Prices

The price of a work of art cannot be calculated on the same way than the one of a manufactured product. The “cost price” can only be a small part of the selling price, because there are many immaterial factors which have to be taken into consideration.

A part of the price of my paintings is the excellent way of working and the highest quality of the materials I utilize. I only use supports, mediums and pigments of the best quality, without taking their price into account. The colors of my pigments are guaranteed for more than 150 years in the normal light of a house, an apartment or a museum. In some cases — for example the blue-violet flowers in the hair of my “Green Lady” (see the picture) — the permanence of the colors can rise to 5 centuries (or more), because the pigments are only Titanium White, Cobalt Blue and Cobalt Violet (See Extremely permanent pigments).

Another part of the price is the originality of each of my works. Most painters, even the most renowned, paint nearly always the same subjects. On the contrary, I always paint something entirely different from what I painted before. This creativity and the compositional work of each picture needs time, and time is money.

But the main part of the price is that I sell you a part of my own soul.

Each painting is different. I cannot paint twice the same thing because each painting is another part of my own soul. Once this part is on the canvas — i.e. out of my unconscious — it doesn’t mean anything any longer to paint it again, because it has become conscious. I can only paint what is in my own unconscious; that’s what makes the priceless emotive value of my works.

The price of my paintings cannot be something else but a small compensation for the pain I feel when I leave one of them — i.e. the pain caused by the separation of this part of myself.

Furthermore, from a financial point of view, experience shows that original paintings are one of the best conceivable investments. Every day, art auction prices keep rising, particularly for works of artists who haven’t paint many pictures.

For example Jan Vermeer of Delft has only painted about thirty pictures. His works are priceless.

I’m persuaded that in about 10 or 20 years, my works will value at least 100 times the price they will be paid at the present time.

In other words: if you want silk, you have to be prepared to pay for it.

(Back to Purchase)

Page updated July 30th 2004

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