Nudes on canvas sell best
Commercial economist Adri de Ridder knows that nudity sells well. Zorn's painting Sunday Morning, which sold for SEK 35 million in 2021, is shown here. Photo: Bukowskis/Wikipedia and Daniel Olsson
How much does a painting by a Swedish master cost? This was the focus of an analysis by commercial economist Adri de Ridder. The results show that nudes sell best. Meanwhile, female artists are barely paid for the paint – unless they are a household name.
The price of art is determined not only by the artist's name, but by a number of other factors. So says Adri de Ridder, who has analysed more than 15,000 paintings by Swedish artists sold by the major auction houses over the past decade. The database he has built up contains information about the size of the works, their technique, whether they are signed or not, the artist's gender, starting price and selling price.
“Most importantly, we have looked at the subject – what the painting depicts. And then we see that nude paintings are the category of paintings that go up in price the most. Previous research has only looked at the name of the painting, but that doesn't tell us anything,” explains de Ridder, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Business Studies.
He cites Anders Zorn's paintings Old Mirror and Red Sand as examples. What the titles do not reveal is that both works depict nudes and sold for SEK 3.6 and 11.8 million respectively. The same artist is also behind the painting Sunday Morning, which sold for over SEK 35 million in 2021. That painting also features a nude motif.
Less popular subjects are landscapes and portraits, even if a famous artist has produced them.
“You can buy a painting by Anders Zorn showing a portrait of Mrs. Faulkner in London, who wants that? Nobody wants it. Or a young, dressed-up depiction of Carl Bildt's father or grandfather. You don't want that in your house. You want a neutral subject, don't you?”
However, according to de Ridder, paintings by women fare the worst.
“Paintings by female artists are much cheaper. They barely get paid for the paint or the frame. Unless you're a household name like Helene Schjerfbeck or Tove Jansson.”
Art as an investment
De Ridder says that the art market is interesting to study because it has such a large turnover. He now plans to go on to investigate why it is that auction houses seem to work according to a completely different logic, where the starting price and the final price can differ enormously.
“Why is the starting price of an Ivan Aguéli SEK 4 million when it then goes on to be sold for 6 million? There is too great a discrepancy between the starting price and the final price. It's like going to a car dealership and thinking you're buying a Volvo for SEK 50,000, when it's worth 150,000. It doesn't make sense.”
He is also interested in exploring whether Swedish art can be a profitable investment strategy – a way to grow money independent of the stock market.
“People talk about 'alternative investment strategies'. If you have SEK 100 million, you might not invest it all in shares, but buy paintings instead. I'm interested to find out if it works. What are the returns in the short or long term, does it seem profitable?”
It became clear that people who buy paintings don't just do it to have something nice on the wall at home when de Ridder looked at how often paintings change hands. This was done by calculating the average timeframe over which a painting is sold.
“The average time is around seven to eight years in the US. In Sweden it is much shorter, meaning that there seems to be more speculation in Sweden compared to the US.”
Sandra Gunnarsson, Daniel Olsson