The Auction Market for Contemporary Inuit Art by By Mary-Louise Davis B.A. (Honours) A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Canadian Art History Copyright Protected, Mary-Louise Davis, 2010 Library and Archives Bibliotheque et 1*1 Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington OttawaONK1A0N4 OttawaONK1A0N4 Canada Canada Your Tile Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-71677-9 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-71677-9 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distribute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non­ support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in this et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. Ni thesis. Neither the thesis nor la these ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci substantial extracts from it may be ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement printed or otherwise reproduced reproduits sans son autorisation. without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la lot canadienne sur la Privacy Act some supporting forms protection de la vie privee, quelques may have been removed from this formulaires secondaires ont ete enleves de thesis. cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. 1*1 Canada 11 Abstract This thesis is an examination of Inuit art auctions. It includes a history of Inuit art auctions in Canada and internationally, which demonstrates the rise of Waddington's to the dominant place in the market it now holds. This is followed by chapters focused on a case study of one Waddington's November 9th 2009 auction of Inuit art. Chapter 2 is an analysis of the events and publications which preceded auction. The next chapter is a discussion of the auction itself. The thesis concludes with a chapter regarding the repercussions of the case study and of auctions of Inuit art in general. The thesis demonstrates that auctions are a dynamic arena for affixing an economic or exchange value, and they often provide re-assessments of a work or of the entire justification system for an art form. Therefore, auction institutions clearly have significance for all involved in Inuit art. u Ill Acknowledgements This thesis would not have been completed without the dedication and intellectual support of my supervisors who provided me with the advice and criticism that I needed to complete this work. Likewise, my peers at Carleton helped me with their many suggestions and ideas despite my somewhat unusual thesis topic while many of my friends outside of the ivory tower (with a few exceptions) provided useful insights into my work from their very varied fields. I would like to earnestly thank all those who I interviewed for this thesis. Their words not only made evident each of their important positions in the market for Inuit art but they made this thesis project valuable and unique. My family also contributed in a large way to this thesis. Discussions with my grandmother, uncles, aunts and cousins about art, culture, history and the art market contributed to the shape of this paper. My mother, sister and father's enthusiasm for my interests influenced me to begin the work at Ritchie's auction house that caused my initial interests in Inuit art auctions. Since that time they have been eager to help and support me whenever possible. Thanks also to Mike, who always had the patience to listen to thesis- rants, to proofread and who has also shown his skill in providing useful distractions from the work whenever they were necessary. in iv Table of Contents Abstract ii Acknowledgements iii Table of Contents iv Preface vi 1 Introduction 1 Major Questions 4 Review of the Literature 11 Methodology 23 1.4 Chapter Outline 26 2 A History of Inuit Art Auctions 28 2.1 Early Auctions 28 2.2 The Birth of an Auction Market for Inuit Art 34 2.3 1980s 49 2.4 1990s 56 2.4.1 Online Auctions 59 2.5 2000-2009 61 3 Pre-Auction Events and Publications 71 3.1 The Catalogue 72 3.1.1 Catalogue Entries 75 3.1.2 Catalogue Photography 78 3.1.3 Pre-sale Estimates 82 3.1.4 Embellishing Text 83 3.1.5 Conclusions 86 3.2 The Website 86 3.3 The Advertisement 90 3.3.1 Conclusions 93 3.4 The Preview 94 4 The Auction 102 4.1 A Crowd Gathers: Planning versus Spontaneity 103 4.2 The Bidding Begins: Conservation versus Subordination of Community Interests 109 4.3 The Auction Intensifies: The Auctioneer 115 4.4 Closing the Sale: Audience Responses to Art Works 120 4.5 I leave Waddington's, and I don't go empty handed: Conclusions 123 5 Conclusions 125 iv V 5.1 Repercussions of Waddington's 2009 Auction of Inuit Art 125 5.2 Conclusions 132 Appendix A 138 Bibliography 173 Figures 194 v vi Preface The desire to collect is instilled in North American children at a young age. McDonald's encourages kids to collect all six, ten or fifteen plastic, Happy Meal toys. When I was growing up in Toronto in the 1990s, my friends and I collected TY Beanie Babies which were individuated by names, authenticity tags, and numbers. The market value of these stuffed animals could be tracked on the manufacturer's website, and so I learned that the utility of the stuffed-animals was not only their cuddly physical properties, but their value. Collecting, it seemed, was a pursuit of valuable objects. However, my mother pointed out an impediment to these early collecting activities. She argued that: "The website may say that each toy is worth forty dollars, but where could you sell them for that price?" I discovered that to be a collector or a seller of collectible objects, you must have access to a suitable marketplace which brings buyers and sellers together. Many years after assessing a "Happy Meals" collector, when I was studying Anthropology at Trent University, I reflected on the collector's dilemma again. This time, however, my concern was for Inuit art and not stuffed animals. In the summers of 2006 and 2007 I spent time assisting the Inuit art specialist at Ritchie's auction house, now defunct, in Toronto. Ritchie's regularly received consignments of Inuit art along with Canadian art consignments, but these pieces always failed to reach the price points of similar works selling at Waddington's auction house only a few blocks away. Therefore, if I had a work of Inuit art that I felt was valuable, Waddington's Inuit art auctions seemed better able to generate the highest prices. How are the high price points reached? Why is the market at Waddington's so good at generating them? Waddington's sales, vi vii held twice a year in Toronto, are known to attract a wide variety of dealers and collectors from Canada, the United States and Europe. These collectors and dealers congregate at each auction where they assign prices to works of Inuit art and redistributing them to buyers. Waddington's auctions seem to solve the principal dilemma of the art collector and the art dealer: they have provided a dedicated and documented marketplace for Inuit art since 1978. [Figure 1.1] However, is that the only feat this institution has accomplished? Over the following years, I was determined to examine the reasons for the continued success of Waddington's Inuit art auctions. This auction house, more than any others in Toronto, in Canada and internationally, has developed a record-breaking market for a very specialized art form. I enrolled to complete my MA in art history at Carleton University, Ottawa, so that I could fully investigate this phenomenon. vn 1 Introduction The art auction is a system of market-implicated events which cumulatively create both price and object identities based on auction-specific processes. The principles relied on in the art auction, however, are shared with many other institutions operating in the art/culture system. Information about art works and participants is funneled in before and during a sale, and new information created at auction is subsequently distributed throughout the art world. As Joseph Alsop discusses,1 art auctions are a part of the interconnected art-culture system which involves art dealing, art collection, art history, revaluation of art and many other "by-products".2 All of these institutions, despite any apparent rivalries that may exist between them, function co-operatively to contribute the "rare art traditions". Inuit art auctions, therefore, are important components of a larger Inuit art system which functions to preserve itself and its associated events and systems. Previous examinations of the systems of production, writing, and circulation of Inuit art which have not taken auctions into account are, I argue, incomplete.