The Versatile Master Artist

”I wonder if this guy knows the ropes, can we just simply sign him for fifteen years?” the young blonde clicked his tongue.

From top to bottom, Ma Shi Gallery has signed a total of 196 artists, from big fish to small shrimps.

From a profit perspective, the gallery and their contracted artists have almost aligned external interests, while internally, there are various power struggles.

Gallery owners look at artists like veteran farmers watch the crops in their fields, or like team captains look at the donkeys of the production teams.

The essence of signing new artists and running a youth training team for a Premier League football club is not different.

It’s just that the European Union has regulations: athletes under 16 can only sign one-year contracts, and those under 18 can sign only three-year contracts, to protect young people from unknowingly selling their future to shady clubs.

The art industry doesn’t have such regulations, making the waters very muddied, with a mix of proper and improper galleries, and a fair share of fly-by-night operations.

Regardless of size, galleries, when facing newcomers in their ”low-price period” of their careers,

all adhere to the principle that alive they belong to us, and dead they become our ghosts; if a five-year contract is possible, they won’t sign three, and if a ten-year is possible, they won’t sign five, ideally signing them for life.

Artists, however, are not keen to tie their careers to a single withering tree.

Water flows downwards, people go upwards.

What if a better opportunity arises in the future?

Therefore, each artist’s contract term varies within the industry, and the terms are completely different.

Small galleries generally have three-year contracts, but a top-tier gallery like Ma Shi Gallery, standing at the top of the industry’s pyramid, can generally negotiate for terms of five or even seven or more years.

For a completely inexperienced newcomer like Gu Weijing, from training to fame, and then to flourishing,

a short contract would be pointless.

Hanks came on this trip aiming to sign a long-term contract of ten years or more.

They can’t let Ma Shi Gallery’s production team nurture this little donkey until it’s plump and healthy, only to have it switch to another team to grind their mill.

”There shouldn’t be an issue, with a 70% share, an annual creation subsidy of forty thousand dollars, an annual salary increase of 3-5% in allowances, and a signing bonus of 25 million Myanmar Kyat, it’s really generous. Hmph, if it wasn’t for giving Professor Yajima some face, a category four contract would have been enough...”

Hanks zipped up his briefcase with a smile, envisioning the other party’s tears of excitement upon receiving an offer from Ma Shi Gallery.

An unknown small fry receiving an invitation from a top-tier gallery usually reacts this way.

That day, after learning about Gu Weijing from Professor Yakai Ichiro, Hanks hesitated for a while at Narita International Airport and decided not to rush directly to Myanmar.

After all, in a place like Yangon, competitors are unlikely to appear daily.

Hanks spent two days considering the nature of the contract he should offer.

Ma Shi Gallery’s regular contracts are divided into four categories.

Category three and four are for artists without any market recognition.

Once these artists are signed by Ma Shi Gallery, optimistically, they are branded as ”emerging artists” during marketing. Pessimistically, without a gallery, they are nobodies.

Four-category contracts typically have a commission of over 85%. Alternatively, if they prefer not to do consignment, the gallery will buy out their oil painting works at about 1,500 US dollars per piece.

It sounds as if the gallery is a vicious vampire.

Indeed, perhaps a 90% commission is quite harsh, but such is the confidence of a first-tier gallery.

Faced with such a towering tree,

ordinary, grassroots painters are just ants enjoying the shade under it... or not even vines climbing between its branches.

Think of those idol trainees with a few hundred dollars in monthly income from performing companies, and you’ll understand.

There’s no shortage of people wishing to be sucked dry even without the qualifications.

Randomly ask a small artist whether they prefer a standard 50% share at a third-tier gallery or a salary at Ma Shi Gallery, and nine and a half out of ten would jump at the opportunity to work for free to board Ma Shi’s big ship.

The shares for category three contracts cover a wide range.

They range from 60% to 85%, with buyout prices rising sharply, from four to five thousand US dollars per piece to as high as ten thousand dollars.

These are contracts for emerging or highly potential art students who’ve earned some fame.

High potential usually refers to the cream of the crop among graduates from well-known art schools.

For instance, those who’ve participated in outstanding graduation exhibitions, various joint exhibitions, or student groups in certain city biennales may catch the gallery’s attention with their self-recommendations.

Other hundreds of self-recommendation resumes sent to Ma Shi Gallery every year go straight in the trash.

The harsh reality is that those CDs containing blood, sweat, and possibly hundreds of hours of effort from art students, recorded with artworks, hold no necessity to be opened in the eyes of top-tier galleries.

Even some who graduated from institutions like the Repin Academy of Fine Arts or the Royal Academy of Arts face the same fate.

Becoming a serious artist, even at the lowest level, is forever the privilege of a scarce few.

Category three contracts represent the ceiling for ordinary painters, as shown by the buyout price being two to three times higher than the fourth category.

The gallery is willing to offer a baseline price of around 1,500 dollars for fourth-category contracts, not because they couldn’t negotiate a lower price but because it wouldn’t be dignified.

Large galleries don’t want to be seen as buying trash and selling to collectors at a markup by paparazzi.

Ma Shi Gallery feels it beneath them to offer a few hundred dollars as the acquisition price.

Yet in ordinary local small galleries, there may not even be works as expensive as four or five thousand dollars available.

Category three artists at Ma Shi Gallery are still classified as emerging artists.

Across the visual arts industry, however, they would be living quite decently.

Their income certainly exceeds the average level in developed countries.

As for second and first categories, these are major contracts for internationally recognized artists with some fame.

Globally, no more than a thousand can obtain such contracts.

Including all related industries worldwide, among tens of millions involved in the visual arts industry, they are truly one in a million.

Signing any category two contract with high productivity.

Paint for a year or two, and then it’s villas and Ferraris.

This isn’t something Hanks can decide alone; it requires the owner’s, Ma Shi III’s, direct approval.

Above that are some special contracts, like that of Yakai Ichiro, which are negotiated individually, case by case.

Money may no longer be the key, involving global exhibitions, collaborations with some top national art galleries for solo exhibitions, linking with surrounding commercial IP and culture, and deciding whether to hold joint auctions at Sotheby’s or Christie’s.

Each detail must be specially negotiated, involving many aspects.

For those who are not industry veterans, it is hard to imagine how demanding truly top-tier artists can be.

During Damien Hirst’s popular years,

Gagosian Gallery formed a team of over 160 people, which included marketing experts, curators, legal counselors, assistant agents, and yoga therapists, all to serve Hirst round the clock.

Koizumi Katsuko received a junior artist contract from Tokyo Gallery + BTAP, which also belongs to this kind of tailor-made special contract.

Of course, Koizumi Katsuko deserved a customized contract from Tokyo Gallery, but this doesn’t mean Gu Weijing does; Koizumi was Yakai Ichiro’s daughter, capturing the attention of the Asian art media since she was ten, while this Yangon guy is merely a rural worker.

Different people lead different lives.

A fifteen-year contract indeed feels somewhat like an indenture, but the conditions are genuinely sincere.

After all, as introduced by Professor Yakai, Hanks can’t bear to bully someone unworldly and already offered a remarkably friendly price.

Otherwise, a category four contract would also have left them teary with gratitude.

Hanks simply aimed for long-term dealings.

Artists aren’t slaves; forming a good relationship means smoother cooperation when they truly become famous.