The Art of the Steal - Hardcover

Mason, Christopher

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0399150935 ISBN 13: 9780399150937

Publisher: Putnam Adult, 2004

Synopsis

Journeys inside the price-fixing scandal that rocked the art auction world, describing how billionaire Alfred Taubman; Diana Brooks, the most powerful woman in the art world; and British executive Christopher Davidge conspired to cheat clients out of millions, while offering a revealing look at the inner operations of Sotheby's and Christie's. 50,000 first printing.

About this title

About the Author:

Christopher Mason is a frequent contributor to The New York Times and New York magazine, and has been writing for more than a dozen years on the worlds of art, society, fashion, and design.

From Publishers Weekly:

Veteran art writer Mason does a good job separating the bad guys from the slightly less bad guys in his lively, anecdote-packed saga about how the world's two leading auction houses, Sotheby's and Christie's, conspired to fix prices on everything from famous paintings to antique furniture. Alfred Taubman, the shopping-mall king who bought Sotheby's in 1983 to keep it from falling into the hands of a couple of carpet salesmen, became the only principal in the case to actually do jail time-apparently due to what some courtroom observers labeled "the worst defense money can buy." It didn't help that Diana "DeDe" Brooks, who started her career as an unpaid intern and whose workaholic habits persuaded Taubman to make her Sotheby's CEO, became one of the government's chief witnesses against Taubman. On the Christie's side, the lineup features a number of snobbish Brits, including Christie's CEO, Christopher Davidge, who seems to have sold everyone else down the river. It would have made for smoother reading if Mason (or his editor) had done some pruning: how many times do we need to be told that Brooks is six feet tall or that Taubman's wife, Judy, is a glamorous former beauty queen? But in the end, it's the story that carries the day-an amazing and depressing chronicle of greed in the name of culture that should (but probably won't) keep art buyers from ever walking into an auction house again.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: Putnam Adult
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0399150935
• ISBN 13: 9780399150937
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 416