah, yeah. The  

[00:30:43] Kyrin Down:

tricky. That's, that's a tricky one. Because I would say neither of us are particularly involved in it. I'm taking some burgeoning steps into it starting to go to some real life galleries. I've been buying digital art for the last year or two.   So   I   I wouldn't 100%   agree with that statement in that, because there are certainly many people.   The other half of the podcast, the more positive aspect of it is where I would say, Yeah, they're not talking about the money side of things. They're not talking about   the,   you know, debating whether   an artist doing this many pieces and releasing in this manner is better than this one or whether gallery   owners can buy their own art that they're selling   because, you know, conflict of interest or like they're trying to trying to hype up their own pieces or   that they're selling or things like this.  

The other aspect is more of them talking,   Okay, you know, I bought this stuff because   I   want to help support this artist. I, you know, I commissioned this one, because I really enjoy what they create. And I wanted something   for myself   from them.   And   so there's there's plenty of things like that, where I go, alright, there's   a lot of merit to this as well, which is, you know, they'll talk about things like   one of the most, if not the most important factor you should consider when buying a piece of art is how does it actually make you feel? Do you enjoy it? What's does it give you a like a strong   reaction to it? If it's bland, if you see something and you're like, it doesn't make you feel anything,   then that's probably a sign that it you shouldn't   acquire it or own it. And if you're doing it purely for financial purposes,   there's,   you know, it's risky, it's risky.  

So yeah, I think we'll leave it there for the moment, Do the Bootstrap Lounge and then I'll talk a little bit about some   how would I describe it?   Being involved in other spaces and misconceptions that people can have about it because we're probably making a whole bunch of misconceptions. Probably, probably.  

[00:32:56] Juan Granados:

Boost commands we have new boosts come through. No boosts, let me double check.  

[00:33:02] Kyrin Down:

Also I forgot to put this on for last week so. Let me confirm.   Maybe one can do a make good and   put it on put it on just check fountain as well once you're doing that now. Yeah, I'm jumping on onto fountain now. So for those who don't know,   this is the section where we nothing that I can see extra say to everyone, thank you much appreciation for helping to   support the podcast.   And you can do this in many different ways. But financially speaking, you can either go to the stand store link that one has got up and I don't know, you can purchase something from one from there I believe. Yeah, you can send us in a PayPal or you can jump onto a podcasting app like fountain and support us directly   within the app. Didn't see any coming through this week. So  

[00:33:50] Juan Granados:

it's all stream stream came through streaming has come through but no, no direct   boosts.  

[00:33:56] Kyrin Down:

Chuck's off beanie not coming on for me. There's a way   so a couple of people have come up to me in the gym recently and   typically,   they they say like,   Oh, man,   you must do like calisthenics, right? Because they'll see me doing handstands. Sure.   And I think this is where I could say, you know, there's,   I'm in   the calisthenics   space or I'm in the   handstand space or perhaps a circus space because   I hang around with, you know, people who do those sorts of things. Like some of them   circus less so although I have hung around with I guess people who do   pole dancing   dances of various sorts and   I guess you'd call them some musicians, things like that.  

And certainly people who are really into handstands and also calisthenics.   And   each of those I would say is a separate niche.   But someone from the outside just looking at would just be like, Oh,   gymnastics, or like calisthenics.   And   it can be a bit of a struggle to describe like,   the differences between them as well. Because typically, I'll say like, nowadays, I just say, Yeah, yeah, calisthenics, but I focus on handstands. Whereas   I probably would probably   the most accurate thing would be to say is I'm really into hand balancing. That's, that's my thing, and not in the performing aspect either of it. And if I was to get even knee sure into it, I'd say I'm really into the isometric   part of hand balancing. So   doing   one arms, but not kind of like moving your arms and things around, but just like holding it as still as possible. Yep.  

And   the I think   misconceptions just arise super easily from that.   Another typical one man, you must have been doing this since you were a kid. No wrong. Incorrect.   That's   I would hopefully be a lot better if I was. Yeah,   kid. Yep. And   I wonder   if we're just doing the same thing with the art world where we're not in it enough to know some of the nuances. So   observations that we make from the outside, yeah, we can have some input, I guess. But unless you're really diving into it, unless you're, it's your full time job in a way.   There's just things that you can't understand or won't understand without   spending enough time   in it. So I would look at something like   a book I read a long time ago, it was called chasing Aphrodite. And it's basically   this book about this.  

I think it was a marble   struck like a marble bronze   marble bronze   can be both a marble   statue or busk of   a   prodigy. And it was taken from like, it was found in Greece,   or,   you know, some archaeological site. And it's like, oh, wow, this is like,   historically really important.   And then this place, this, this piece got shipped off to many different places.   And eventually it's like this whole story of like, Oh, wait,   one, is this actually real or is this just a really good forgery?   Two,   how,   museums   verifying   these sorts of pieces and what sorts of games go on there. And it's this whole convoluted thing where   the more you read about it, I feel like the more disgusted   I got. It's just going like, this is all bullshit. You know, museums are just looting from other places in the world.  

They're employing these like underhanded,   you know, art dealers who are essentially   they're kind of close to like human traffickers in the sense of the legal   shadiness of what they're doing.   Obviously, without the the human suffering component,   but even then, some of it could be like,   yeah, they're just really exploiting some really talented savant in The Philippines   to create this forgery.   And then, you know, reselling this on.   And   that book just made me go like, Fuck this. It's disgusting. But   if someone was really in that world, that would probably be like, okay, yes, that story is but there's certain reasons why you need to   have dealings with these types of people who are a little bit underhanded because   there's so much taxes or something that you can't, you know, the   it's, you know, what's worse dealing with the government or dealing with this underhanded, you know, slightly shady person? Well, it's like,   alright, well, if you put it in that context, yeah, maybe the slightly shady person is  

[00:38:51] Juan Granados:

the better the better thing. Yeah,  

[00:38:53] Kyrin Down:

the lesser of the evils.   How often have you been asked if you've been   taking steroids?  

[00:39:03] Juan Granados:

So many times. Yeah.   In fact, I know you told me about the hand balancing thing. I was just like, want to go get a massage on Thursday.   And during the massage,   unfortunately,   this donkey   just would not stop talking the entire time. Like he talked the entire time. Like   I,   I don't like people talking   haircut.  

[00:39:24] Kyrin Down:

Yeah. Yeah. Sarge. Don't talk to my brother. Talk to me. Talking about the haircut. And he's like, a good haircut person will just shut up. Yeah. Don't talk to me. Not ask for it. Exactly. So  

[00:39:33] Juan Granados:

in this massage thing, I was talking about the whole time and it was a nonstop barrage of,   oh, how do you do how do you do this to get this? Are you a bodybuilder?   Oh, I trained this. Like, what would you do in my situation? Is there food to the training? Is there any enhancements? What do you need to do? Right. Just like   over and over. And I was just like, not   prompting anything further apart from just answering the question.   So   again, it's, I get to the same point of   the,   if I'd really cared for speaking back about it, you know, saying about bodybuilding and getting big,   Can't even try to say like, yeah, I'm just more, like I'd run more than I do gym. I'd run more than I do gym.  

I'd do other types of movements. You gotta get this big, run.   And you could generalize it as more, hey, you care about fitness. Kind of like saying you care about art. But yeah, I can see how there would be such   little parts that you could potentially take and you're only really knowing until   you get into the space and go, Oh, actually, this is like microcosm of this. And yes, there's all the trouble about   taxation implications   and financial issues and then there's a power control. But actually there's a group over here that really cares about the story and the art and the pieces. So maybe, yeah, we don't, we don't see that because we're just not as deeply   embedded in it. I do have another example though that we were at a charity event. And as part of a few charity things that they were giving away or selling, there was three art pieces.  

And   at least to me objectively, there was one that was   kind of cool, but not not my taste. And now I'm sold fine. The other two   were not objectively cool. I didn't seem like anything big. There was no story behind that. It was just someone who had created this.   And they struggled   to sell this at a charity event. And it was an ended up being, you know, the charity   group themselves who bought it because nobody else in this one of a 100   person room wanted to buy it. Yeah. So yeah, I I can also I've seen also firsthand where it's like   I when it feels like it's shit, no one cares. Especially when there's nothing to Elsa bolsters it for any reason. Like, there's no power, there's no story, there's no like, oh, I bought it in this particular location.  

Nothing like that, then it it the value evaporates. Yeah. I I think  

[00:41:48] Kyrin Down:

the good point and almost summing this up in a way would be   the   space, whatever space you're in, the more it gets towards the   attention,   whether that be in big numbers in terms of eyeballs on a thing,   best in the world,   etc, etc.   That's when   it becomes distorted.   The   if you want to be like the best artist in the world, you probably need to spend 95% of your time on marketing. That's, that's what you do, and then 5% on actually creating art.   Same with like the fitness aspect, if you want to be, you know, Arnold body bodybuilder,   sure, you need to spend a lot of time   doing the actual work. But there's the enhancement aspects of, you know, researching drugs and steroids, what's the optimal common combination,   he spent so much of his time on posing as well, the small tricks that he would do in like,   out competing.  

I remember a story of him walking offstage   with another guy and then he would run back on to do like an encore. An actual pause. Yeah. And   I think I think like   the the more you go down into I guess like   the the middle level where perhaps there's not as much money involved where there's not as much   attention or time or   interest   in a thing,   that's when it's perhaps closer to its   purest form, in a sense where it's like, yeah, the average person in the gym,   just working out really hard, or like, I'm not trying to be a professional athlete in the sense of making money from it. But men do I spend a lot of time   trying to like perfect the craft and,   and achieve something which I   have as like a long term goal, and I think would be really amazing.  

Does this make me better or more pure than,   you know, as a circus athlete or something who   can do much more impressive things. No.   But there is a that aspect of like, yeah, if you're trying to,   I guess, to get to like,   the essence of of a of a space like what is the essence of the art world? Well, it's like buying and enjoying art, and   or   not even necessarily the buying aspect enjoying of art, like   the they're trying to the artists are trying to communicate something to you or, or   I explain something   or   highlight   an injustice or justice in the world, the beauty of certain things.  

And you're probably going to get   more of that in your like, local   random gallery   at a showing at a pop up art.  

[00:44:40] Juan Granados:

Yeah.  

[00:44:41] Kyrin Down:

Pop up art event. Yeah, then you would at  

[00:44:44] Juan Granados:

perhaps Art Basel or I'm just thinking that the what's the underlying equation to art that brings a joy,   right? Like what's the   derivative of joy for an artist? It's actually   by paying dollars   or by   recognition. Right. You think of something else like say if you were an artist. Yeah. What's the derivative? Yep. You can get joy from the creation of it. I would say if it's if it's if it's for nobody else, but just for yourself, the creation, absolutely. I can see there's there's that pure joy that comes from the doing wonderful.   But if you then take the next step forward of, okay, it's odd for   putting it up for someone to acquire,   I can't see any other derivative being like it being determined by the money or the amount of people that go see it. Yeah, the  

[00:45:33] Kyrin Down:

you know, I suppose they could be like, I want art to affect   someone in a certain way and it like doesn't necessarily need that mean that   more people being more   affected in a certain way is is better.   I think you can have ones where it's like, oh, I'd love   to create this piece of art for   a certain community, for example, and it's like representation for that community or   a focus point for that community   to to rally behind to give them hope or faith in or something like that.   I think there's plenty of reasons why   an artist   and probably, yep, most   don't   do it for   the, you know, we're not doing this for the financial gains doing the podcast   And the vast majority of podcasters don't they do it for   fun hanging out,   being able to connect with other people,   perhaps getting some stuff off of their mind, which they couldn't have had before   explaining concepts.  

Because doing that in person with someone bouncing off ideas. Yeah, there's a whole different bunch of reasons.   Are we a purer podcaster than Joe Rogan?   In a certain sense?   Yes. He's just more successful in a in another sense. I guess Yeah, I guess the   struggle like both of them are true. We're both in the   podcasting space, the podcasting world.   His world is just very different. And I think when you get to   a certain level, it becomes  

[00:47:11] Juan Granados:

different. And you start playing a different game in essence, or it's like the I guess I just I would probably it'd be cool to know a lot of more artists   who are doing it for not for a financial benefit like that. If you know someone someone point me to someone who's someone who's doing art, not for the financial benefit of it or for the ultimate goal of becoming more well known for their art. If they are if there's artists out there that are doing, and I'm not talking about someone who's doing it on the side for fun, because that's very different. If you're doing it as I, I want to become   really great as an artist,   but then your end goal is not to then be more recognized or or financial benefit.  

That's an that's a very interesting dynamic that I would love to see. I don't think I've seen an example of that.   Yeah. It's because even even you even though you're talking about like, what I had in my mind is when you're saying like, oh, doing it for a community and maybe it's like a mural or it's like a painting that they can do.   Part of me thinks like, yeah, but they've got paid for it. Someone's paid them in some regard, either in recognition   or in financial.   So will it be would the art world be exactly the same if there was if all of a sudden it just dropped out that,   when you put out your art, it's kind of like a Banksy   style where, yep, no one will know who you are   and well, not in Banksy style, but if an overlay as well, it'd be like, oh, and there's no finance to this. They'd be, you can't sell it. There's no money that you can get. It's purely for the entertainment and the creation and the joy that you just get purely from, from the piece. I wonder how much that would change   the keenness of maybe, artists to create a thing. I did know someone who was a good   drawer, a good painter,   and she exclusively was like, I'm doing this for money. I'm doing this. I'm a good artist. I became really good, and I want to make pieces for people. I wanna make money from it. I wanna become as a full time job. So I wonder if in that example, if it's like, oh,   you know,   what if people can do you can give it to people and they'll find lots of joy, but you won't get paid.  

Maybe they'll give you enough money so you can create the piece. So maybe it's a fraction of what you do, but you still have to put in the effort. Would   would it be what what percentage of people would kind of go I'm doing that? Yeah, I  

[00:49:19] Kyrin Down:

would almost say that everyone is like that. And then just the money aspect just comes into it. You can't you can't avoid it in a certain respect as well. So   the more you do something and get better at it, the more   that just forces its way in even if you don't want it to. And I think there's   plenty of stories of  

[00:49:40] Juan Granados:

people who I don't know if that's exactly right, though. I don't know if it always has to be influenced in the in the your artist friend.  

[00:49:47] Kyrin Down:

What was the reason she did art in the first place? Or she liked us? She enjoyed it? Yeah. So I think like that. That's probably always the starting point. And   it's very not always but 99%   There are certainly grifters of people who come in and just be like, I'm gonna do it. We saw it in the   NFT craze of 2021.   Those people coming in who are like, I'm an artist, I do this.   And  

[00:50:15] Juan Granados:

they made a bunch of money and then just disappeared. So it's like, alright, well, obviously, you're not still doing it. So the money was the most important. I mean, you have like celebrity, like Kevin Hart, and you had other like giant players coming in doing NFTs and be like, get get my NFT for this, whatever. And Was it? Okay. Yeah. There'll be those men, tons of people who were doing that. Sure. But the example I'm kind of thinking is, don't again, I don't know if you could, it's like tangential, I guess. Music. Would you say music is art? Maybe some people would, maybe some people would, maybe some people would, something different. I would. Mozart. So Mozart, when he was growing up,   him and like his sister, old sister was really good as a pianist and his dad was also a composer.  

And as he was growing up,   he was   a gifted, really prodigious, hardworking kid and dad was like, Hey, I've got to, I can get these guys to, like my kids to be able to pay the bills and make some money by doing whatever, whatever, whatever. They traveled throughout Europe. They got back to their hometown.   His dad got him a position at, like   the local, not mayor, but local, like chief or whatever you want to call it. And he was a composer for that and Mozart was like, Hey, yeah, I'm doing here for the money, but I hate it because I want to go and do this other thing, which was in relation to creation of   music. And he ended up, they went to   Venice and then he basically told us I'd like piss off. I'm not going back home. They designed him. And then he like worked like a crazy maniac, died kind of young, but he created all this art, art, all this music that people to this day are like, wow, he was freaking amazing, but he wasn't doing it for the money. He was like, no, I've got this in thing within me. I have to create all these various things because I find his joy and he died. I'm pretty sure not very rich,   but just had created all of these various things before he died. Yeah.  

That but what I'm saying in that example is in the art world,   sure.   I'm sure there's an equivalent to that like that. Benko. Yeah.   But   again, the percentage of that is so low in the art, like in this art scene as a global thing. And it gets me back to the point of the phoniness where I think it's, yes, there's a few individuals like that. Maybe a couple of percentage of all of the art world, the rest of phonies, the rest of they really, if you really looked into it and they say like, okay, cool, you get no money. You're just doing this purely for joy, no recognition. Your name's taken off it. You're going to still do it. I reckon a lot of them would just go, nah. What percentage would you put that at? I get 95%.  

[00:52:37] Kyrin Down:

That's I think that's too high.   I think that   a lot of people would still do it. But obviously, they couldn't do it to the same extent.   So   that still create things. But   the the realities of also life and having to work a job and stuff would restrict   time, for example, so they wouldn't be able to create   ridiculous   big things or spend all their time on it.   Yeah, true. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Good point. Less cynical in that respect. And   I'd say,   I'd   say the majority would still create   and   that the amount of grifters   who are people who do it, even though they hate it, or it's purely for the money aspect   is less   much like,   if you were to take   Instagram   influencers,   or fitness   influencers,   or people like that, I think a lot of them would still stay in shape.  

Even if   they they weren't   able to make money from their body, in essence. Yeah, for sure. But   yeah, would they be as in shape? No, no, no way like that.   They'd have to like work a fucking job and can't   and you know, be sitting on their ass a whole bunch of time in front of a computer and things like that. So yeah.   Yeah, the all of these worlds, I guess.   They're complex,   and   I feel   get distorted at the upper echelons,   where other things get involved, which make it   strange,   counterintuitive   behaviors,   things that you might even be like morally like,   that's, that's a bit gross.  

But the actual   creation,   the idea or the inspiration of why people do these things, I think is,   is, yeah, that that's a human thing. That's, there's a purity to that, of wanting to,   you know, express yourself via art, of wanting to   be fit and feel good and,   feel healthy and things like that. So, yeah, that's a   secret to the art world, secrets of the of the universe, secrets of podcasting,   exposed much of it. A lot of random stuff in there. But yeah, some some good things in the end  

[00:54:58] Juan Granados:

as well. Yeah, I guess I mean, I'm good season and all that those sort of books are okay as Yeah,  

[00:55:04] Kyrin Down:

this is not going to be   very memorable in terms   of the things that I've read, but   it was a   little bit of   a talking point, which is good. So good on you. 100 Secrets of the Art World by and I do like Magnus Suresh. I I find I'm reading one or two of his other books, and  

[00:55:25] Juan Granados:

I'll talk about I'll talk about that in the future episodes. Good. Alright. New more than glad. I think we'll leave it there. Again, if you want to support, newmortalspodcast.com   forward slash support. You can send through a boost to grand. There's loads of links there that you can go and and interact with as well.  

[00:55:38] Kyrin Down:

You can join us live like Cole has. He says, Tell me, Kyron was involved with the Louvre robbery.   I know all bald men are   thieves, gangsters and brothers.  

[00:55:50] Juan Granados:

But he's not saying no. Yeah. He's not saying no. So where was I on the   whatever that actually occurred. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah   And if things if art wasn't worth anything anymore, would it be worth stealing?   You know, maybe that's that's the if you wanna stop art being stolen,   make it so it's worth nothing. All of it's worth nothing, then, no, it will no longer be stolen. So that's probably complicating it even more so than it needs to for for,   art, but that'd be it. I appreciate it for those who have been live as well. Tune in 9AM Australian Eastern Standard Time on the Sundays for the next conversation. For sure in there. We'll leave you there for now. Hope you're well. Be well. Stay artistic. One. App. Carry now.  



[00:56:35] Kyrin Down:

Bye.