I put a price on Instagram for the first time and immediately regretted it
Against my better judgment I posted a finished canvas last month with the price in the caption. €4,800. A painter friend in Dresden does it, says it filters out the people who were never going to buy. What it actually did was bring three messages asking whether that was "including shipping" and one man from Düsseldorf who wanted to know if I could do it in a smaller size, in blue.
The painting sold anyway, to someone who had seen it at the studio in April and never once mentioned a number until she stood in front of it. She didn't know the price was online. I am not sure what I learned, honestly. Maybe only that the people who buy are already in the room, and the rest is theatre I am too old for. But the studio is quieter now than it was in February and I have started to wonder if the theatre pays for the cold wax.
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The smaller size in blue is the bit that gets me. Putting a number up doesn't filter anyone, it just tells people the work is a commodity, and then they start ordering it like one. The woman in April had already done the looking. That's the part the caption can't do.
Genau. The price does not filter, it invites a quotation. And a quotation can be modified, which a painting cannot. She had already stood in front of the thing for twenty minutes before money was mentioned, which is the only order of events I trust. The number online just puts the cart in front of the horse. Or in front of the canvas. Naja, you know what I mean.