How “Gentleman Jack” Reveals the Economic Forces Behind 18th-Century Art

Colorful birds of paradise cavorting on flowers and cherry branches: The baroque “Badminton Cabinet” (1726–1732) causes a lot of attention with its delicate gemstone inlays, golden decoration and eight pretty feet. The magnificent piece, which 30 people worked on for six years, is the most expensive piece of furniture ever sold – and serves in the Garden Palace as an exquisite example of a cultural transfer from south to north.

The piece was once a particularly valuable souvenir that Henry Somerset, the third Duke of Beaufort, took with him on his “Grand Tour” of Italy. In the 18th century, extensive educational trips were common among British nobility – Italian art production responded and created art suitable for souvenirs. The painter Pompeo Girolamo Batoni is considered the inventor of the tourist portrait, and copper engravings of the Roman “Top Sights” became objects of desire.

Theme “Art and Money”

Supply and demand always went hand in hand: With “Noble Desires. A History of the European Art Market”, the Vienna Garden Palace of the Princes of Liechtenstein will be highlighting the topic of “art and money” and thus a relationship that often falls under the table from Friday. People prefer to talk about quality, important artists, beauty and spirit, but less like the influence of the market on taste and historiography.

The course features top-class items from Titian, Rembrandt, Brueghel and Monet. In addition to loans, the House of Liechtenstein has plenty to draw from: according to the Swiss business magazine “Bilanz”, the value of the princely collections is four billion euros, and the royal family still collects at the highest level today.

Commissioned works and subjects in stock

As we can see, the passionate hunt for special works of art is not a new phenomenon – nor are the market’s reactions. Even in ancient times, there were art auctions and production that had “noble desires” in mind: Because Greek sculpture was in vogue in the Roman Empire, famous statues were copied in smaller sizes and in a wide variety of materials.

Rome and Florence flourished as major art market centers of the modern era. “Art is always there or always flourishes where there are people who are willing to spend money on it,” said curator Yvonne Wagner, who designed the show together with Christian Huemer, the art market specialist at the Belvedere Research Center, in an interview with ORF. This “interaction” can be understood everywhere, it “continues throughout history”.

In the city-state in Tuscany, wealthy families such as the Medici commissioned high-quality large formats and negotiated the theme, materials, size and price directly with the artist. At the same time, artists such as Andrea della Robbia produced popular subjects such as the “Madonna and Child and John the Baptist” (1480/1490) in stock. There are 15 variants of the round painting, which is exhibited here in triplicate form.

First Art Knives in Antwerp

In the north, Antwerp and Amsterdam stood out as “art hubs” from the 16th century onwards. Through maritime trade, the port city in Flanders had developed into a wealthy center. The first art fairs in Antwerp took place in a hall-like building next to the Cathedral of Our Lady, with dealers renting stands called “Panden”.

Interestingly, “it was often the women who were the first art dealers because the men were employed in the workshops,” says co-curator Huemer. Albrecht Dürer also knew that the clients could be “complicated”, for whom the prints that he sold through dealers were much more profitable than paintings commissioned directly.

Impressed Rembrandt at Van Uffel auction

The Van Uffel auction went down in history as the most important art deal of the 16th century. Among other things, Raphael’s portrait of the nobleman Baldassare Castiglione was auctioned there. The obviously deeply impressed Rembrandt wrote down 3,500 guilders in his notebook and made an ink brush drawing.

“He might be thinking, I’m that important. I play at that level too, I can demand these prices,” said Stephan Koja, Director of the Princely Collections in an ORF interview. On the other hand, the painting provided the first inspiration for Rembrandt’s famous self-portraits with a beret and gold chains – one of which can be admired in the exhibition.

Viennese art player Charles Sedelmeyer

After Antwerp and Amsterdam, Paris and London distinguished themselves as new capitals of art in the 19th century with the auction houses Christie’s and Sotheby’s. Catalogs, catalogs of works and presentation proposals were created – also because art dealers like the influential Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Pierre Lebrun also wanted to sell the “hot goods”.

With Karl Sedelmeyer, who revolutionized the marketing of art as Charles Sedelmeyer, a central player of the 19th century came from Vienna: He staged the huge paintings of the Hungarian painter Mihaly Munkacsy, whom he employed with him on a yearly basis, like a cinema, charged admission for them and sold small formats and engravings of the motif to the wealthy.

Sedelmeyer also had old masters in his repertoire; today they hang with the Princes of Liechtenstein as well as in US museums such as the Metropolitan. Last but not least, it is dealers like Sedelmeyer who continue to satisfy “noble desires” today – and always create new ones.