A British artist, Damien Hirst, took 223 pieces of his new work to Sotheby's auction house and sold every single piece.

英國藝術家 Damien Hirst 拿了 223 件他的新作品去 Sotheby 的拍賣行，賣掉了他的所有作品。

I'll start the bidding here at £2,500,000.

我從 250 萬英鎊開始喊價吧！

It was a 2 day event, and the total sale was about $200 million.

這是一個兩天的活動，總銷售額大約是 20 億。

It broke the record for single artist auction of $20 million back in 1993.

打破了 1993 年的 2 億單人銷售額。

Hirst's work included things like this zebra, this unicorn, and this painting made from butterflies.

Hirst 的作品包括斑馬、獨角獸還有蝴蝶作成的畫作。

So how did he, how do artists, do this?

所以他，藝術家們，是如何做到的呢？

Well, for the most part, the artists aren't the ones behind it.

大部分來說，藝術家都不是真正的幕後推手。

Okay, so obviously money isn't the only value that defines a work of art, and who knows how history will remember this unicorn.

好啦，很明顯的價錢不是恆量藝術品的唯一方法，誰知道這個獨角獸會不會名留千史。

But in order to sell a million-dollar artwork, you need strong market value, and you need extremely high demand, and a ton of work goes into creating that.

但如果要賣出一件價值百萬的藝術品，你需要強大的市場價值，你需要極大的市場需求，還需要花費很多心力去製造它們。

As Don Thompson describes in his book, the formula for art pricing goes something like this.

就如 Don Thompson 在他書裡所描述的，藝術品的價錢秘方是這樣的。

The bigger the work, generally the more expensive it is.

越大的作品，大致上來說就會越貴。

But, the biggest variable is the reputation of the artist, sometimes you're world-famous, and sometimes you're not.

但，最大的變數是藝術家的名聲，有時候你是舉世聞名的，有時候你沒有任何名氣。

What?

什麼？

But when a new artist steps into the art market, the reputation of the artist heavily relies on the name of the dealer.

但一位新的藝術家踏進藝術市場時，他的名氣大多是依靠買家。

This shark by Damien Hirst is a good example.

來自 Damien Hirst 的這隻鯊魚是一個很好的例子。

Hirst first began working with an art industry giant, Charles Saatchi, in the 1990s.

Hirst 首先在 90 年代的時候與藝術界巨擘 Charles Saatchi 合作。

Saatchi commissioned Hirst to make anything he wanted for £50,000 after seeing this cow's head at a show shortly after Hirst's graduation in 1990.

在看了 Hirst 1990 年畢業後的牛頭作品之後，Saatchi 用 5 萬英鎊委託 Hirst 做出任何他想要的東西。

Hirst bought a shark for £6000 from an Australian fisherman and created this, injecting it with tons of formaldehyde.

Hirst 花了 6 千英鎊跟一位澳洲漁夫買了一隻鯊魚並創作了這個，在它裡面注入了一大堆甲醛。

Later in 2004, it was sold for $12 million to a billionaire hedge fund manager, Steve Cohen.

2004 年，它以 1 億 2 千萬賣給了 Steve Cohen ，一位億萬富翁對沖基金經理。

It was roughly 130 times the original price.

這相當是原價的 130 倍。

But it makes sense considering Saatchi's reputation, and it makes more sense when you think about how it was bought, dealers can use selective information to get potential buyers to pay more.

但考慮到 Saatchi's 的名聲，賣這麼貴是有道理的，而且如果你想到這是如何取得的以及交易者可以用選擇性的資訊讓潛在買家付更多錢，就會覺得更有道理了。

Hirst's huge auction I mentioned before.

Hirst 的拍賣我剛剛有提過。

For dealer-sold work, everything is private, including the prices, which gives dealers the upper hand in pricing.

交易出去的作品都是私人的，包括價錢都是私密的，這讓交易者有掌握價錢的能力。

In 1988, New York City tried to ban this by reinforcing the truth in Pricing law, and galleries fought back hard, paying fines and protesting saying that showing prices will be “getting in the way of the enjoyment of the exhibition.”

1998 年，紐約市用定價法律的事實試著禁止這件事，畫廊以付出罰金和表示「秀出價錢會失去展覽的興致」強力反擊。

By keeping the price private, art dealers can rely more on their reputation to make artwork feel more valuable to the buyer.

不透露價錢，藝術品交易者可以依靠自己的名聲來讓作品對買家感覺起來更值錢。

Outside this equation, the basic laws of economics also apply.

除了這個方程式以外，基礎的經濟學定律也可以應用。

The next step of operations for the dealer is creating scarcity.

交易者的下一步行動就是製造稀有程度。

In 1999, when Jenny Saville, a new emerging British artist became affiliated with Charles Saatchi, he convinced her to cut her work down to only 6 paintings per year.

1999 年，當 Jenny Saville (一位新興英國作家) 與 Charles Saatchi 合作時，他說服她把她一年的作品量減少到剩下六件。

He sold them for $100,000 each.

他每一件作品賣了 10 萬美金。

So what does this all result to?

所以最後會得到什麼樣的結論呢？

According to Artnet, the estimated size of the art market was $64 billion in 2015.

根據 Artnet ，這樣大小的作品在 2015 年要賣 640 億美金。

And market is growing outside of traditional sales of galleries and auction houses.

而且，傳統市場以外的拍賣屋價錢更是增長。

This chart shows the art world might be learning the lesson Saatchi taught Jenny Savile , the total value of the art that's being sold is growing faster than the number of pieces.

這個數據表示藝術世界或許學到了 Saatchi 教導 Jenny Savile 的一堂課，作品的總價錢是在於你的作品件數。

Sell less of it, for more.

為了賣更多，賣少一點。

But to sell that million-dollar artwork, you'll need reputation bigger than Hirst's, or Charles Saatchi's.

但要賣出一件百萬的藝術作品，你需要比 Hirst 更有名氣，或是比 Charles Saatchi 更有名氣才行。

The dealer model still dominates the fine art world, but for the rest of us, selling art online has never been easier.

這樣的交易模板掌控著藝術世界，但對於剩下的其他人，在網路上賣藝術品不能更簡單了。

The prices are open and it's accessible for a broad group of people.

價錢公開而且又可觸及一大群人。

And for one thing, now you know where to start: think big.

還有一件事，現在你知道怎麼開始了，把目光放得更遼闊一點！