REVIEW : "The Great Contemporary Art Bubble" (2009) - Movie by Ben Lewis

It is more than a decade ago now, that the economies of the world suffered from the financial crisis around 2008. In the years before, money had been cheap and plenty and banks practically begged their customers to loan money in their fast appreciating house "values". This meant that collectors of various kinds of art, among other things, channeled more and more money into contemporary art in the hope that it would be a good investment or at least something that kept it.

Ben Lewis takes a look at the art scene around 2008 and tries to understand what is going on at that point in time and what the state of contemporary is, what kind of characters deals in art and tries to follow the money flow. This is a bit of an off the beaten path kind of documentary, and for that bit alone something that commands my attention.

Ben Lewis travels around the auction houses and art galleries to interview both customers and dealers to understand what is going on at the moment. The housing bubble has already popped and despite everyone being aware of that credit contraction, contemporary art seem to expand its bubble nevertheless.

Under way we get a good look at examples of contemporary art styles and its prices. We also get some more private insights in private collectors homes and attitude towards buying and collecting art and what turns them on in it.

We get a clear understanding that much of what apparently is going on is about cornering certain artists, like Warhol, in auctions, to keep the perceived value of a collectors other items in their collection, stays high. Even if a collector pays too much for a certain piece, the overall value of all the artists works will stay high or increase on the idea of average value.

One should be a bit careful not putting too much into what various interviewed collectors and critics may claim insight into. A collectors market on this level is probably rife with rumours and lies, to either get at other collectors or artificially manipulate perceived value.

At some point around mid way through I started to find the "conspiracy" like plot too thin. I just enjoyed the interviews of particularly the eccentric collectors and dealers and their at times insightful comments on the art and at other times uninspiringly money oriented.

The narrater/interviewer is at times quite prejudiced and suffer from a bunch of different fallacies concerning free market operations. But that aside, he does not dominate the frame and stays well out of it to let the art and the "characters" come to the forefront.

One thing I noticed is that the artistic expression of the cinematography is not in itself very artistic. And thank god for that. It makes it a lot less self aware or pretentious. It is quite lively and gets around a lot and pretty much bumps into people and places like an an elephant in a chinashop.

I like this style as it feels alive and inquisitive and you get the feel like it is you who are pressing on to get information that is a bit harder to get at in just asking nicely.

With that said, at the same time, it feels rather directionless and the "exposure" of a great conspiracy does not really materialise like the interviewer really wants. All in all it is a decently entertaining and informative snapshot of particular time in the story of art collecting and a taste of how contemporary artists work and think, both artistically and presumed money wise. It comes with a good recommendation.

7/10