Bernard Ewell "Salvador Dali ARTPRO"

MOVING ON AND MOVING OVER

2011-11-23T13:01:00.000-07:00

MOVING ON AND MOVING OVER

Good news, folks! At last our new website is up and offering hopefully easy navigation. It's the same address: bernardewell.com.

To keep reading this blog, you'll have to go to the website, click on the very obvious "OUR BLOG" and, I hope, link to it. Now I'm perfectly aware that there are a couple of people linked to this site whom I'd rather shed in the transition, but that probably won't happen. The rest of you will, I hope, create your link.

We are engaged in an aggressive SEO (search engine optimization) campaign and this is all part of that effort. Your linking will help strengthen our site in the eyes of GOOGLE and I'll be grateful.

I plan to be more active in my blogging and I'll make every effort to post interesting and entertaining material. The focus will continue to be on Salvador Dali and I still have lots of stories to tell.

Charles Kurault once said, "If you write enough words, one or two of them may jump up and bite you." Some that I have written already have. Charles Kurault also used to say at the end of a television report, "I'll see you on the radio."

I'll see you on the new blog.

DOING SWIMMINGLY IN THE CANYON

2011-10-31T13:12:00.001-06:00

DOING SWIMMINGLY IN THE CANYON

Actually, we don't have enough water in our canyon to actually swim--except when a flash flood comes roaring down the Rio Galisteo at the bottom of our property. Then for anywhere from a few hours to a few days we can hear the water from our house.

So what do I mean by the headline? I mean to indicate that since Suzanne and I moved the offices of Bernard Ewell Art Appraisals, LLC to my home in Apache Canyon from our historic compound on Old Santa Fe Trail in Santa Fe, business has grown steadily. What's the explanation? Who knows?

Our new business model is working very well and we are just about to put up a new and better website. You will still get there through http://www.bernardewell.com/. In just a couple of weeks you should be able to check it out and if you don't find it contains answers to all of your questions or you don't find it easy to navigate, let me know, Please.

I'm just back from the Southwest Art History Conference in Taos, New Mexico so I won't post much this time. I was one of the originators of the conference twenty-three years ago. Curator David Witt was the idea guy and I supported him. It has grown into a very strong annual event and we had speakers from all over the country.

As you can guess from the title, there was no Salvador Dali content other than some discussions with art professionals who need my Dali expertise and some stories I told at meals. There is no shortage of good Dali market stories with better characters than I could make up for a novel.

WHERE ARE WE?

2011-10-19T10:05:00.000-06:00

WHERE ARE WE?

A conversation with Dali dealer Joe Nuzzolo today made me ask myself (as he had) where are we in the ongoing Dali Wars?

Lawsuits: The lawsuits filed by Park West Gallery against Fine Art Registry and the lawsuits filed against Park West by Theresa Franks, Fine Art Registry and various former clients are pretty much in an advanced state of rigormortis. Some claims against Park West have been dismissed (such as Sharon Day's) and papers have been filed seeking to dismiss the others. The class action suits against Park West have pretty much evaporated like a late morning coastal fog.

I currently have no involvement in any of the legal proceedings and have no relationship with Park West Gallery. As you know, at one time I examined and gave opinions about the authenticity of Dali prints that Park West bought, but never did an appraisal for them. I have, through all of the online attacks by Fine Art Registry, depositions and court testimony, had no reason to change any of the opinions that I developed. They were developed through examining prints, doing research and, especially, through being the only Dali expert to do due diligence by traveling to Italy and Spain and confirming all information at the source. Of course, in the court cases, I have been the only truly experienced and independent expert.

Dali dealers continue to sell good and bad Dali prints and original works. Almost none do due diligence by having me check out what they sell. Their clientele are no better protected than they were in the worst days of the Dali market. If the dealers use one of the "catalogs" to "authenticate" a print, they are on very shaky ground. If they use one of the self-styled "experts" to "authenticate" a print, they are on very shaky ground. Both Sotheby's and Christie's continue to follow very compromised and dangerous paths to Dali "authentications" and I am anxious for one of them to be named a defendant in a lawsuit as a result. Because of the disservice and personal vendettas of their bogus Dali "expert" they have turned away some pretty fine original Dali artworks and thus tainted the pieces and greatly hurt the sellers. I just don't understand why they won't listed to reason and change their policy to better and more honestly serve their clientele.

Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness in the Art Market is through editing and hopefully will be available to readers soon. My second book, Persistence of Enigma: The Salvador Dali Market is moving forward slowly because of the crush of business and life.

Theresa Franks and Fine Art Registry have backed off on their lies and attacks. As I was quoted as saying in the Fine Art Investigations article (last blog), living in rattlesnake country, I know better than to stir up a viper. If you are reading this, I assume you read that article which is linked to my last posting. It has been picked up and disseminated through other blogs, newsletters and news services but will not do nearly enough to counter the damage done by Franks and FAR.

Online, especially on Facebook, a lot of interesting photographs of Dali have been posted by Enrique Zepeda, Joe Nuzzolo and others. Paul Chimera continues to post some good blogs and the lines between the good guys and the bad continue to be pretty much unchanged.

Here in the canyon we are having a gorgeous Fall. The aspens are pretty much past their prime, but the cottonwoods and willows are gloriously golden. We have a nightly visit from a bear who is trying to bulk up for winter and the coyotes go about their usual business. We had a visit from a roadrunner a couple of days ago. They are always so entertaining. I have finger surgery today and we are hosting a wedding at our house on Saturday. Same old same old........

A MUST READ !!!

2011-10-03T12:44:00.000-06:00

A MUST READ REPORT ON THERESA FRANKS AND FINE ART REGISTRY

Much has been said on this blog about Theresa Franks, her bogus "art marking system" and her attacks on me because I am the expert witness who testifies against her. Now a totally independent and disinterested writer, Michael Wilson, has posted the results of an invesitigation he conducted into Theresa Franks and her Fine Art Registry sites.

I believe it is a very fine article as Wilson had to work his way through all of the interlocking chambers of horror that Franks has constructed to defame her targets, stir up ignorant folks with the beiief that they've been screwed, and spread lies about topics on which this self-styled "art expert" (without credentials) believes she has something to say.

Read the full article at http://www.fineartinvestigations.blogspot.com/.http://www.fineartinvestigations.blogspot.com/

ED WESTON PULLS A DALI SHENANIGAN Part 2

2011-09-22T21:55:00.001-06:00

ED WESTON PULLS A DALI SHENANIGAN, Part 2

So, I've told you that Ed Weston called to "run an idea" past me which he believed would help him sell a couple of hundred fake prints of "Discovery of America By Christopher Columbus". I knew the edition very well. It was part of my first Dali case in which I served as expert witness for the prosecution - State of New Mexico vs. Ron Caven, Kurt Caven and Shelby Fine Art.

A transparency of the original 1958-1959 painting titled "The Dream of Columbus" was given to Jean-Paul Delcourt (aka David Mondai; aka David Mondai-Delcourt) by A. Reynolds Morse of The Salvador Dali Museum/Foundation. He quickly revoked his permission for its reproduction, but Delcourt proceeded anyway. He sold a publication contract to Gilbert Hamon who prodused 1,000 prints on "pre-signed paper" which I proved over and over again in court exhibited fake signatures. I believe the paper was signed by John Peter Moore (former Dali secretary) or his wife Katherin (as Moore later suggested to me).

Now, back to Ed's phone call.......

He said, "We all know those things are bogus, Bernard, but how about this.... You know we're coming up on some centennial of Columbus discovering this place (Los Aneles?) and I have friends who know a lot of Mafia guys. You know theyr'e all Italians and I bet they'd buy this shit. Here's what I plan to do.

When the three reproduction ships sail from New York to Florida (after crossing the Atlantic from Spain), I'm going to do this event next to the moored ships in Miami. I'm going to have Diego Colon--the twentieth generation grandson of Christopher Columbus--arrive by helicopter. He'll stamp the family crest on every print and then sign them. If that isn't brilliant enough, I'll also give away a Columbus half-dollar with each print sold. I'll send you a set--print and coin. The Mafia guys should eat it up."

How could I respond except to say, "Ed, I see you're thinking big, as always. Go for it and good luck. Let me know how it goes."

He did. He called a couple of month later and said, "Aw, the whole thing's in the toilet. Those damn ships never made it. Spain is going crazy over the Olympics and forgot about Columbus. I still got Diego Colon to stamp and sign the prints and I still give away a Columbian half-dollar with each one. Thing is, I still have a lot of them. Don't worry. I'll send you yours."

I don't think Ed did sell very many because I have never been asked to appraise one and with the volume of Dali prints that I appraise, that's surprising. You have to agree, however, my job's more entertaining that almost any other. After all, I am immersed in Salvador Dali every day.

Here is a picture of Diego Colon, twentieth generation grandson of Christopher Columbus, signing Ed's fake prints.

ED WESTON PULLS A DALI SHENANIGAN Part 1

2011-09-20T20:39:00.001-06:00

ED WESTON PULLS A DALI SHENANIGAN Part 1

In my thirty-one years of debunking cons and scams related to the sale of prints attributed to Salvador Dali, I have seen some doozies, but perhaps Ed Weston topped all of his competitors. Yes, I know, Edward Weston was a well-known photographer, but I'm talking about the California art publisher and distributor who founded Edward Weston Publishing.

I met Ed one evening when legendary New York print dealer Marty Gordon, who founded Gordon's Print Price Annual, asked me to accompany him to have dinner in Los Angeles with a friend. We drove to the St. James Club on Sunset Blvd. in a fabulous Art Deco building. The club was very upscale (the cashews in the bar came mounted on little wheels because they were so huge). I liked Ed from the first, but sensed that he was somewhat of a flim-flam man. I was to learn that he was actually a flaboyant pirate in a business made up of fantastic characters.

What was I doing hanging with Marty in Los Angeles, anyway? We had both been hired by Forest Lawn Corporation (yes, that Forest Lawn) which owned a lot of businesses other than the famous cemetary. One was Upstairs Gallery, whose four locations had recently been raided by a multi-agency police squad. I was to examine and pass judgement on all of the Dali prints in the Upstairs inventory and Marty was to do the same for the Miros. Our opinions would then be used by the DA to press charges, or not. We worked every day in the evidence room of the LAPD in the basement of Parker Center. We were surrounded by the proof that every item on earth has been used at some time to kill someone. It was the beginning of a very close and mutually rewarding friendship between me and Marty. I still miss him.

Well that evening at the St. James the three of us had a delighful and very amusing time. Ed and I later kept in touch and I even hired him to be part of a team of expert witnesses I assembled for a court case. Later, my beloved Melinda and I stayed at Ed's home for several days. Right after the 1994 Northridge Earthquake, I called to check on him and he told me he was up to his knees in smashed Picasso ceramics and fully a third of his extensive collection was gone.

Since we talked frequently, I was not surprised when Ed called one day to "run an idea" past me. It involved one of the best know editions of fake prints attributed to and sold as being original Dali prints.

You are going to love what Ed proposed to do to sell a couple of hundred prints. He had designed an elaborate event to launch the sales of what everyone knew were fake prints; but these had been enhanced in a most ingenious way. I'll tell that story in Ed Weston Pulls A Dali Shenanigan Part 2.

Ed died at the age of 82 in 2007. He lived well and he lived large. He was unique.

Oh, what print was it? "Discovery of America By Christopher Columbus".

NO OTHER PLACE LIKE SANTA FE

2011-09-15T16:43:00.000-06:00

NO OTHER PLACE LIKE SANTA FE

When I first moved to Santa Fe eleven years ago (after doing business here monthly for almost thirty years) people would ask why, after thirty years in Colorado, I had moved. I would tell them it was because Santa Fe is the most spiritual place I know. After a while I changed the answer to "Because Santa Fe is the most entertaining place I know."

I just returned from a 2,300 mile driving trip. I went first to Colorado Springs to pick up my son Duncan, daughter-in-law Mariana and their enormous Rhodesian Ridgeback. We drove to Houston where they took flight for Rio de Janeiro--Mariana's home. The job prospects are much better there than in Colorado. I then drove back to Santa Fe. As always, I was very glad to be back in my canyon paradise where we live within a National Historic Park. I didn't remember that Texas was so huge and so boring.

The lead line of the lead article in the Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper reminded me of what an entertaining place this is:

"Santa Fe County road maintenance manager Diego Gomez said Thursday that his decision to use county equipment and staff to work on a private driveway had nothing to do with the fact that his mother-in-law lives at the end of it."

Actually, I think he got tired of having his wife demand, why, with all the equipment and men he had, her elderly mother was still having to travel over tha wretched road. The poor guy didn't mean to do anything unethical, he just wanted some peace.

CONTINUING CASUALTIES OF GOOGLEBOMB

2011-08-31T19:59:00.001-06:00

CONTINUING CASUALTIES OF GOOGLE BOMB

Just as with all warfare, the casualties last far beyond the live action. Throughout 2008, 2009 and 2010, Theresa Franks of the bogus Fine Art Registry posted lies about me on the Internet. Some were posted in her own name, some were hatchet jobs by paid assassins and some were posted with aliases to hide their true origin. Why was I targeted?

More than anything else, it was because I was to be the expert witness in lawsuits in which Theresa Franks and Fine Art Registry were defendants. Today it's possible to destroy the credibility of an opposing expert before the trial even begins. Scary, unjust and just plain despicable. Not surprising considering the source.

Today a writer asked me some questions about Theresa Franks and I was at a loss to fully answer. I told him I was hampered by a lack of knowledge about psychological disorders. I also told him that I live in rattlesnake country. I know how to catch, move and release snakes. I also know better than to stir up vipers. This post may do just that, but not nearly to the extent that a lawsuit against my attackers would.

The real tragedy of all of this twisted lying is that a career of exemplary professional services, unsurpassed credibility and total integrity has been almost destroyed. When people with Salvador Dali artworks are given my name, they probably Google me and are treated to a series of fabricated lies about my knowledge, professionalism and reputation. Not surprising, they go elsewhere. This means they probably become the victims of those in the market who don't know what they should.
The very best--and only totally didinterested Dali expert has thus been pushed aside. At the same time, my business has suffered and I have been unable to help a lot of people who would otherwise greatly benefit from my knowledge. Perhaps I'll have to stir up that viper after all.

ANTONIO GATTORNO ARTWORK FOR SALE

2011-08-23T15:21:00.004-06:00

GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO PURCHASE SURREAL ART

2011-08-23T15:14:00.001-06:00

GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO PURCHASE SURREALIST ART

I have been contacted privately about an offering of works by a major surrealist whose work is little known. Antonio Gattorno (Cuban 1904-1980) created a large body of art, much of which is clearly Dali-inspired, but never derivative. Born in the same year as the Spanish Master, Gattorno developed a huge reputation in Cuba, was a close friend of Ernest Hemingway (who wrote a book about him) and John Dos Pasos. He then went to New York where he was supported by his wife and conequently did not develop a commercial career of gallery shows, museum exhibitions and publications.

When I appraised the artist's daughter's estate in 1995 (I was referred by The Salvador Dali Museum), I was stunned by the exceptional quality of the work and its relationship to the perceptions and theories of Dali. The Antonio Gattorno Foundation was set up by the artist's neice and her husband and in time they published a gorgious book titled Gattorno: A Cuban Painter For The World. Now, they are offering nine original works in various mediums at very reasonable prices.

In the Introduction to Sean Pooles book, Juan A. Martinez wrote, "The wonder kid of Cuba's art academy in the 1920s, one of the leading figures in the Cuban modernist art movement in the 1930s and a recognized painter of the New Romanticism trend in New York in the 1940s (photographed by Walker Evans), today Gattorno has become practically unknown." A look at the book or the website http://www.artbyantoniogattorno.com/ will show what an accomplished and diverse artist he was.

Can't afford a Dali? Take a look at Gattorno. Contact Terri Cabral or Sean Poole at http://www.agattorno/

EARLY REYNOLDS MORSE Part three

2011-08-10T20:37:00.000-06:00

Lincoln in Dalivision

Once again we turn to Reynolds Morse's ca. 1989-1990 Memorandum For Prosecutors, Judges and Juries Involved in Dali Art Fraud Cases and find him discussing the Dali print that would end up being faked more than any other image (even Persistence of Memory). Yes, that would be the image released in 1976 in edition of 1,240 mixed media prints as Lincoln in Dalivision. The publisher was Levine & Levine in New York and one of the major distributors was Martin Lawrence Limited Editions in Van Nuys, California. Just a few year later Martin Lawrence would claim to have no records of the publication and sales.

The original image was Salvador Dali's original oil painting Gala Looking At The Mediterranean Sea Which at a Distance of Twenty Meters is Transformed Into The Portrait of Abraham Lincoln (Homage to Rothko). The prints were originally described as original lithographs. Morse wrote in his memorandum, "When I pointed out to Dali it was not a lithograph but a reproduction of his painting, he produced a small "original" etching (or drawing) of a small head which was printed in red at the lower right of this limited edition so that the word "original" could be left in the literature."

I heard Ren tell this story many times, but he was never able to confirm that Dali created the small Picassoesque head with extended tongue as an etching--something I very much doubt. If Dali had created the image on a plate, it would have been a drypoint. When examining the prints with the remarque printed on them, I have never been convinced that it was printed from an original plate. It appears rather to be an embossed reproduction of the original image. None the less, it was accepted by all and indeed the prices paid did rise.

Many fake versions of the image quickly appeared; most with forged signatures. How many bogus editions are in circulation? Who knows. I have tracked at least eight and, at one time, had samples of six of them together in a single location--Upstairs Gallery's warehouse in Huntington Beach, California. I had been hired by the gallery's parent company--Forest Lawn Corporation--to examine prints of many Dali images that were returned by collectors after the Los Angeles District Attorney busted four Upstairs locations. Some examples from the fake editions were sold by various galleries for up to $25,000, as original prints by Salvador Dali, of course.

The Lincoln in Dalivision image was also used for bogus stamped brass bas reliefs, 4,500 solid metal castings with precious metal patinas (silver, gold and platinum) and a "tapestry". This last was actually a printed serigraph on fabric and the design was not woven as it must be for a tapestry. Dali had nothing to do with these efforts to capitalize on the popularity of his imagery.

I continue to see examples from every edition with regularity. Yes, I also see "good" prints from the Levine & Levine edition. I'm always happy to check them out for collectors and dealers and give them all of the information known.

The edition was released at an initial price of $750 and sold out very quickly. In fact, the whirlwind sales caused the vendors to start announcing that the value would quickly climb to as high as $30,000. My files are full of the high hype mailings. Some of the fakes were sold for $25,000 and it is clear from current EBay listings that there are still owners who have note learned anything beyond the sales pitch they heard in the late 1970s and 1980s.

EARLY REYNOLDS MORSE Part 2

2011-08-02T12:05:00.000-06:00

EARLY REYNOLDS MORSE Part 2

In his ca. 1990 Memorandum For Prosecutors, Judges and Juries Involved in Dali Art Fraud Cases, Ren Morse, President of The Salvador Dali Foundation and The Salvador Dali Museum, refers to, "The most flagrant case where a commissioned Dali subject was ripped off is the reprinting of certain watercolors from the illustrated book, Alice In Wonderland by Collectors Guild in collaboration with American Express." He states that, "it was reportedly a successful five million dollar scam."

Well, I have the rest of the story. I was the government's expert in that case and traveled to both Washington and New York to work with the Federal Trade Commission on the investigation. In New York I examined Alice In Wonderland prints at both the American Express headquarters at the World Financial Center (across the street from the World Trade Center) and a warehouse in Mt. Vernon in Westchester County. It was at this latter location that I was accompanied by my eleven year old daughter who afterwards said to me and our FTC and FBI companions, "Those guys were really creepy. They were just like the Maffia." The FBI agent replied that they were the Maffia.

In 1968, Salvador Dali painted twelve original gouaches to illustrate the Lewis Carroll classic. He was paid $5,000. Maecenas Press (a division of Random House) printed reproductions of the twelve watercolors as well as a drypoint and issued an edition of 2,800 portfolios.

The rights to the images were acquired by Max Munn of Collectors Guild, Ltd. and he cut a distribution deal with American Express who offered four of the reprinted images to cardholders in July, 1984. The AmEx brochure stated the prints were "original lithographs by Salvador Dali" and there were "no prior states of these original lithographs, and no prior editons." The promotional mailing also said the images on Arches paper, "were signed by Salvador Dali before the lithographs were individually hand-pulled, numbered and custom-framed."

I was able to prove that none of this was true. In his opinion on the case, Judge Pierre N. Level wrote, "The prints appear to have been signed by Dali, whereas in fact Dali never saw them or even knew they were being printed." Collectors Guild agreed with the FTC to stop misrepresenting the prints and American Express eventually made refunds totaling about $2.5 million to cardholders.

OK, so what's the rest of the rest of the story? American Express did some fancy footwork and in large measure avoided any legal responsibility. Their letters to cardholders who had bought and then questioned the prints are an interesting read. Early on, all assurances were made that the prints were fully original and legitimate. As the scheme unravelled, however, the responses waffle more and more, but never actually accept responsibility. In fact, American Express, expressing indignation at being fooled themselves, actually became a party to the action on the side of the Government against Collectors Guild. Not all purchasers of the bogus prints were contacted and reimbursed either.

EARLY INFO. FROM REYNOLDS MORSE

2011-07-28T12:22:00.003-06:00

EARLY INFO. FROM REYNOLDS MORSE

I'd almost forgotten about the undated essay I received from Reynolds Morse, probably in 1988-1990. The founder and president of The Salvador Dali Museum and I were corresponding about the massive increase in fake prints attributed to Salvador Dali. We had met and shared what each of us knew and we'd also had meetings with prosecutors who were filing charges and scheduling court cases. Little did I know that in the next five years I'd spent as much as 70% of my time as an expert for almost every federal law enforcement and regulatory agency as well as a great many state and private entities.

The document is titled MEMORANDUM for Prosecutors, Judges and Juries Involved in Dali Art Fraud Cases. The cover page is on the letterhead of The Salvador Dali Foundation, Inc. and IMS Company, Morse's plastic injection molding company. There is a typed message "With my compliments and gratitude. When evil is Bold Right must be Strong. Ren Morse."

There is then a hand-written note: "Dear Bernard: Here is the first "final" draft of something I have felt needed by all who are trying to stem the flood of Dali bogus reproductions. Any comments or suggestions will be appreciated to make this more useful. Sincerely, Ren."

In the opening paragraph, Ren uses a word he coined from which I have always gotten a kick. He refers to "unscrupulous art dealsters (dealer-gangsters)," a concept that was to prove far more true and wide spread than either of us knew at the time.

He goes on to point out that the "dealsters" and their lawyers keep confusing prosecutors and judges with "verbal obfuscations" to "muddy and distort simple facts." He was so right as he was in his observation that, "...a sort of clandestine art mafia has grown up..." he just didn't know the extent of the problem. Or, perhaps he did because he then mentions, "the sheer enormity of the multi-billion dollar Dali scams"

Ren Morse, in his memo, addresses the various purported mediums of the genuine and the fake prints. I am especially interested to note something that I had forgotten he said, but which I had probably figured out by then. Dali's etchings are not etchings, but are drypoints.

He wrote, "Many were by his own hand, and were done between 1934 and 1978. On some plates, professional help was supplied. But in the end, for all practical purposes here, all of his etchings (drypoints) were produced under his own personal supervision and were signed by him for specific clients such as Pierre Argillet and others."

Unfortunately, the market generally believes that all intaglio prints by Dali are etchings. In fact, they are drypoints. The problem is that few people know the difference. Having actually done both, I do. A drypoint is created when the artist scratches the design into the surface of a copper or zinc plate and that plate is inked and polished prior to passing through the press with a piece of paper. The lines in the plate that hold the ink for an etching are created (bitten) by acid and in an engraving they are gouged out of the surface. Each intaglio medium looks sightly different and connoisseurship is required to properly identify the resulting prints.

Salvador Dali chose drypoint because it was immediate. He "drew" on the plate with his diamond point in a totally spontaneous act of creation and did not have to muck around with ground, acid, proofs and all the rest of what he considered the tiresome process of creating an etching.

Does it matter? It does if one is examining a print to discern all of the clues that demonstrate it is a genuine Dali. It does if one is interested in accuracy. It is also one of the many tell-tale signs that an art professional is, or ain't.

We'll look further at Reynold Morse's memo in future postings. In the meantime,don't refer to "Dali's etchings".

BACK ON THE TRAIL AGAIN

2011-07-24T12:23:00.000-06:00

BACK ON THE TRAIL AGAIN

There comes a time in the affairs of man...when it's time to move on. Actually, I've not so much moved on as I have picked up and moved twelve miles south. I've sold my marvelous ca. 1820s compound on Old Santa Fe Trail because I no longer need a staff of four or five and one of the most visible locations in Santa Fe. After all, I'm semi-retired.

My splendid assistant Suzanne and I are now comfortably settled in the large studio attached to my home in Lower Canoncito at the bottom of Apache Canyon. Since I live within a National Historic Park, it is a really dramatic and beautiful setting. This is also the great transportation corridor through the southern spur of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.

Behind our property is the Santa Fe Trail, which in the nineteenth century (1820-1885) connected New Mexico Territory with the rest of the United States--primarily Missouri. Running parallel to it is Old Las Vegas (NM) highway which was Route 66 prior to 1937 when Route 66 was rerouted. Also passing through the canyon are the old Indian and Spanish trail along Rio Galisteo, the mainline of the Santa Fe Railroad (which carries only two Amtrack trains a day) and Interstate 25 which runs from Mexico to Canada. I have developed a six page chronology of the Spanish expeditions (starting with Coronado in 1542), famous people, armies, stage coach lines and special freight (first printing press, first piano) that have traveled through my front yard. A rugged ridge separates us from the Interstate so our location at the end of our road and within the park is remote and private.

From here, I can handle my international practice in the authentication and appraisal of artworks attributed to Salvador Dali and all other appraisal assignments that I choose to accept. I feel really good about being home every day with my wife, pets and wildlife.

The mailing address of the business is now: PMB #447; 7 Avenida Vista Grande B-7; Santa Fe, New Mexico 87508. The email address is still artpro@bernardewell.com and the telephone numbers are still 505-954-4113 and 800-884-3254.

"PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN"

2011-06-12T12:15:00.002-06:00

"PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN"

Shortly after the 1987 broadcast of CBS News' 60 Minutes telecast about abuses in the Salvador Dali market I had an eye-opening experience. I had taken the story to the network and then worked closely with Mike Wallace and his producer to put the program together. I had hoped it would alert art buyers to the extent of fraud in the market, but was not free to appear on-air because I was also serving as the prosecution's expert witness in the trial of Ron and Kurt Caven of Shelby Fine Arts. They had forty-three galleries around the southwest and eventually plead guilty to selling a vast number of fake prints attributed to Dali.

I was generally satisfied with Wallace's report, but soon found out that it had not had the effect I had hoped for.

On a visit to a gallery that heavily advertised its offerings of Dali prints, I was at first pleased to find that a monitor in the main gallery room was showing the 60 Minutes segment. When it ended, however, the dealer, a smarmy character in sharkskin suit and diamond pinkie ring, walked over and addressed the small crowd that had been watching.

"That really frosts me," he said with feeling. "We work our butts off doing the right thing and selling only the best and guys like that taint the whole market because they get greedy." His lack of articulation as he continued was remarkable. I left the gallery soon after satisfying myself that fully two thirds of the "Dali" prints he was offering were fakes.

I was reminded of the scene in The Wizard of Oz in which the dog Toto pulls back a curtain to reveal that the "Great and Terrible Oz" was actually the humbug carnival balloonist from Kansas. The Salvador Dali market has been the playground of many such imposters.

A WORD ABOUT COMMENTS ON THIS BLOG

It is not uncommon for a posting on this blog to be followed by my receiving comments which I rarely post. Why? They usually consist of two types. There are those which fully agree with me and blast the same rotton apples that I try to counter, but have decided not to attack here because it just results in their ranting at higher volume. Many of these supportive come from a very well-informed and articulate Dali scholar in Germany.

The second type are not worth my time or yours.

AND THE CON GOES ON - "DALI BRONZES"

2011-05-27T13:30:00.001-06:00

AND THE CON GOES ON - "DALI" BRONZES

So there I was, once again explaining to a collector that the "original bronze by Salvador Dali" that she had bought was not what she had been told. I said it was created and cast posthumously and the Master never authorized it (though some are manufactured under highly questionable contracts); that he never saw it; that he never provided the signature facsimile on the base; and that it was best characterized as an "after" because it was an interpretation of a design that Dali created in another (two-dimensional) medium.

Such "Dali bronzes" are being sold in large numbers in Europe where they originated and are featured in several venues (Barcelona, Paris, London) set up to appear as Dali museums. I also told her that they are now being sold in the U. S. and, most disturbing of all, are being resold at many auctions as authentic. This last is dangerous as it strengthens the perception that the pieces have validity as artworks created by Salvador Dali.

If you are considering buying a sculpture attributed to Dali, already own one or know someone who does, we'd better talk so you get the straight information on what it actually is. Remember, being totally disinterested, I gain nothing from telling you an artwork is real or fake, valuable or worthless.

Check the website at http://www.bernardewell.com/ or call 1-800-884-3254. My job is to provide truthful answers. That's why I'm such a target of the bad guys.

LET'S GET THIS STRAIGHT

2011-05-27T13:11:00.000-06:00

LET'S GET THIS STRAIGHT:

After I posted about the expected sale of the fine collection of Salvador Dali original artworks to be offered by Baron Philippe duNoyer, this blog received a comment that I have posted below. It asked why I would say lauditory things about "a real schmuck" like Philippe Noyer. I presume this is a reference to the artist of that name. It also mentions his son Dennis.

Philippe duNoyer has no son and certainly is not a schmuck. Case of mistaken identity. The comment submitter said I should know better than to compliment Phillip Noyer. I had no such intention.

DEATH OF GALA

2011-05-22T21:07:00.000-06:00

DEATH OF GALA

That is the title of this poem. Who do you think wrote it?

I had a dream that Gala died
With no one standing by her side,
For even death refused to host
Such a terrifying ghost.

All lived in mortal fear of her,
A tigress with deep ruffled fur.
Adder-tongued, she struck at friends
To leave a scar that never mends.
Born too soon, died too late,
She deserved a better fate.

The sort of legend she became,
Tied to Dali's clounish fame,
Created minions who would poke
Specious fun at her and joke
About her ways behind her back.
Nor did their jibes irreverence lack,
Though to her face they would pretend
Her reign as queen would never end.

Who can count the human cost
To have a soul of Russian frost?
When none are left who can recall
The eyes that pierced a lover's wall
How sad no one should be bereft
When only Gala's name is left!
When mortal friends have been denied
And no one cares that one has died,
A force like Gala's fades away,
While Dali's courtiers mince and play.
Now all are gone who could endure
The weight of hatred so mature
It rejected love and chose
Just the callowest of those
Who came to love and stayed to hate
The temptress by the white-whashed-gate.
So the day that Gala died
No one mourned and no one cried.
With no lovers left to see
Her tarnished immortality,
The friends her tongue had wounded said,
"Her bitter soul is better dead."

OK, who do you think wrote that? It was privately printed in 1991 in a book titled Some Fifty Unprofessional Poems 1988-1933 (that's right). The book was given to me by the author along with another which contained olumns he had written about mining for a Colorado mountain newspaper.

It was written by A. Reynolds Morse, the great Dali collector, founder of The Salvador Dali Museum and The Salvador Dali Foundation.

GREAT DALI COLLECTION TO BE OFFERED FOR SALE

2011-05-18T11:59:00.001-06:00

GREAT DALI COLLECTION TO BE OFFERED FOR SALE

Remember, you heard it here first--even if we don't have all the details yet.

The Baron Philippe duNoyer, a longtime player in the market for Salvador Dali artworks, told me in a personal telephone call I made to him on his birthday that he is about to release his splendid collection of original Dali works. He accumulated them during the years that he was a Dali dealer in New York. He was also the exclusive North American representative for the great French publisher Pierre Argillet and the exclusive Albaretto Collection of Turin, Italy.

I have had the pleasure of examinng each of the original artworks and believe them to be a very fine selection. I also visited the chateau of Pierre Argillet and twice was a guest of the Albaretto family. In fact, I am the only person calling himself a Dali expert who has made those two efforts in pursuit of due dilligence. I know the sources of Philippe's art, I have seen the documentation, I have questioned the previous owners and I am fully satisfied that each of the artworks is genuine. Of course, it is the works themselves that really hold the clues for an art detective. Believe me, this is good stuff.

Now, about Baron Philippe himself. He and I have traveled in Europe together. I have watched him import and sell a great quantity of Dali artworks. I have been retained to examine and give opinions of authenticity for hundreds of pieces that he has handled. He has shipped art to me for examination. I have examined art in warehouses in New York and in Philippe's professional space. We have jointly investigated sources and have spent a vast amount of time discussing Dali, the market and the other players, both good and bad.
I have know him to always play it straight and be honest. He says, "If the cards are not all on the table, there is no game."

This will be an important offering of very good original Dali material. What I can't yet tell you is where and when it will be available. Watch this space for those details when Philippe is ready to release them.

Of Glass and Class

2011-05-04T11:26:00.000-06:00

OF GLASS AND CLASS

In my almost four decades of developing and pursuing a career as an international fine art appraiser, I have, of course, encountered a great many very accomplished artists, many of whom had international reputations. Few have impressed me as much as Ana Thiel of San Miguel de Alliende, Mexico. Her international reputation as a major artist working in glass in richly deserved. Her reputation as a very lovely person is also richly deserved and I am very proud to call her my friend.

Glass is unique in many of its limitations and the demands it makes on the artist. The degree of success represented by an artwork in glass is largely due to the artist's success in overcoming the limitations, pushing the medium and creating new effects and shapes. Ana's reputation is therefore indicative of her success in bending the material to her creative imagination and vision. Not only is her work a testiment to her technical virtuosity, but most of it is very beautiful also. Some of her pieces can be seen at her website www.anathiel.net.

Tomorrow (May 5) Ana has an exhibition opening at the Museo de Arte y Vivrio--The Museum of Art and Glass in Madrid, Spain. She has shown her work numerous times in Spain as well as having solo shows in Mexico, Sweden, USA, Japan, Portugal, Finland, Canada, Germany, Peru and Costa Rica. She has also been in group exhibits in many of these countries and also in France, Panama, Egypt, China, Ukraine, Belgium, Czechoslovakia (as it was then) and Switzerland. She seems far too young for such a resume, but she works very hard at her large studio in San Miguel and at numerous other studios where she does residencies and seminars--such as Pilchuck in Washington state.

Ana Thiel is the subject of a gorgious new book as well as being included in 10 other books and an extensive list of catalogs and journals. I am especially glad that she has received so much recognition because I was thrilled by her work when Melinda and I three times visited her home and studio. I believe I can say that I immediately knew I was in the presence of a major artistic talent. When we met at a lunch arranged by friends so we could meet, we enjoyed her as a beautiful, engaging and very kind person, but her work itself told me that I now knew a glass artist of true international significance. We are so pleased that she'll be lecturing--and hopefully exhibiting--in Santa Fe next year.

WANNA BUY A PAINTING?

2011-04-27T13:52:00.000-06:00

WANNA BUY A PAINTING?

I've been asked more than once, "So how much does a painting usually cost?" There is, of course, no definitive answer to this unreasonable question, but the parameters within which it might be answered have just expanded--explosively. Have you ever given an estimate as to how high a price might someday be paid for a single painting? For several decades we've all been raising our estimates. Are you sitting down?

An unconfirmed, but widely accepted report has it that recently one of the five Paul Cezanne "The Card Players" paintings has sold privately for $250 million! It was owned by the late Greek shipping magnate George Embiricos. Others from the set--painted late in the artist's career--are owned by the Barnes Foundation, Courtauld Institute, Musee d'Orsay, and the Metropolitan Museum.

The reportedly sold painting measures 97 X 130 centimeters. That's 38.3 X 51.3 inches (just right for your living room) so the price paid, if correct, equals $127,240.07 per square inch. Sorry you weren't in on the deal.

BOUND FOR SPAIN? POSSIBLY

2011-04-25T16:12:00.000-06:00

BOUND FOR SPAIN? POSSIBLY

The Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali has announced that with several other entities it will sponsor an international seminar on authentication and the identification of fake works of art. The goal is to bring together experts who will exchange information on detection techniques, experiences and ideas for legal measures. It is scheduled for June 19, 20 and 21.

Enrique Zepeda and I are discussing attending, but must first find out more about the agenda and goals of the seminar. If it is intended to focus on artworks attributed to Salvador Dali, we will definitely go. That will give us the opportunity to celebrate Enrique's birthday with a paella and Catalan wine! (Oh, yes, we do knoiw how to have fun). We presume, but don't yet know, that the seminar will be in Figures.

Since graphic works (prints) are to be one topic, it is especially important for me to be there if Dali is the focus. After all, I have examined over 55,000--more than anyone else--and I have the files and expertise to offer assistance to my colleagues, museums, collectors and yes, the Fundacio itself.

Will they, or won't they? (go) Stay tuned.

THE DIEGO RIVERA PICKPOCKET and ARTFUL DODGERS

2011-04-06T16:23:00.000-06:00

THE DIEGO RIVERA PICKPOCKET AND ARTFUL DODGERS

You have read here about the fun we had with Enrique and Silvia Zepeda in Mexico City. One of the things we did was to visit the Diego Rivera Mural Museum which displays a huge painting containing most of the historic figures of the history of Mexico. Enrique and I enjoyed identifying the portraits to each other and discussing the myriad of interesting details.

One was a small boy lower left who is picking the pocket of a gentleman--possibly the 1890s. I made mention to Enrique that perhaps I should consider using the image for the cover of my book Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness In The Art Market. The title, of course, is taken from the Charles Dickens pickpocket character in Oliver Twist. Being the splendid fellow he is, I soon received an e-mail from Enrique with that image from the mural attached.

The book is in final rewrite and will go to an editor for preliminary review next week. I feel it is going to be well-received, provide a lot of perspectives on the art market that hardly anyone (except the insiders) know, and piss off a lot of dealers. As John Pope Hennessey wrote, "A dedication to the truth can make one many enemies". Who knows that better than me; the target of a Googlebomb, online lies and attacks from the lower reaches of the Dali market?

It will be good to soon move on to full concentration on my next book, Persistence of Enigma: The Salvador Dali Market. Now that one's really going to upset some people, but after all, if they'd live their lives better, I'd have nothing to write about.

THE EYES HAVE IT!

2011-04-01T13:52:00.000-06:00

THE EYES HAVE IT!

Yes, Melinda's eye operation was a great success even though the doctor said that because of all of her challenges it was a hard one. He was sufficiently satisfied with the results to take photographs to use in teaching at the University of North Carolina Medical Center. She is dazzled by how bright the world is and has even been able to reduce the size of the print on her Kendel reader. It will be a new day for her in many respects and we both thank you for the positive energy and prayers you sent her way. She'll be home next Tuesday.

NEED SOME PRAYERS

2011-03-27T16:43:00.000-06:00

NEED SOME PRAYERS

Whatever your religious and spiritual beliefs may be, I would really appreciate your saying a prayer for my darling wife Melinda who will be having eye surgery at the University of North Carolina on Monday. Her left eye will hava a cataract removed and receive a new lense. While everyone says this is a relatively routine procedure these days, Melinda faces a special challenge.

She has almost no vision in her right eye, so this operation on her left is the one big chance to see better in the future. She has gone through weeks of concern about the possibility (one in a thousand) of something going wrong and then facing a future of virtual blindness.

Melinda and I have three adopted kids in India and we have visited them a couple of times. All three are Tibetan refugees and one, Wangchuk, is a monk in a Buddhist monestary outside Mysore. Melinda also sponsors four monks at the Drepong Losling Monestary further north. Because of our years long association with the monestaries, we have been assured that prayers are being said in every Tibetan Buddhist monestary in India.

Here in Santa Fe, they are praying at Santo Domingo Pueblo and a Hispanic women's prayer group. So please join in and add your best thoughts and wishes and prayers to the collective energy that will accompany her tomorrow. Many thanks for your blessings. Stay tuned for a report.

SUCH A GUY, THAT ENRIQUE!

2011-03-12T12:37:00.004-07:00

SUCH A GUY, THAT ENRIQUE!

Well it took me long enough to find the time here in San Miguel de Alliende, Mexico to post a report of our visit with Enrique and Silvia Zepeda in Mexico City last week end. Vacations like this are not what they used to be. I'm sitting here in my third floor writing studio. I can hear Cuban music from the Jardin (main plaza) because the annual Cuba Fest is on. Melinda is joining friends for lunch but I begged off to work on editing Artful Dodgers and I'm surrounded by a computer and three telephones. What's wrong with this picture?

OK. Enough whining. Rather, I'll think about Mexico City and the marvelous time we had with Enrique and Silvia and their two very bright boys (8 & 11). We spent an awful lot of time in the car (Enrique and Silvia were tireless in dealing with the traffic) but saw a lot of really terrific art as well. Of course we had some memorable meals, saw the sites and thoroughly enjoyed the delightful family. For me personally, however, the time that Enrique and I spent looking at his Dali collection of artworks and books, talking Dali subjects, comparing notes on the various players in the Dali market and sharing as only two total nuts on a subject can, was invaluable. Silvia looked slightly perturbed/bored a couple of times, but we tried not to impose too much on the lovely ladies. Especially as both are so much fun and so interesting themselves. (Silvia is a sparkling doll!)

Enrique really knows a lot about Dali, Mexican art, the art market and a host of other subjects. With a career as a diplomat, a career with the Attorney General's office and a career as a lawyer, he can speak on almost any topic. He is never separated from his iPad (probably even in the shower) and he has the world at his fingertips. This is the type of intellectually stimulating person I most like to be with. This was our third time together and I'm looking forward to more. We've tentatively set our next visit for Santa Fe.

At the Bellas Artes (national gallery of art) and the Museo Dolores Oumeda, Enrique and I had a terrific opportunity to look at art together--especially Diego Rivera--and compare notes. I love doing this with another art expert because I always learn things I didn't know and learn about how much the other person knows. With Enrique, it was especially rewarding. That man knows alot. He also has a very good eye and brings a lot of perspectives (especially historic) to viewing art.

Better still, he fully exemplifies the first part of my motto:

If a person has integrity, nothing else matters

If a person does not have integrity, nothing else matters.

MIA CULPA - AGAIN

2011-03-08T08:12:00.003-07:00

MIA CULPA - AGAIN

No sooner had I returned from Mexico City and a splendid visit with Dali collector and scholar Enrique Zepeda, than I received an email from him pointing out that in my last blog posting I had referred to him as "Ernesto Zepeda".

Ernesto Zepeda is an Argentinian painter who lived for years in Santa Fe. I saw him frequently, we talked often and I consider him a fine man. Even so, he is no Enrique Zepeda, who continues to impress me with the breadth of his general knowledge, his insightful awareness of most things Dali and his generous kindness. I'll be posting a blog later today describing the fun and intellectual sharing of our visit, but for now, I want to sincerely apologize for referring to him by other than his correct name--my friend, Enrique Esteban Zepeda Vasquez.

And by the way, if anyone knows how I can insert the accents that a name such as Enrique's should properly have, please send instructions to me at artpro@bernardewell.com. I do not have Enrique's technical prowess. He carries an iPad everywhere and can make it do wonderous things.

HOLA FROM MEXICO !

2011-03-01T13:21:00.002-07:00

Hola From Mexico !

Here I again sit in my third floor writing studio working on the rewrite of Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness in the Art Market. With a terrific torta Cubana and a Cerveza Pacifico close at hand, gentle breezes wafting in from my roof-top terrace and all of San Miguel de Alliende around and below me, I am reminded of the thought that "the best revenge is to live well". So how am I doing?

With the promise of a luxury bus ride to Mexico City on Friday and several days with my friend Ernesto Zepeda, the Dali collector and scholar, the nastiness of Fine Art Registry and those associated with them seem a very long way away. A host of strong and supportive comments have come in from people who really do know the truth, but the settlement agreement in a recent lawsuit precludes me from publishing them. Pity, but it's the cost of deciding that no matter how badly I've been treated, no matter how many lies have been posted about me and no matter how flawed other "Dali experts" may be, I just don't want to spend the next three years of my life in a lawsuit proving myself right. The people who really matter and the people who really do know don't have to have me prove anything to them. I'll concentrate on living well and try to keep the poison extruded by others out of my life.

Oh, by the way...... One comment sent to this blog by someone too chicken to identify themself (although it's obvious who it is) referred to my posting in which I said I had never worked for Park West Gallery and said that I was lying. NO. I have never worked for Park West Gallery. I have only been retained as an independent Dali expert and believe me, that is a whole different role, especially when my reputation is everything and I shall never be influenced by a client to report opinions that I don't fully believe are true. Ever notice how those who don't understand integrity assume that everyone else is cheating?

So, about Artful Dodgers..... The rewrite (always a part of the process) is going well even though at one point I thought I might be in the position of Felix Mendelssohn who said after completing his Italian Symphony, "Of everything I have written down, as much was deleted as was allowed to stand."

Unraveling Dali's Les Caprices de Goya

Recently I received an interesting assignment. Actually, they all are.
Janice Embry Brown, docent extraordinaire at The Salvador Dali Museum, was asked a question about the printing methods used to produce the 80 prints of the Dali suite Les Caprices de Goya. She, always wanting to give the full and correct answers, passed the question on to Professor Elliott King who suggested she ask me since it is an area of my specialization.

Before leaving Santa Fe for San Miguel I did my research, copied entries from the two catalogues of Dali prints and other printed references and added notes from my files (the most extensive in the world) on my personal examination of a suite of the prints.

I found that the catalogues, as usual, were confused. Dali et Les Livres came the closest. My determination was as follows.

Salvador Dali obtained a set of reproductions of the eighty Francisco Goya images from the Musee de Castres--the Goya Museum--about two hundred fifty miles southwest of Paris. Between 1973 and 1977 he created drypoint plates which, when printed over reproductions of the Goyas, produced eighty two-artist prints. These were then hand colored with watercolor applied through stencils at Atelier J. J. Rigal.

The prints exhibit printed facsimile Goya signatures, titles and plate numbers, drypoint signatures of Dali and pencil signatures of Dali. The total edition size is 250 sets.

If you have any further explanation, additional information or new perspectives on this one of innumerable Dali print enigmas, please pass it on to me at artpro@bernardewell.com. I always appreciate such contributions.

Hasta Luego!

ANSWERING THE QUESTIONS

2011-02-21T11:48:00.003-07:00

ANSWERING THE QUESTIONS

So, there I was enjoying breakfast with friends in a beautiful courtyard restaurant in San Miguel de Alliende, Mexico, when that frequently asked question again came up. "What's happening with the Dali court cases and those crazies who were attacking you on-line? It seems that lots of people want to know that because for a couple of year there it was such a big topic and recently it's hardly been mentioned. OK, here goes.

THE DALI COURT CASES:

You'll remember that in August, Federal Court Judge Zatkoff dismissed the jury decision against Park West Gallery. That set up the stage for a second trial in Port Huron, Michigan. Park West Gallery would still be the plaintiff and the defendants would still be Fine Art Registry, Theresa Franks and David Phillips, her writer.

In December, Judge Zatkoff denied the FAR motion to overturn his ruling, but did give the defendants the opportunity to appeal his decision to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals. They have done so, but it is far from unclear that the court will accept the case. If they do, FAR will file their brief, Park West's attorneys will respond and the Circuit Court will hear verbal arguments before ruling. If they do not accept the case, Judge Zatkoff will order the retrial. Either way, it's going to be some months before there is forward movement.

Will I testify again? I don't know. I would expect that I will, but I currently have no contract with or retainer from either Park West Gallery of their law firm.

Now, about the attempted class action suits that FAR and others make so much noise about. Either they have been dismissed or are in the process of Park West moving for their dismissal. None have been certified to go forward or are even close to certification.

The State Court case filed by Fine Art Registry and others has been stayed pending an appeal by Frank Hunter of a decision to keep him in the case as a FAR witness. This matter also has a long way to go before either dying with a wimper or, less likely it seems, being tried.

THE LYING BASTARDS:

With no discernable purpose other than keeping the pot boiling, the FAR witch keeps throwing fuel onto the fire beneath her caldron of lies, innuendos and insults. She apparently continues to see me as a potent threat or she wouldn't continue her tirades.

How amusing to see that Fine Art Registry posted a photograph of me (taken from this blog) dressed in my costume for the Surreal Parade from The Salvador Dali Museum to the opening of the New Dali Museum. This they point to as evidence that I'm somehow irresponsible and ridiculous. They obviously know nothing of Dalinian culture and didn't even recognize that the action figure in my breast pocket was Sigmund Freud.

The posting refers to me as "...Park West Gallery's lone, self-proclaimed Dali authenticator, Bernie Ewell, an appraiser (so he claims) residing in New Mexico." That's "Thirty-nine year Accredited Senior Appraiser of The American Society of Appraisers" to you, Lady.

Interesting how a slimy comment like "self-proclaimed" is used to question the credibility and reputation recognized in many countries of the world where I am the expert of choice for those who know.

The posting repeats the old lie that I "worked for Park West Gallery for more than a decade (and was paid handsomely)." Not even close. I NEVER worked for Park West. I have always been a totally independent and disinterested third party expert who was called as an EXPERT WITNESS. And the "paid handsomely" part? Nowhere near enough for the grief, reputation assasination and business destruction that I have suffered at the hands of these loonies. Fortunately saying what they say ("impotent and clownish") doesn't make it true.

There have been some wonderful comments sent to this blog expressing outrage at the way Fine Art Registry has targeted me for a Google Bomb. I appreciate the support and faith of those who have sent them, but have decided that to post them would just further push an obviously unbalanced woman closer to the edge.

Unfortunately this crap will continue. They'll keep pouring toxins into the Dali market pond which will spread out to sicken or kill all other organisms. The legitimate players see this and complain about their sick market, but do and say nothing. Sometimes I wonder why I continue to work on their behalf when they are so unwilling to clean their own pond.

POSITIVE, EXCITING MEETINGS:

When Melinda and I were in Dallas/Fort Worth airport on our way to Mexico, who should come along with a huge smile and his dynamite glasses but our friend Elliott King? He pulled up a chair to our table and we had a great catch-up chat. Elliott was on his way to Canada for the reinstallation of "Santiago El Grande" which had thrilled many thousands at his splendid Dali: The Later Years show in Atlanta. He was pleased to hear that while we were in Mexico we would be traveling down to Mexico City to visit our mutual friend Enrique Zepeda. I'll enjoy telling you all about our adventures in a couple of weeks.

Meanwhile, I'll work on the revision of Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness in the Art Market and enjoy Central Mexico. Hasta luego!

DALI POPS AND POP DALI

2011-02-14T21:51:00.003-07:00

DALI POPS AND POP DALI

Did you see that? A Salvador Dali oil on panel painting has once again set a new record at auction. They almost always do, you know.

In this case, the winner was "Etude pour 'Le Miel est plus doux que le Sang'" which, of course, you'll know is "Study for 'Honey Is Sweeter Than Blood'", a 1926 painting that has been in a private collection. In very Dalinian fashion, it contains several of the visual elements found in the work for which it is a "study", but there is little other direct correlation. The painting, which sold at Christie's, London for an astounding (but not unreasonable) $6,561,070, includes the severed head of Federico Garcia Lorca (Spanish poet and Dali's lover), a putrefied donkey, the apparatus and hand and other recognizable Dali imagery of the era.

This is clearly the best Salvador Dali painting to appear on the international auction scene in some time, but it is far from the top tier of works which, if one became available, could finally blow the top off the Dali market. It's long past time for a work by The Master to break the $20 million mark and not at all impossible for one of the best to go to $50 million or higher.

Remember, you heard it here first. How long will it take? Let the betting pools begin.

Now, in other news........ I fired up my computer to take care of some quick business before leaving for Mexico for a month, and what should Internet Explorer show me than Lady Gaga being carried into the Grammy Awards ceremony in a huge egg! That is soooooo Dalinian. Don't we have videos of Dali and Gala stepping out of better shaped giant eggs on the beach at Port Lligat? Isn't the museum in Figures at the Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali surmounted by giant eggs? On Facebook I said, "There us nothing new on the face of the Earth since Dali."

Enrique Zepeda (that very clever Dali collector and rapidly expanding expert) responded that her name is "LADI GAGA" and he is sure it is an anagram for "Dali". I love it.

I remember when my son Duncan was young and used to watch television. I never did so he would dash in to where I was reading or writing and shout, "Dad, come on. There's and ad on TV that is straight Dali!!!" He was always right. He is very sharp on Dali images and a real joy to take to Spain. Check out the older blogs about those experiences alone in the museums with Duncan.

OK. Off to Mexico. See you from San Miguel de Alliende and I'll tell you about my visit with Enrique in Mexico City. If he doesn't show me a good time, I'll let you know.

2011-01-24T15:28:00.007-07:00

MY FRIENDS REN AND ELEANORE

Attending the Grand Opening of the splendid new Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida (story and pics below), I thought frequently of how thrilled A. Reynolds and Eleanore Morse would have been to see the culmination of their half-century efforts to build the world's best Dali collection. Perhaps they were with us. I almost thought at times that I heard Ren's chuckling.

He and I first met in 1987 when he stopped by my Colorado Springs appraisal office to discuss an upcoming prosecution of two Denver brothers whose 43 galleries sold fake Dali prints throughout the southwest. He would testify and I was the prosecution's chief expert witness.

Biographies and obituaries (both in The New York Times) are easily available online. The memories I have of the Morses are both personal and enjoyable.

If he was here today, I believe that Ren would agree that we hit it off immediately--as he told Eleanor when we called her from my office. As he saw it, he and I were both Colorado boys. He had grown up in the state, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Colorado, was a Board member of the Denver Natural History Museum, had published a newspaper column titled Gold Links Tailings about life in the gold mining town of Leadville, and collected and wrote about etchings by George Elbert Burr.

I was the Past-President of the Colorado Open Space Council and the Colorado Nature Conservancy, owned a wildlife preserve on the west side of Pikes Peak, was an expert on etchings and he and I had climbed many of the same mountains. In St. Petersburg he loved the fact that I, like he, wore a bolo tie.

When I visited Ren and Eleanor in 1987, 1993 and 1998 to appraise the museum collection and to lecture, Ren frequently brought me volumes of his journals and read me passages. Eleanor would tell me stories about the acquisition of one work or another. When we went to dinner at their favorite restaurant, we would often be accompanied by curator Joan Kropf who was really good about going through the experience yet again and hearing the same stories yet again.

The first time they took me to their house, in 1987, Ren pointed at a handsome polished ebony sculpture on a stand in the living room. "Bet you don't know what that is," he said. When I identified it as the rowing post from a Venetian gondola he was amazed because he said I was the first person to ever pass his little test.

Sweet Eleanore (with a core of iron) was an accomplished French scholar and translated numerous Dali books, including Robert Descharnes' 1984 monumental Salvador Dali: The Work the Man. When she heard that my wife Melinda and I would be attending the 2004 Dali centennial seminars at the Museum, she invited us to dinner at the Yacht Club and her box at the symphony. She and Melinda had become fond of each other when Melinda assisted me with the 1998 appraisal. Every year I also did appraisals of the artworks that the Morses donated to the Museum.

Eleanor was less passionate that Ren who often burst out with opinions before carefully considering them. When he heard for the first time about the Albaretto Collection in Turin, Italy, he stated that the works must be fakes because he didn't know about them. Later the couple became close to the other collecting couple, Giuseppe and Mara Albaretto, visited their home and exchanged warm letters, which I have read. When I twice visited the Albarettos, we shared stories about our mutual friends from Florida. Unfortunately, Ren's first response has been used by the bad guys in the Dali market to taint the Albaretto reputation. Dali had carefully kept his major collectors from knowing about each other.

As the new museum opens to welcome its annual quarter of a million visitors, I enjoy thinking about what it would mean to my friends Ren and Eleanore. The building is enormous, the collection is magnificently hung and the curatorial staff is far larger and more scholarly that the Morses every knew. Dr. William Jeffett's splendid 2010 book Dali Doubled is a must-have for every Dali fan. Ren, who wrote seven Dali books, would be impressed and proud.

2011-01-17T15:58:00.005-07:00

The top image is the wonderful new home of The Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida. Just below it are Elliott King, Dali scholar and the curator of Dali: The Later Years in Atlanta and me in my Dalinian costume for the surreal parade from the old museum to the new

ATLANTA TO ST. PETERSBURG

2011-01-16T14:38:00.002-07:00

ATLANTA TO ST. PETERSBURG

My last post shared some of the excitement expressed by the droves of visitors to the all-night "closing" of the major exhibition at the High Museum in Atlanta, Dali: The Later Years. Well now we have the numbers.

When we again linked up a couple of days later in St. Petersburg, Florida, the show's curator Elliott King told me that over 15,000 people waited in line, paid their money and viewed the exhibit. That would be phenomenal, a dream or impossible for almost any other artist, but not for Dali and not for a show of this quality and importance.

It was evident from the people swirling around Elliott and me that they considered seeing the show before it closed was a personal priority. It was fun to point out to people that the tall young man with the sequined tie and sequined shoes standing next to me was the curator who had, in one year, identified the works he wanted to display, borrowed them from museums and private collections, written the catalog, received and hung the shipped artworks and hosted the surrounding events. The responses were always such as to make Elliott's mother very proud. They also showed that the viewers had some idea of the curator's Herculean task.

OPENING OF THE NEW SALVADOR DALI MUSEUM

Well, we were finally at the anticipated date - 1/11/2011 - the opening of the magnificent new building that will henceforth offer to the world the unrivalled collection and changing exhibitions of The Salvador Dali Museum. Not only that, but I was waking up to the day in the Hilton Bayside Hotel just a couple of blocks away in St. Petersburg, Florida. I was there because Elliott King had been kind enough to call me when he arrived in Atlanta and heard an ice storm was forecast for Monday when he and I were scheduled to fly to Tampa. We both changed our airline reservations to get out of Dodge on Sunday. I am so grateful for this kindness and view with horror the possibility that I might otherwise have been stuck in Atlanta when the airport was shut down. I would not then have been waking up to the great day in St. Petersburg.

The surreal parade from the wonderful old museum to the new building was great fun. Lots of people dressed up in Dalinian costumes and there were fun marching groups with props, including some I never identified. The route was lined with television and other cameras and six broadcast trucks had their antennas raised for transmission.

Having been to the members' preview at the museum when I arrived from Atlanta on the previous Sunday, I was less concerned with seeing the interior and installation in the new building, than I was in seeing the characters who showed up, some other Dali heavy hitters, the panel of speakers and S.A.R. la Infanta Cristina of Spain. The Princess, whose life my wife well knows from HOLA! magazine, gave a generous short speech before cutting the ribbon, one half of which will be delivered to the Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali in Figures, Spain.

Since I first visited the (now old) Dali Museum in 1987 to do the first of three appraisals of the collection for founder A. Reynolds Morse, I have examine each piece in the collection under magnification, so my visit during the preview was a visit to many old friends. No longer are the huge masterpieces lined up on a single wall somewhat remote from visitors. Each has its own alcove and visitors can get really close to each. This is great for viewers and I hope it will never prove to be too close. The small, intimate works, each protected by glass, continue to be lined up for close viewing. I assume that the guards, as was the practice in the previous facility, will have to clean nose and finger prints off the glass twice a day.

It was good to again see Curator Peter Tush and discuss how we thought the building would "work". There is no question that it is an inspiring design. It is dominated by a free-standing three story high spiral staircase on the inside and an irregularly shaped glass dome that flows from the roof to the ground on the outside. Constructed of 1,026 individually sized triangles of glass, the "Glass Enigma" suggests that a Buckminster Fuller geodesic dome may have melted in the Florida sun. From the atrium inside, it opens the building to a lovely exterior view of gardens, palm trees and a yacht marina across the street.

The Salvador Dali Museum has housed the world's largest and best collection of original Salvador Dali paintings in St.Petersburg since 1982. It has become the state's most-attended museum (over 200,000 a year) and will certainly attract even more visitors with its new building.

Everyone who works for the museum, the outstanding army of volunteers and the movers and shakers of St. Petersburg can be very proud of their new gem. The Dali world has a new icon at which people can experience the genius and universal appeal of Salvador Dali. I am so pleased to have been part of the celebration.

ATLANTA SHOW CONFIRMS DALI'S APPEAL

2011-01-10T11:57:00.004-07:00

ATLANTA SHOW CONFIRMS DALI'S APPEAL

SALVADOR DALI: THE LATE WORK, currated by Elliott King at the High Museum Of Art in Atlanta was just as splendid a show as I had hoped. When you read a high-quality show catalog, the curator's essay will reveal just how much he or she "gets" the artist's work and will also frequently demonstrate how much he or she likes it. In the case of an Elliott King, you have a curator with a life-long dedication to the study of the artist so an exhibition he organizes can be expected to offer special insights. This one absolutely did and the crowds responded big time.

The High Museum's idea was to mount a final celebration titled "Dali 'till Dawn" that would keep the exhibition open for its final 31 hours. King was scheduled to lead three tours - 1am, 3am and 5am! The next afternoon, after we both flew to St. Petersburg ahead of Atlanta's snow storm, he called to ask if I could join him and some other Dali people for drinks and possibly dinner. What stamina! What youth!

Elliott and I linked up in Atlanta (as planned) and went to meet a very engaging and stimulating coupe for drinks. We then swung past the museum at about 8:00 to see what was happening. The line for admission was about three blocks long. We went back to the hotel and agreed to visit the exhibition at 10:00 PM. Again, when we arrived we were stunned to see the line had not diminished and the museum was packed. The atmosphere was electric and the excitement easily negated the fact that the temperature was 38 degrees and a strong, cold wind was blowing. Apparently hundreds of people thought the discomfort was worth braving. They were eventually well rewarded.

I also got the reward I had long anticipated as Elliott gave me a personal tour of the show and we discussed the works, their history and techniques and a great deal more about our mutual passion--Salvador Dali. It is always so exciting to be with an intellectual and well informed companion, especially at such an exhibition. The show was really splendid in spite of the fact that 18 artworks had been reurned to The Salvador Dali Museum to be hung for the grand opening of their new building on the 11th. I, of course, had examined every one of them under magnification when I appraised the museum's collection three times throughout the years.

When I left the High Museum at 1:30 in the morning with two companions with whom I discussed Dali until 2:30 back at my hotel, the line to get into the exhibition was still two blocks long! The temperature had dropped even lower, but these folks would not be denied. The show was crowded all night. What a recognition of the fascination people have with Salvador Dali and what a recognition of the show that Elliott King had curated--in just one year. Wow.

I arrived in St. POetersburg in time for the members' reception at the new museum. The Grand opening is tomorrow. Stay tuned for a report of all of the fun and foolishness and my opinions of the new buiding.

ARGILLET BEFORE ATLANTA

2011-01-06T11:06:00.003-07:00

ARGILLET BEFORE ATLANTA

What a surprise to have a quick flurry of e-mails and telephone calls with Christine Argillet who, with her very talented artist husband Jean and her son and his girlfriend had decided to make a trip to Santa Fe. Christine and Jean have been here about three times before and my wife Melinda and I are always delighted to see them. What a sparkling and fun evening we have when we meet for dinner. It has been equally fun to meet for lunch or to have them visit our home in the canyon. We have also gotten together several times at their home in Venice, California.

Naturally there was talk of Christine's totally unique father, art publisher, photographer and gallerist Pierre Argillet. I remembered my visit with Pierre at his chateau south of Paris and the Argillet's added much from their extensive experiences. Viken Argillet had spent a lot of time with his grandfather on various occasions, including when he could not fly out of Paris because of the 9/11 attacks. I suggested that these experiences helped him develop his "eye" as a filmmaker and he enthusiastically agreed.

Christine told me that when her father and Dali hit on an idea for a suite of prints illustrating a text, they were both so impatient to see the results that their joint energy was frenetic. I have seen many of the preliminary sketches that Dali did during their discussions. I have also seen a lot of the "home movies" Pierre made of the "happenings" they staged and of other visits to the chateau by Salvador and Gala. The best of all--which Baron Philippe duNoyer has promised me a copy of--is a short clip of Salvador Dali dancing the Charleston on the lawn.

What a pleasure it was to get a Dali fix from this delightful family just days before I fly to Atlanta for the closing of Elliot King's A-1 exhibition of the late works of The Master. How do I know the show is so good before I even see it? I've been spending time with the excellent catalog that Elliott gave me when we met for lunch last month.

And.....speaking of the show and the catalog, there is something that I have not mentioned previously. Elliott astounded me with the information that he had only a year to plan the exhibition with the staff of the High Museum, arrange loans of the major works from institutions in the US and Spain, write the catalog with essays by other Dali scholars and pull all of the thousands of details together prior to the opening. I was astounded. Such an exhibition usually takes three or four years of work.

I'm getting pretty excited about the trip to Atlanta and then on to St. Petersburg. I have seen a great many of the works in the show, and, of course, have appraised all of the paintings at The Salvador Dali Museum. Elliott was even able to include the iconic and internationally-known 1931 oil "Persistence of Memory" from the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. I always enjoy asking people who have not seen the actual painting how large they think it is. The answer is usually expressed with hand movements indicating a work about 20 by 24 inches or larger. It's only 9 1/2 by 13 inches! That makes it even more impressive.

SO MANY GREAT SUPPORTERS IN 2010

2011-01-03T16:27:00.002-07:00

SO MANY GREAT SUPPORTERS IN 2010

Now that we're launched into 2011, I am spending some time looking back at what was a very difficult year professionally. There was the Google Bomb and the cyber mugging of Fine Art Register. There was the Federal Court trial in Port Huron, Michigan in which I was not as well used as I would like and the subsequent puzzling behavior of Albert Scaglione. There were lies and attacks from others and a significant loss of prestige and business.

At the same time, there was a tremendous swell of support and positive response on my behalf to all of this. When I look at the members of the Dali Study Group, the former clients, the colleagues and others who took time to express their continued support and admiration, I find that they represent the best and the most informed opinions. They are people who have looked at the facts, weighed the reputations of those involved, factored in their experiences of me over the years and have said quite clearly, "Bernard, we believe in you, regret the pain you have suffered, and know that those who do not treat you as you deserve are beneath our contempt.

These opinions--coming from people who really know--have sustained and energised me. These are the voices that repeatedly say, "Keep up the good work, Bernard. Continue to be the beacon of truth and integrity and don't let the scum win."

I am immensely grateful to those voices. I am grateful for their loyalty, their careful weighing of the facts and their courage in speaking out. It may be that a reputation carefully built over decades can be destroyed overnight, but these people have reminded me that I am not in that position.

Now it's on to exciting new adventures. Next week at the High Museum in Atlanta catching up with Elliott King's splendid presentation of Dali's last forty years of work and his excellent catalog essay demonstrating its quality will be a marvelous way to kick off the Year of Return. That will be followed almost immediately by the Grand Opening of the fantastic new Salvador Dali Museum location in St. Petersburg. That will attract all of the brightest and the best from the world of Dali. Even if one of the low life creeps into the festivities, it will make no difference. I'll be among those who know more about The Master than have gathered anywhere else.

Then in February I'll spend several days in Mexico City with one of the most passionate--and best informed--Dali collectors I know of. That will hopefully be followed by the retrial of Park West Gallery v. Fine Art Registry, Theresa Franks et al. and I'll hopefully be asked to contribute my expertise and perspectives.

Amidst all of this, I'll have the always rewarding experience of talking with Dali collectors almost every day that I am in my office. I enjoy the telephone consultations so much and am pleased to always be able to provide more information than others are capable of. Those calls, in which I tell a client everything I know and they need to know about their Dali artwork, are always great fun. That's true even when the discussion is about a fake because I have the opportunity to tell the collector stories about the scoundrels responsible.

Yes. Actually 2010 was a pretty exciting year and the positives clearly overshadow the smoggy parts. There are a lot of wonderful people out there and I am grateful to draw energy and pleasure from them. 2011 is going to be GREAT! On to the YEAR OF RETURN!

MEETING ONE OF THE TRUE EXPERTS

2010-12-30T10:47:00.004-07:00

MEETING ONE OF THE TRUE EXPERTS

The large exhibition currently at the High Museum in Atlanta is about to end. SALVADOR DALI: THE LATE WORKS was guest curated by Elliott H. King, a Dali scholar who received his PhD at the University of Essex where he worked closely with Dawn Ades. He has focused on the art created by Dali after 1940--a period that has been critically dismissed by many as inferior to his earlier works. "Not so" says Dr. King and demonstrates in the exhibition that the Master created numerous very important works in the years from 1940 to 1980.

It is the creative period during which Dali painted "Santiago El Grande" (1957); "The Ecumenical Council" (1960); "Christ of St. John of the Cross" (1951); "Madonna of Port Lligat" (1950) and numerous other significant works, including portraits. King's curatorial triumph, however, was acquiring the loan of "Assumpta Corpusculaire Lapislazuline" (1952) from a Spanish collection. This exhibition clearly demonstrates that the years covered were filled with more than just the commercial commissions and public shenanigans. In other words, it is an important contribution to the study of Dali and an eye-opener for the critical dismissers.

On the way back from a pre-Christmas family visit, Melinda and I had the great pleasure of having lunch with Elliott King who generously showed up with a catalog of the exhibition as a gift. It is a beautiful publication and includes essays by other Dali scholars including Hank Hine, Director of The Salvador Dali Museum and William Jeffett, Chief Curator of Exhibitions at the Dali Museum.

What an intense hour and a half that was. Both Elliott and I jammed as much information and perspective-sharing into it as possible. I am quite sure it was the beginning of an enjoyable friendship characterized by mutual trust and the sharing of more information and perspectives. We first met in 2004 at the Dali centennial symposia at The Salvador Dali Museum, but did not have any time together.

I'm excited that we'll next meet in Atlanta for the final couple of days of the exhibition. Elliott is scheduled to participate in the 31 hour Dali Till Dawn event. He'll be giving three "insomniac tours" of the show at 1 a.m., 3 a.m., and 5 a.m.!!! Perhaps I can bring him coffee. Details and tickets are to be found at www.high.org.

On January 10th, both Elliott and I will fly to Tampa and drive to St.Petersburg for the January 11th Grand Opening of the new Salvador Dali Museum. You can check out the schedule of events at www.salvadordalimuseum.org. I am really looking forward to seeing the next stage in the phenomenal advances that have been made since my first visit with Ren and Eleanor Morse in 1987 at the time that I did my first (of three) appraisal of the collection.

There will be several postings in early January that will share with you my experiences at the High and Dali Museums. I believe this will be a great way to kick off a year in which I expect to regain whatever reputation and prestige the low life in the Dali market have tried to tarnish. As John Pope Hessey wrote, "Dedication to the truth can gain one many enemies."

For my supporters, well-wishers, clients and good guys, I send my very best for a rewarding 2011. Peace on Earth to men of good will.

TIME MACHINE

2010-11-17T14:11:00.004-07:00

TIME MACHINE

Last week end two of the periodic auctions of Western and Southwestern art took place in Santa Fe. Dealers and collectors came from distances short and long and the halls were filled. The bids and prices paid were closely watched by all because in the past couple of years they have been significantly lower than in 2007 and the years leading up to it. At that time, the direction of all sales was up, up and away.

On Saturday, The Santa Fe Art Auction was held at the Santa Fe Convention Center, a beautiful and versatile facility that opened just a couple of years ago. I was interested to note that most of the major dealers except Gerald Peters (whose company puts on the auction) were in attendance. They were not bidding. I think they were there to gauge how much trouble their market is in.

The answer is that it's not in as much trouble as it was a year ago. Most lots sold and they sold at right about the low estimate. The estimates printed in the catalog were clearly set low in the hope of inveigling bidders into the action.

On Sunday the Altermann Auction was held in the former community center that long served the folks who lived in the Spanish colonial neighborhood along the Acequia Madre--the Mother Ditch which carried water from the canyon to the farms and homes down the valley. Today it is an exclusive part of the city with lovely homes consisting of expanded historic adobes behind adobe walls. The orchards are mostly gone and there are only a few fields extant.

Tony Altermann has a long and distinguished history of mounting fine art auctions in Santa Fe and Scottsdale and they are always worth attending. Today son Richard Altermann is the auction impresario. Again, the offerings were a wide range of historic and contemporary Western and Southwestern art--mostly paintings (no works by Salvador Dali). The biding results were much like those at the Saturday auction. It is wise, I believe, for both dealers to schedule their sales for the same week end so the out of town buyers will find a trip to Santa Fe worthwhile.

So where does the time machine come in?

I have wanted to own a time machine since I was a small, scared boy at a British prep school. I have the mind of a historian and I was trained in graduate school as a historian. I remember dates, names and events and I always try to imagine what it was like in a particular location at a historic time or event. I would love to go back to Runnymede in 1215 when the Earls forced King John to sign the Magna Carta.

This time my thoughts were a bit different. It seemed a perfect time for me to have a time machine so I could bid on a lot of fine paintings, buy them at low prices and then return to the art market of 2006 and sell them all for a whopping profit.

A HALLOWEEN TALE

2010-11-09T15:22:00.005-07:00

A HALLOWEEN TALE

It's more than a week since Halloween, but I'm still chuckling about an encounter I observed, so I thought I'd share it will youall.

On the day before Halloween, a saturday, I was pushing a cart around our very nice small grocery store about ten miles outside Santa Fe. There was a community Halloween party underway in the commercial center's plaza and there were lots of little kids in costume. The checkers had candy to give to any who came into the store.

Surprisingly, two of the small goblins made their way to the back of the store and approached the fish counter. They called out "trick or treat". The normally sanguine clerk who never exhibited any sense of humor looked startled and confused about how he was supposed to respond. He didn't have any candy to dispense.

Leaning over the counter he checked out their costumes and asked, "Uh, you kids want a flounder?"

The whole thing was so surreal, I knew Dali would have loved it.

ERIK'S FRUSTRATION

Recently my daughter and her family visited us from Longmont, Colorado. One evening we were sitting around the patio table after dinner and I was telling a story--as I often do.

Grandson Erik (4 1/2) ran up panting, "Granddad, Granddad....".
I said, "Just a minute, Erik, I'm telling a story.

Erik tried his Grandmother who replied, "Just a minute, Erik, I'm listening to Granddad."

Exasperated, he turned to his last resort and said, "Mom, can you put Granddad on pause?"

VALUING SALVADOR DALI PRINTS

2010-09-17T12:02:00.006-06:00

VALUING SALVADOR DALI PRINTS: Part One

This is the topic that brought me into the world of Salvador Dali in 1980 and has assured that all other professional appraisers have avoided it as much as possible ever since. It is a service that I perform almost daily, not only for print owners internationally, but for a great many of my appraiser colleagues who encounter prints attributed to Dali in the course of doing appraisals of collections. Since they have only one fully informed and dependable source of information, they call me and I introduce them to my service which has supplied credible information to appraisers for many years. The same service is available to anyone who needs it, and they don't have to send me the print. Just go to www.bernardewell.com

HOW DO I DO IT?

It is possible for me to give opinions of authenticity and value for Dali prints because I have been collecting information for thirty years and because I have so many contacts in the market. Perhaps even more important is that I know who knows what they are talking about and who doesn't and I know who those driven by self-interest are. Of course, it doesn't hurt that I have seen more Dali prints and originals than anyone else.

My opinions of authenticity are based on the information in my files accumulated during the examination and appraisal of over 55,000 prints attributed to the Spanish master. Mediums, edition numbers, sizes, appearance of signatures, blind chops, identity of paper and other clues help me place a subject print into the framework of all editions about which I have such details.

When I was serving as the court expert for a long list of Federal and state regulatory and law enforcement agencies I frequently had access to the files of dealers and distributors selling fakes and publishers both legitimate and illegitimate. This body of documentation is unsurpassed. It is also incomplete. As anyone who knows much about Dali prints will tell you, we learn more all the time and know that we shall never know everything we need to or wish to know.

While I would always prefer to personally examine a questioned print, my files let me make legitimate decisions about authenticity without doing so and I have never had one challenged, except in court where I have always prevailed.

My value research is based on a variety of sources and since the results are so varied, I have to extrapolate an on-going sense of what people are willing to pay for Dali prints. There is no single and reliable source of information that one can check for a quick value. While we have tracked both the prices and the values (don't confuse the two terms--more later) of Dali prints for thirty years, it is very difficult to make generalizations about pricing or value trends.

WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO VALUES?

Prices paid, collector interest, saleability, availability and the attitudes of people in the market often change in reaction to specific events, court cases, investigations, market gossip and even lies which are posted in profusion on the Internet. Thus, if it was possible to place Dali print values over the years on a graph, it would be very confusing. I will say that after the bottom fell out of the Dali print market in the late 1980s through the mid-1990s following the Federal prosecutions, there has been a steady, though not dramatic, rise in prices asked and paid for Dali prints. This has meant a slow increase in appraiser opinions of Replacement Value (for insurance) and Fair Market Value (for resale or donation).

There have also been a great many flawed appraisals written because the appraiser used bogus information sources. We'll talk more about these later in this series.

Every appraisal must take into account the relevant market. That is the market in which a property most often changes hands. There are many markets. For instance, if the works of a particular artist are available only from his studio, that is where their value is established--by sales. If he has a gallery presence and that's where his works are sold, that's the relevant market. These are both examples of the primary market, that in which the art changes hands for the first time. Resales at auction, through galleries or privately, constitute the secondary Market.

Sometimes, availability and the resulting relevant market are restricted. This is important to know because art sold in a restricted market must be valued in that market using sales information from that market. For instance, Park West Galleries contracted with the Albaretto Collection of Turin, Italy to purchase the Salvador Dali prints still held by the collecting and publishing family of Giuseppe Albaretto. Those prints were then sold exclusively by Park West and, because they had direct and unsurpassed provenance and guarantee of genuineness, the prices paid at Park West auctions on land and sea were considered by some to be high. They weren't because the only other sales to which they could rightfully be compared are other sales of similar art with similar provenance sold by Park West. Never mind that an identical image without the provenance, probably without a signature and without the guaranteed authenticity of the Park West material was floating around in the general market. It's price and value would be set by the general market. The Park West prints had to be valued within the restricted market in which they were offered where thousands of collectors bought them.

Every day I speak with Dali print owners who bought their treasure in the print boom of the 1980s and were told at that time that it would appreciate in value every year--especially after the artist's expected death. That event occurred in 1989. My clients have believed all of these years that their print was becoming more and more valuable.

If their print is genuine--either fully original or authorized and signed--then I must explain why the values have not increased as much as they were told they would. If their print is bogus, then I must explain how I know that and tell them that, in spite of what they paid for it, it has never had any legitimate market value. I always share all of the information that goes into my opinions of authenticity.

WHERE TO FROM HERE?

In future posts of this blog, I'll look at such topics as:

Pricing at auction
Pricing on Internet brokerage sites
Pricing in the galleries
The appropriate use of the "Print Price Guide" (a book review)
Other sources of information; good and bad

Ah, Summer In Santa Fe and rattle snakes

2010-06-18T15:44:00.003-06:00

AH, SUMMER IN SANTA FE!

I just can't tell you how nice it is to be back in Santa Fe with only a few comparatively short trips on the schedule for the next three months. Santa Fe is such a wonder at this time of the year. There are musical festivals, the Santa Fe Opera season, the chamber music season, the Site Santa Fe biennial, Indian Market, Art Santa Fe, a fantastic video installation and so many cultural events that one cannot help but miss a lot of them.

The weather is warmer than usual (mid 80s to occasionally the low 90s) but very dry, so we don't have the discomfort of the more humid parts of the country. The daily breezes help and at night, the temperatures drop into the 50s. All of those outside concerts recommend a light sweater. Of course, the sky is that lovely turquoise every day and at night, the stars remind us that we are at 7,000 feet with no pollution or humidity.

I'm really enjoying working on my property a great deal and sitting out reading in the evening as the setting sun paints Glorietta Mesa across the canyon a glowing orange. Our home and land are within a National Historic Park so we are surrounded by wilderness and at night there are no lights.

So why am I going on like this? The first answer is because I love so much living this way. The second is that I know what a great contrast there is between my life and the people who attack me because I serve as an independent expert witness in court and know the truth about their activities and twisted postings online. My conscience is completely clear because I always act and speak ethically. I'm not tainted by the poison that must boil through the blood of those who try to smear me and my professional integrity.

The next trial in the on-going Dali Wars won't start until sometime in 2011. That will be the most important one because it is about the authenticity of the Dali prints sold by Park West Gallery. Finally it will be possible to prove in court that every one is indeed authentic--whatever the misguided folks might claim. That's so far in the future, however, and I'm so sure of the truth that I can forget about it for now and enjoy summer in Santa Fe.

One interesting event recently is the story of the two rattle snakes. One day I happened across a rattle snake while I was going out to the bird feeding platform. We serve about a ton and a half of seed every year and play host to up to 140 humming birds this time of year. We live surrounded by birds and other wildlife. Frequently we are awakened in the night as Kenai, my Malamute, joins the coyotes in song.

Oh, yes. The rattle snake..... It wasn't very large and I was able to get an empty trash can and cover it so I'd know where it was when I returned with my pitch fork. I then tipped the can over, held the snake down with one tine of the fork just behind its head and maneuvered the other tines under it so I could lift and flip it into the can. I then put on the top, secured it with a bungee cord and took it up on the mesa for release. It had six rattles so I identified it as a pygmy rattle snake. They are not very large, but they are the most venomous. What a beautiful little creature.

About two weeks later, I happened across what appeared to be its double--probably its mate. This snake quickly disappeared under the garden shed and I've been looking for it ever since. Since they are not aggressive, it may have decided to move on and I may never see it again. If it is still around, I hope to catch it before my dogs find it.

Actually, my daughter, the PhD Wildlife Ecologist, tells me that only about one in four rattle snake bites involves the injection of venom. If a snake is being hassled or attacked, it bites to scare off its attacker, but if the attacker is likely to eat the snake, the venom won't work fast enough to preclude that happening. The venom is saved to kill prey. I've moved and caught numerous rattle snakes of various sizes, but never been bitten. We always treat each other with sufficient respect that it always ends well for both of us.

Then too, rattle snakes are always courteous enough to warn me they are contemplating an attack. That's much more civilized than the people who attack on the Internet without warning, provocation or justification.

Wherever you are, I hope you are also remembering to enjoy summer. Don't let it pass without taking some time to do your favorite summertime activities. And remember, summer involves heat. If you complain about it rather than enjoying it, your complaints about winter's cold won't deserve much attention.

THE ARGILLET CONNECTION, Part II

2010-02-20T10:57:00.005-07:00

From the first I knew that Pierre Argillet was one of those rare creatures who follow Oscar Wilde's advice to "always be a little improbable".

We were greeted at the door of the Chateau by Marie-Claude, Pierre's assistant and caretaker. A warm welcome was received by Philippe (the Baron Philippe duNoyer) and (the Baroness) Ghislaine and I was greeted with great cordiality. We were shown into Pierre's study to wait while Marie-Claude fetched the famous publisher and photographer.

After about ten minutes, Marie-Claude came back down the hall pushing Pierre in a wheel chair. He was heavily swathed in blankets and his head was resting on his chest. "He has sunk very much," Ghislaine whispered. Aging was to be expected because Pierre had recently celebrated his 84th birthday with a party, the invitations to which exhibited a photograph of Pierre in a coffin with the printed words, "Come and see of I'm still alive."

They stopped a few feet in front of us and there was a minute of uncomfortable silence and then Pierre sprang up, threw off the blankets, kicked the wheel chair back down the hall and shouted, "Not yet!" That was the signal for the fun to begin.

We sat in the study/office for about and hour and a half talking about Salvador Dali, with whom Pierre had worked and cooperated on print editions for fifty years. We talked about specific publishing projects. Pierre told many Dali stories, showed us printing plates and documentation, photographs and memorabilia. Then we toured the crypt of the caste where Pierre's collection of Daliana and artworks comprised the Museum of Surrealism. After collecting the works of Futerists and Dadaist, Pierre had concentrated on the Surrealists and Salvador Dali--who had been expelled from the Surrealist Group by Andre Breton.

Pierre, having discussed many print projects with Dali, considered both preliminary and finished drawings and then helped the Master bring his ideas to graphic reality as etchings and drypoints, had many things to show us. He retained an extensive collection of original unique Dali drawings, watercolors and other creations. He and I had extensive discussions about printmaking techniques and the artist's practices and preferences. Our collegial conversations were uniquely educational.

In one large room was an assemblage of Dalinian objects, including the famous piano with the Dali-painted lid and a faucet on the side that could pour water into a tray in which the piano stood. There too was the life-size wax Salvador Dali that had been made by Madame Tussaude. I realized that the room was a recreation of the installation that had been created for the exhibition at the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Of particular interest to me were the photographs and films with which Pierre had recorded the various surrealist "happenings" that he and Dali had staged at the Chateau. There were the six liveried footmen riding their horses up the grand staircase, the "Marie Antoinette" actress in the Orangerie, the hot air balloon and the line of priests carrying a tremendously long snake. These were all events I was familiar with and I deeply regret not being able to participate in them. The only thing that could top that experience would be if my companion was Kurt Vonnegut. (Novelist and brother of my God father, Bernard Vonnegut)

When we all agreed that we were ready to go to lunch, we left the chateau and drove into the Fontainbleau Forest to an ancient inn with tremendous walk-in fireplaces were rows of spits loaded with meats and fowl of all kinds turned over the wood fires. Here we were at Barbizon where so many artists had been inspired to paint. The scenes out the inn's windows all looked like works by Diaz de la Penna and Corot.

We were joined for lunch by a great, friendly bear of a man named Bruno. He is Philippe duNoyer's cousin and after lunch we drove to his farm which features ancient buildings built in a defensive square. The chapel was built in 1200 AD. As I pointed out to Bruno, the people who built it had no idea there was a Western Hemisphere and had never heard of potatoes, corn, chilies, chocolate or squash.

Bruno has found a very ingenious way to make money fro his farm. He owns the only mountain in that part of otherwise totally flat France. On top at one end is a picnic area with the only views to be found for many miles. At the other end, the mountain is still under construction for, after all, it is built of the solid waste from many towns and villages in a fifty-mile radius. An access road carries a constantly long line of garbage trucks, each one of which pays Bruno to dump its load. The mountain is a dirt-covered landfill!

Not only does Bruno make money from the garbage trucks and admission to the picnic area, but the mountain is equipped with pipes that siphon the methane off so it can be used to generate electricity which supplies all of the farm's needs and is sold into the national electric grid.

Unfortunately, since I'm writing in Mexico, I am not in a position to post photographs of Pierre, Philippe, Ghislaine, Bruno, the chateau, the inn and Bruno's farm.

Next Time: The Argillet Connection, Part III will tell you about the next generation of the Argillet family and some internal conflicts and questionable practices.

My Brother Was Murdered

2009-11-03T09:30:00.000-07:00

Sonny Jim James (Modoc 1940-2009)

On Thursday, October 29th we gathered at the Convention Center among the gorgeous red sandstone cliffs and outcrops of Red Rock State Park outside Gallup, New Mexico for the memorial gathering to honor Sonny Jim, my pledged brother of twenty-two years. The shock of his murder, along with that of the friend he was trying to help in a boundary dispute the previous Friday, was strongly reflected in the six or seven hundred people who braved the snow and ice to be there. Many (especially the large number of rodeo cowboys) had traveled from several states away.

Heather had battled her way through the Denver “Monster Snow Storm”, dealt with airline delays and foolishness and met us for the drive over to Gallup. We had spent two hours creeping over black ice and sitting in a twenty-mile long double line of idling semi-trucks and a few cars. To have over half a thousand Navajos show up on time was a unique experience in any weather.

We were given places of honor among Sunshine’s family and honored as elders and family members. I am now her only “Dad” and the four girls’ only granddad. By extension, I am also that to Sunshine’s four sisters whom I have known since they were little girls. All now have their own families. All have lost their father. So many beautiful, loving, sad people.

The convention center is huge, but was inadequate to hold all of the love shared that day. The tears were copious and the tributes all from the heart. The feast was served and the songs sung and the Medicine Man, Chester, offered a long prayer of perspective and solace.

I won’t attempt to recreate the unique experience, but I do want to share one thought. A member of the Navajo Nation Tribal Council spoke. As elders always do, he spoke in a fatherly tone and reminded the assembled Diné (people) of their heritage and pride and talked about the conditions we had braved to assemble in Sonny’s honor.

“Water,” he said, “is the source of all life and means life to us. When the clouds are low, there is mist and fog and we have rain, snow and even annoying and perhaps dangerous ice, we are being blessed with water and the gods have come down among us. Obviously, they have come to help us honor Sonny and they are among us, today.”

The lessons of the day were that there is strength in numbers, love should be expressed and when we are blessed with precipitation, even if it is annoying, the gods are walking among us.

OFF TO RIO !

2009-06-02T23:17:00.003-06:00

OFF TO RIO !

On the eve of our departure for Rio de Janeiro to attend my son Duncan's wedding, I'm recalling what I was doing a month ago. You remember Duncan who had the Dali adventures with me in Spain? He married Mariana DeSalles three years ago and now her splendid, cosmopolitan family is giving them the full Brazilian family/social wedding. She is a smart and beautiful woman who is studying art/industrial design in Denver. This should be fun. We're staying at Ipanema.

So where was I a month ago? I was at a cattle and sheep auction in the small village of Dowra in County Leitrum, Ireland. Nothing fancy there. The village sits in a beautiful valley at the north end of Lock Allan which is part of the River Shannon system--the longest navigable river system (including many, many lakes) in Europe. It's so small it's only a six pub place.

The sales barns appear to be ancient and there are two sales going on simultaneously. It was great to be there with my brother Jon, a Colorado rancher, and my friend Enda Dolen who also has "beasties". Those guys knew what to look for in the livestock, what to listen for in the auctioneer's chant and how to judge the prices. I just enjoyed the experience.

The cattle were sold individually, but the sheep were sold in lots of ten. No buying a single darling lamb for the granddaughter. Take the lot.

What an interesting and timeless scene. The look of the farmers has not changed much in the last couple of centuries. The old tweed jackets, soft caps and ruddy complexions are enhanced by the musical conversations and amusing comments. No one's attention is ever very far from the bidding, however. This is a social occasion, but also serious business. The cattle handlers keep the animals moving down the chute, into the small ring in front of the cement stands, around the ring a couple of times and out back for loading.

The farmers standing around with shit several inches up their Wellingtons are remarkably like the art dealers standing around the edges of art auctions I attend. They also are standing in about four inches of bull shit.

2009-05-18T15:56:00.003-06:00

IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN'T? Part 3

So what about this independent and disinterested business that I keep harping on with reference to myself as opposed to the other people who claim to be "Dali Experts" and who offer to provide "authentications" of the Master's work? I have recently done a re-evaluation of the topic while writing my book Artful Dodgers in Ireland. My conclusion is that it is a really critical issue.

After all, it's all about credibility and we must not forget that:

If a person has integrity, nothing else matters.

If a person does not have integrity, nothing else matters.

When you are considering having an artwork authenticated it is a very good idea to ask yourself if the person who claims to be an authenticator could possibly benefit financially or in any other way from the opinions they give.

For instance, a dealer may have all sorts of potential conflict-of-interest problems. Has he ever sold this particular artwork? Has he sold another piece from the same edition? Does he have one in stock? Does he have a relationship with the publisher or distributor? Has he ever published an opinion concerning the artwork? You get the idea.

Former "secretaries" to Salvador Dali have played all sorts of games with the "authentication" process because they have had a number of relationships with the Master's work and one has even been known to state that if he did not receive a commission on the original sale, he did not consider the work genuine. Great.

It is also potentially dangerous to rely on an "archivist" as an authenticator, especially if he is not the person who accumulated the archived information, but is, rather, the administrator.

The very best authenticator (that is, one who gives opinions of authenticity) for atworks attributed to Salvador Dali would be one who meets the following criteria:

Fully independent.
Disinterested in that he has never bought, sold or brokered a Dali artwork. In other words, he has lived his professional life outside the market.
Has extensively developed his connoisseurship and seen a great many genuine artworks by the artist, hopefully more than anyone else.
Has developed his examination techniques and uses the Scientific Method as an Art Detective.
Has been relied upon by museums and foundations which specialize in Dali's art.
Has met the major collectors, been trusted by them and had access to their documentation as well as photographs, stories and, of course, artworks.
Been repeatedly accepted in courts of law at all levels as an expert.
Served as an expert for numerous law enforcement and regulatory agencies at all levels of government.
Published articles on the artist.
Given lectures at museums, galleries and other art venues.
Never been proved wrong in court or by the IRS or been accused of an ethics violation.

These and other criteria are extensively discussed in my upcoming book Artful Dodgers: Fraud and Foolishness In The Art Market. Where would one find such a professional if one wanted to have a Dali artwork authenticated? I can think of only one place: http://www.bernardewell.com/.

IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN'T?

2009-04-26T08:20:00.002-06:00

IS THEY IS, OR IS THEY AIN’T?
AUTHENTICATING DALI ARTWORKS, Part one

While writing about art authentication for my book Artful Dodgers in a cottage overlooking Culdaff Bay in Donegal, Ireland, it occurs to me that it is a useful topic to address in reference to artworks attributed to Salvador Dalí. After all, that’s who I am—the Dalí Expert—and so I do a lot of that. It’s also worth taking a look at the several other sources of “authentication” for Dalí artworks. Some of them are not what and who they say they are.

The first thing to understand about art authentication, however, is that The only person who can authenticate an artwork is the person who created it. If that person is not available (dead, in an asylum, or suffering from dementia) then all you can hope for is to get the best opinions from the best people available. The operable word is “opinion”.

The “best people available” means those who are accepted as experts in the artist’s work through their relationship with the artist (family or collaborator), their authorship of a reliable catalog, scholarship or extensive experience examining the artist’s work and doing research. There are two other critical factors: connoisseurship and the credibility that comes with being independent and disinterested. In other words, they must not have any conceivable way of materially benefiting from the opinion they give.

When the art of Salvador Dalí is the topic, authenticity becomes even more important than it would normally be. Why? Because there are probably more fakes attributed to Dalí than to almost any other artist of any era. After all, he was a sick recluse (or prisoner) for the last nine years of his life and many people proceeded to produce fakes and sell then as genuine with the assurance that the artist would die on Thursday and the values would shoot up. This was especially true of editions (usually 1,000) of prints which were sold with forged signatures—many thousands of them.

So let’s look at the subject of the fake prints first. Since the topic is complex and unraveling it represents the work I’ve done over almost three decades, this must be a somewhat simplified telling of the tale.

Actually I was very fortunate. I benefited from my opportunities to serve as the expert for a long list of federal and state law enforcement and regulatory agencies because each criminal prosecution or civil lawsuit brought me endless opportunities to examine good prints and forgeries of every type as well as piles of files and information. For example, when the Federal Trade Commission went after Pierre Marcand of Magui Publishing, there was a particularly rich windfall.

Pierre lived in a mansion in Beverly Hills where he hosted lots of out-of-work actors and actresses who paid their rent by hand-coloring the fake prints he produced on his own presses. At one point he decided he needed a larger mansion. Unfortunately for him, it would not be available for his occupancy until after he was committed to vacating the old one. Consequently he had to move to a hotel for four months and put all of his belongings in storage. He called Beverly Hills Storage and they sent over several trucks and packers.

Within an hour of the arrival of the loaded trucks at the warehouse, everything Pierre owned (except what he had at the hotel) was under Federal Court order and I was on my way from my home in Colorado. For the next couple of weeks I had access to all of Pierre’s stuff. I ignored the personal items, but was elated to have his printing plates and presses, 1,000 sheets of blank paper with (forged) Dalí signatures, 3,000 fake prints and some of the drawings and transparencies used to create the fakes.

Using my art detective techniques, I collected all of the clues the material offered that I was later able to use in Federal Court to prove the prints fakes and the signatures forgeries. Such an opportunity added tremendously to my knowledge and understanding of the activities of the crooks. No one else has had access to this type of material, and I did in case after case.

This is the sort of experience that has permitted me to develop the information, understanding and connoisseurship that makes me the expert I am today. Having examined 53,000 prints attributed to Salvador Dalí, I have more hands-on experience than anyone else. Having actually done the various printmaking techniques myself I am in a unique position and it has added a great deal to my ability not only to determine authenticity, but also to explain it to juries and judges.

I’ll share many more adventures and experiences in future blogs.

BERNARD IN THE FINAL FIVE

2009-04-13T13:06:00.003-06:00

BERNARD IN THE FINAL FIVE

The Appraisal Foundation in Washington, D. C. put out a call for applications for appointment to The Appraisal Standards Board—the body which sets the professional rules for the appraisal profession through writing and promulgating The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice, known as USPAP. Bernard, believing that he had something to offer after thirty-six years as a fine art appraiser, applied. He thought this would be a good way to contribute to the development of a profession that has been good to him. After all, he hasn’t done much of that since he taught Valuation Law to appraisers at various universities and other venues. It was also about time that the membership of The Appraisal Standards Board included a personal property appraiser.

In time he was contacted by Appraisal Board member Elizabeth von Habsburg and a telephone interview was scheduled. That went very well and Bernard was invited to fly to Newport, Rhode Island for a face to face interview with the nominating committee. The Appraisal Foundation Board was meeting at the Hyatt Regency on Goat Island in the beautiful playground of robber barons and yachtsmen.

Apparently 106 appraisers had submitted applications and five were invited for the all-expenses paid week end so they could be available for fifteen minute interviews.

When the results were reported to the Board, Bernard was not one of those selected for one of the three openings on the Appraisal Standards Board. It turns out the three who were are old time insiders, two of whom had been on the board previously and the third was coming off the Board of Directors, but wanted to remain active..

Bernard refuses to feel rejected. He has been told repeatedly by Appraisal Foundation members that he is “the cream of the cream” and that if he’ll reapply next time there is an opening, he’ll almost certainly be selected. How nice it would be to go into the interview knowing what the questions will be, as the three successful applicants did.

Bernard, who was a week away from departure for Thailand, Cambodia, India and Dubai (and has since spent a month in Mexico and is about to leave for Ireland for a month) actually feels some relief. He has been saved from about forty hours of work a month for three years and has been selected by his peers as one of the best, if not one of the insiders.

ARTFUL DODGERS MOVING AHEAD

2009-03-14T11:18:00.002-06:00

ARTFUL DODGERS IS MOVING AHEAD

Here we are at the end of a month in San Miguel de Alliende, Guanajuato, Mexico. It has been a month of rich rewards, lovely friendships, marvelous food, beautiful Spanish colonial city and towns, excursions into the campo and lots of hours spent working very hard on writing Artful Dodgers . It will be the first book to really reveal how the art market works.

Artful Dodgers will explain the fact that there are more than one art market and each works in different ways and is governed by different rules. It will explain the Six Myths That Drive The Art Market, look at the scams, swindles and con men (and women) who populate the market, and give shocking details about the games many people play. The book will also offer the first informed evaluation of the personal property appraisal profession ever. It's a pretty disappointing report, I'm afraid.

The book as a whole, however, is designed to provide an enormous amount of information. The response of many readers is expected to be the same as that which always greeted my columns in ART-talk magazine: "Bernard reveals and states a lot of stuff which I thought was probably true, but no one ever says out loud."

Artful Dodgers is being written in a very accessible and understandable style and there is a minimum of "art bull shit". It is a work of narrative non-fiction that I expect will get a lot of attention. Hopefully no death threats.

We now return to Santa Fe were I have a very heavily scheduled month of hard work before we
leave for a month in Ireland at the cottage in Donnegal where I shall continue work on the book in the hope that when I return it will be close to completion. The writing requires that I spend four to six hours a day at my computer, but is exciting and rewarding.

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 5

2009-03-10T11:16:00.003-06:00

Finally we are going to mount the stone steps within the Castel Gala Dali at Pubol, Catalonia, Spain. They lead us to the interior of the castle which Salvador Dali bought for his wife Gala so she could have a retreat--which he could visit by written invitation only. (see Alone With Dali and Duncan part 4)

The Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali had arranged for my son Duncan and I to have exclusive after-hours visits to both the Teatro-Museo Salvador Dali in Figures and the Casa Dali home at Port Lligat near Cadaques. They had made no special arrangements for our visit to Castel Gala Dali and I was alone since Duncan was in the city of Gerona.

The experience of the Castle of Pubol aka Castel Gala Dali is a mixture of experiences. There is the obvious experience of the physical space, the architecture, the arrangement of rooms etc.

Then there are the surface decorations created by Salvador Dali and they are both decorative and fun. There is the set of rich blue drapes decorated with gold Fleurs-d-Li that flank a shuttered window and double stone window seat that break up one of the plastered walls in the Room Of The Escutcheons. The drapes were painted there by Dali, as is a doorway with open door showing part of the next room. The iron radiators were ripped out durring renovation because Dali thought them ugly. He then replaced them with iron radiators of the same design which he painted on the walls where the originals had been! He must have been having great fun.

The ceiling is painted with an elaborate vaulted double scene of the inside of a dome and the swallow-filled sky, and there are six coats of arms painted on the upper walls. Throughout the castle, these Dali-painted effects can be found. Doorways have painted stone quoining around them and there are other trompe-l'oeil effects.

By far, the most imposing of the Dali wall decorations is to be found over the entrance to the Piano Room. A full-length portrait of Gala appears to be either barring admission or asking the visitor if he is worthy to enter. Her countenance is somewhat severe and she is holding some sort of staff that appears to be a potential weapon. On second look, it becomes apparent that Gala is depiced as a cariatid holding up the corner of a carved stone and brick edifice. Oh, how allegorical.

The pissed-off looking portrait is a notice to all that beyond lie the private apartments of the woman herself. It was within that she entertained a series of beautiful young men, including Jeff Fenholdt, the lead in Jesus Christ Superstar. Neither Gala nor Salvador Dali ever expressed much interest in music and this room was used as a private living room and it was here that Dali spent most of his time when he visited.

A third level of experience at the castle is the furnishings--personal property that had belonged to Gala and Salvador Dali. How nice that Gala's dresses, furniture, bric-a-brack and personal items are displayed here where they lived instead of glass cases in a museum at a distance. It makes it so much easier to imagine the rather extraordinary personalities who walked these halls.

So many of the objects in Gala's apartments were familiar to me from photographs of the surreal couple, because they appear in Dali's paintings, or because I had seen hundreds of the Master's drawings and many were made of random objects around him.

Most people seemed to move through the castle in about thirty to fourty minutes. I needed two hours because in addition to seeing everything I could, I was also trying to feel the presence of Gala or Dali. I was no more successful than I had been at Casa Dali. It just didn't feel as if there was any part of those strong personalities still there. Perhaps next time (I have been back) with much more time.......

After leaving the castle, I again visited the grounds with their grotesque Dali sculptures and other surprises, then walked through the village of Pubol. It really is tiny and all those houses and other buildings really are connected to each other as if for defence. Some villagers were setting up tables in the small plaza and it appeared as if preparations were underway for a festival the next day. Too bad Duncan and I needed to return to Barcelona.

The castle and adjoining church and the conjoined village are all built of rather dark brown stone with little visually breaking up the hulking mass. In all directions, however, the beautiful countryside flows off across fields, streams and clumps of trees.

That is the last of my memories of my first, marvelous visit to Catalonia--Dali Country. It is exciting to see Dali paintings in everything one looks at around the district. Duncan kept pointing out the locations of Dali paintings and various features of the landscape which the Master used as material for his paintings and drawings. We also had great meals at Dali's favorite restaurant.

On my next visit to Catalonia, I was accompanied by my wife Melinda and, in addition to again visiting all three of the Dali locations, I met residents of Figures and Cadaques who knew Dali and shared with me their small collections of original drawings he had given them.

This was and is very important because the only way to develop connoisseurship in the works of an artist is to see a tremendous amount of his work. I really believe that through all of the experiences I have had over the past thirty years as a well-known Dali expert, that I have seen more original Dali artworks than anyone else.

THE ROAD TO PUBOL

2009-02-20T12:40:00.003-07:00

THE ROAD TO PUBOL (ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN, PART 4)

This is the fourth posting in the series recounting the trip my son Duncan and I made around Dalí country in Catalonia, Spain about seven years ago.

After our incredible and never-to-be-forgotten visit to Casa Dalí at Port Lligat and an exploration of Cap de Creuz and the surrounding mountains, I was ready for another adventure. Duncan needed some time off. One can only keep up with the Artpro-On-The-Go for so long. First we made the pilgrimage up exhilierating mountain roads to the other “roads”: San Per de Rhodes Monestary. This is the institution that created and exported all over Europe the Romanesque culture and style.

A gorgeous ruin now, it hangs on the side of a crag, on top of which is a ruined castle named San Salvador. Just down the ridge is a ruined abbey named Santa Helena. To Dalí, this was a tremendously significant place because it had the foundation of scholarship and culture and a castle named “Salvador” and an abbey named “Helena” in close proximity on top of a bare and wind-swept ridge. “Helena” was Gala Dalí’s actual name.

I was ready to be off on the search for the tiny village of Pubol and its castle which had been discovered by Salvador Dalí in 1968 (the year he finished the Teatro-Museo Gala-Salvador Dalí in Figures.) He had been promising Gala that he would buy her a castle as her personal retreat for thirty years. The first time he made the promise they were living in Northern Italy during the Spanish Civil War, which was closely followed by the Second World War, most of which they spent in the United States.

Can you imagine living with Salvador Dalí? Gala—an exceedingly strong and domineering woman—wanted a place of her own where Dalí could visit her by written invitation only. Whoa!

With Duncan chillin’, I set out through the labyrinth of farm roads that spider web the Plane of Ampurdam between Figures and Cadaques (and Port Lligat). I eventually was at the base of the slope on top of which was the silhouette of the village, castle and church of Pubol. They formed an almost solid stone mass because most of the buildings were connected to each other like a Southwestern Indian pueblo. (Yes, I know. “pueblo” is the word the Spanish use for tiny villages like Pubol)

Fields, vineyards and orchards flowed down the sloped below this towering, dark edifice. As I approached, I was fascinated to see the mass evolve into individual houses, stables, taverns and small plaza (but all connected). I think this place was built with consideration for defense.

Just above the village (a street’s width away) stood the conjoined church and Castle Gala Dalí. How nice, it was rather modest in its proportions, being basically a tower house, built without extensions for easier defense. No longer very fortress-like, it had served as a home to the Marquises of Blondel and the family now lived in Madrid. As a result, the castle was more of a “fixer-upper” than a great find.

Dalí bought it in 1970 and the restoration began. When it was completed, Dalí spent four months decorating the vestibule and various nooks of the castle. Everyone’s favorite story about that time was that Dalí was offended by the old iron radiators so he had them ripped out—and then painted radiators on the wall where they had stood! What a goof-ball. I think we would have liked each other (although there are many things about his character that I do not appreciate.)

The yard in front of the south-facing arched castle entrance is taken up with a maze of paths among high evergreen hedges arranged so that a visitor frequently turns a corner and is confronted by some very weird Dalí sculpture or construction. The fish pond is pretty wretched, but architecturally attractive.

Oh, incidentally, the exterior north wall of Gala’s castle faces the little plaza in front of the church and is joined at the corner to the church. Imbedded in it are three skulls.

Time to go in. The entrance is a low arch through what is called “The Persian Room” which includes a peep hole through which one can see into the basement—the former dungeon. And what to the wondering eye should appear but a 1976 Cadillac and a carriage that had been used by the previous proprietor. At one time it also housed Gala’s orange Datsun. (Didn’t know about that one, did you?)

The Cadillac de Ville was purchased in the United States in 1976 for $10,000. (Years later I would buy two 1976 Cadillac Sevilles. Beautiful small cars. One I got from my dear friend Marty Gordon, the legendary print dealer and publisher.)

The small court yard between the front wall and gate and the house proper has the feeling of being in a large stone well. The front of the house exhibits various decorative elements, but is dominated by the decorative stone staircase leading up to the front door which is surmounted by a carved coat of arms.

As an aside, I am reminded that later King Juan Carlos granted Salvador Dalí the title of Marquis of Pubol. Sort of like children playing kingdom in the living and dining rooms and one of them being designated Duke of the Red Chair.

The wonders that I found inside Gala’s Castle will be the subject of my next posting. Since I’m behind, I’ll try to get to it in a few days. I may be here to write, but I’m also on vacation.

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 3

2009-02-07T12:06:00.004-07:00

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 3

While we waited to enter the Casa-Museu Salvador Dali at Port Lligat, we walked over to look at the doors on the Clock Hut which now serves as the coatroom for the main attraction. Dali asked the fishermen for years to finish off the paint and dry their brushes after they painted their boats. The doors are thus painted with many shades in what Dali called "the best abstract pictures in the history of painting."

As we climbed the stairs to the front door and entered "The Hall Of The Bear" (dominated by a stuffed polar bear), we again glanced out over the island-choked bay. There lay one of the artist's greatest inspirations. Later. looking out the windows facing the bay in the Bedroom, The Bird Room, The Yellow Room and, of course, the studio we were struck with the fact that every window serves as a living Salvador Dali painting. Each is so beautiful.

For me the greatest rewards came in the studio where I could see up close (but not touch) the brushes, paints, and paraphernalia. I learned so much in that room and only briefly thought about how much one of the hundreds of brushes or one of the palettes hanging on the wall would add to my collection in Santa Fe.

I think Duncan liked the pool-side terrace most. There they were, the famous penis-shaped swimming pool, a Mae West lips couch in painted cement, the Firelli tire signs, and all the other decorations that are so familiar from numerous post-1968 photographs. So much to see. So much to discover. So much to point out to each other. When I took my wife Melinda a couple of years later I could barely restrain my anxiousness to show her things. As always, she was patient with my enthusiasm.

As with the Teatro-Museu in Figures, we were completely alone. When the caretaker left, she instructed us to push a wall-mounted door bell when we were ready to be let out. For a couple of hours we explored the multi-layer house and tried to figure out the nine stages by which it had grown and expanded up the hill absorbing one fisherman's cottage after another.

We took pictures of each other in various locations (but stayed off the bed) and identified objects we knew from our research.

For instance, in The Yellow Room was a lumpy plaster globe with a clock and various nails and screws pressed into the plaster when it was wet. "That," I told Duncan, "is a bomb. It contains nails and screws and when Dali set a similar bomb off inside a box made of six zinc printing plates, the plates were marred in ways that Dali enjoyed turning into printable images."

I was disappointed, however, that the Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali--who owns the house museum and arranged our solitary visit--had removed all of the Master's books. They, like the paint brushes and paper, would have carried much information for me.

After seeing hundreds of photographs of Salvador, Gala, the Reynolds Morses, Giuseppe and Mara Albaretto, Pierre Argillet, the Tibetan monks, hippies and a great many other visitors, I was a bit surprised not to feel the presence of any of those personalities. The place was stuffed with objects that I associate with the painter, but it didn't feel as if he had been around for a very long time. He seemed even more remote on my next visit when small groups of people were being toured though the house.

There are a great many fantastic things to see and visitors seem always to enjoy themselves. One of the favorites is the dovecote, a plastered and white-washed tower which Dali designed and decorated with wooden Catalan grape forks that stick out on all sides to serve as perches for the doves. The forks are carved from young trees that are trained to grow in the appropriate shape for long-handled implements that are used in the vinyards to life the low-growing grapes off the ground.

Near the barbecue is found a telephone booth. It was one of the first in Spain and Dali like to provide it for his guests to make calls. I can only immagine what it was like stringing those first wires over the ridge from Cadaques and down across the stone terraces. If not burried, the wires would become goat snacks.

Another favorite of mine was the half-dozen six-legged chairs that sat around the terrace. I was told by one of Dali's old friends who generously shared his private collection with me (as did several others) that his father had built them for their painter friend who liked to lean back in a straight chair and was known to sometimes tumble over backwards. That's why two additional legs had been added at an angle at the back so the chair would lean securely back on them.

The Foundation has made an enormous amount of money from admissions to the Teatro-Museu, the Casa-Museu Salvador Dali (the house) and the Castell Gala Dali at Pubol. The last is the castle that Salvador bought Gala so she would have her dream of a retreat from him where he would be summoned by written invitation only.

My visit to Gala's hidaway is the subject of the next posting. See you then.

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 2

2009-02-01T19:38:00.001-07:00

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN Part 2

A couple of days after our extraordinary visit to the Teatro-Museo Salvador Dali in Figures, my son Duncan and I drove down across the Plane of Ampurdam which is often depicted in Dali artworks as a flat surface with orthogonal lines converging at the horizon. This fecund agricultural region was spread out below the boy Salvador as he painted in his first studio, a converted laundry shed on the roof of the apartment building in Figures where the Dali family lived.

At the far edge of the plane, he could see the coastal mountains on the other side of which lay the fishing village of Cadaques where the Dali family visited many summers. It was this delightfully picturesque town build around one of the many bays on the rugged coast that later became the home to Salvador and Gala Dali. They bought and joined together several fishermen’s houses on the tiny, island-choked bay of Port Lligat.

That house, a labyrinthine structure climbing the hill above a stone landing at the shoreline, was our destination. The Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali had kindly made reservations for us to visit at 4:00 of the first day we spent in Figures.

Having discovered very shortly after dropping down from the steep and winding mountain road into Cadaques that we would be smart to stash the car and walk about the town, we started out for Port Lligat early in the afternoon. We later found out there is a steep path over the ridge between Cadaques and the little bay, but in our ignorance we followed the hot winding road that climbed up through ancient, and now abandoned, stone terraces.

Such terraces, almost without any vegetation on them, covered every possible slope along this part of the Costa Brava. The vines had died in the Phyloxea epidemic that wiped out most of Europe’s vineyards. The cork oaks had died during several unusually cold winters and the olives had also perished through almost forgotten environmental disasters. At one time Cadaques had been a busy port exporting cork, wine and olives, but that was before the memory of its current inhabitants. It now serves not freighters, but international yachts and is a popular resort.

A couple of years later, my wife Melinda and I would rent for a while a marvelous restored farm mansion set on a mountainside among the terraces south of Cadaques. At night the only lights we could see were those on boats out in the Mediterranean.

At the top of the ridge where the path to Dali’s house drops down the slope to the sea, Duncan and I found a small chapel sporting a belfry which inspired Dali’s often used image of a girl skipping rope. In the grave yard is a Dali sculpture featuring his hypercubic cross. It felt to us as if we were getting very close to the heart of Dali country.

When we arrived in the small plaza in front of Casa Dali, we were charmed by the view past the beached fishing boats (including Gala’s small yellow one) to the islands and promontories with their horizontal layers of terraces. Everything looked so Dalinian! That is the wonderful thing about visiting this part of Catalonia—one sees Dali images everywhere, especially in Cadaques, Port Lligat and on Cap de Creus. Everywhere I looked around Port Lligat, I saw Dali paintings that I knew very well. Later, looking out of the windows of Casa Dali, I again saw paintings that I know well.

What a thrilling experience to walk into the plaza decorated with a fishing boat out of which grows a cedar tree. Why, that’s “My Cousin Carolineta On The Beach At Rosas”. Never mind that the famous beach is many miles south over very rugged mountains from this boat and tree. They are featured in that painting along with the little girl.

Duncan walked over to the ticked-seller to buy our tickets for the 4 o’clock time slot. He returned with a Duncan smirk that I love. “OK, Dad.” He said. “I’m impressed. They’re closing the house at 4:00 so we can be alone inside.”

It was very hard to relax on the hillside in a more recent olive grove while we awaited the witching hour. We lay on golden dry grass in dappled sunlight and passed a Cuban cigar back and forth. Duncan had bought it for me in Cannes after he left his three traveling buddies to join me in Spain.

A few minutes before 4:00, we worked our way down through the trees and across the terraces to arrive right on time at the front door of Casa Dali. We were welcomed by the caretaker who asked us to wait a few minutes while the earlier visitors left the house.

What happened then (Oh, it was lovely) will have to be the subject of ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART3. See you then.

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN PART 1

2009-01-24T14:14:00.002-07:00

ALONE WITH DALI AND DUNCAN - Part 1

On my first visit to the Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali in Figures, Spain, I was accompanied by my son Duncan and neither of us knew what amazing experiences we were about to have as guests of the foundation.

After an exciting meeting with several of the Foundation's officers, we were asked whether we had yet visited the Teatro Museo (museum) designed and created by Salvador Dali next door to the Torre Galatea in which we were meeting. We had not, but certainly it was one of our primary reasons for visiting Dali country along with our plans to visit Dali's house, Casa Dali, at Port Lligat and the castle at Pubol which Dali had renovated for the use of his wife Gala. All were then open to the public.

Our friends at the Foundation made reservations for us at both the museum and the Casa Dali. The line outside the former was then experiencing a two hour wait for admission and the latter required a reservation be made for a specific time to visit. We, it turned out, were to be treated like royalty.

Our reservation for the Museum was set for 11:30 that night. Closing time was midnight and we were told that we would be permitted to stay as long as we wished and would be let out whenever we told a guard we were ready to leave. Imagine! We were to be alone in the Museum and not have to deal with the vast crowds that otherwise made it difficult to get around and almost impossible to get close to the artworks and artifacts.

The experience was sublime. All of the lights were on. We didn't see a guard or anyone else the entire time and we had complete freedom to go wherever we wished in the labyrinthine converted theatre.

At that time, the actual art collection was not as good as that at The Salvador Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida--which I had appraised three times--but there were numerous works I had not seen and many fantastic displays created by Dali. On my next visit I could clearly see that the collection had expanded.

Duncan and I had a wonderful time for about an hour and a half. I was familiar with many of the displays from book photographs and it was fun to see them in person and without the distraction of throngs of people. There was the taxi with a mannequin siting inside who was periodically drenched with interior rain. There were stage backdrops and sets that Dali had created for ballets and movies and, perhaps best of all, there was the Mae West room. It is designed to appear to be a portrait of the actress. Her hair is comprised of draperies. Her lips are the famous lip-shaped couch. Her eyes are two paintings and her nose is a fireplace. When viewed from the right distance, there she is, looking as voluptuous as in real life.

Duncan recognized a great many of the exhibits because he had been interested in Salvador Dali's work since he was a small child. In fact, when he was four I walked into the living room one day to find him sitting in my large hand-carved rocking chair that had been custom made for me by an artist for whom I had provided some expert witness services. On his lap was the huge book titled Dali: The Work, The Man. He wailed at me, "Dad, get this book off me. I can't move!"

He was always looking at my Dali books and later he proved to have developed an impressive eye for the real and the fake Dalis. When he was eleven, I took him to The Salvador Dali Museum and he was able to discuss several paintings with Joan Kropf the curator. Several years later, in my Santa Fe office, he looked at a fake Dali drawing and accurately identified everything that was wrong with it.

How does one, like Duncan, develop an "eye" for art? There's only one way. Look, look, look. Duncan has spent his life looking at Salvador Dali's art (not surprisingly) and I believe one of his best experiences was being alone with me in Dali's own museum.

It may, however, have been topped a couple of days later when we were given the run of Salvador Dali's house with no one else around. That will be the subject of my next posting.

WHERE TO FROM HERE?

2009-01-15T10:02:00.002-07:00

WHERE TO FROM HERE?

OK. Now that we have taken a new direction, I am working on a list of topics to address. I would be happy to respond to suggestions and questions that youall send to dali@bernardewell.com.

By the way, for those who are not familiar with Southern culture (no, that's not Southern Comfort), you may be confused by the use for "youall". Sometimes it's written "you-all". Either way, it appears to Northerners to be plural. Actually, it's a singular usage. If you're addressing a crowd, the proper term is "all you all".

Am I a southerner? No. But it is true that I am descended from General Richard Stoddard Ewell of the Confederacy and my wife Melinda is a descendent of Jefferson Davis. Even so there are no residual Confederate sympathies in our household.

I beieve the next posting I'll do will share with youall (or y'all) my first visit to Salvador Dali's museum in Figures, Spain and his home in Port Lligat near Cadaques. On both ocassions my son Duncan and I were totally alone in the buildings and were permitted to stay as long as we wished--courtesy of the Fundacio Gala-Salvador Dali. Quite an experience.

Right now I'm in a hotel room in San Francisco and don't have time to write the posting, but I'll try to get to it later. I'm about to go up to San Rafael to visit John Garzoli at the Garzoli Gallery. He is one of the top dealers in historic American art and I am looking forward to finally meeting him. This afternoon I'll return to San Francisco to meet with Roland Weinstein at his gallery near Union Square. He is one of the top delers in Contemporary art and a major "ggod guy" player in the Salvador Dali market.

Tomorrow I start a two day course in USPAP- the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice. I do this every five years as I believe that it represents the most important set of standards for the appraisal profession. USPAP is the wall that divides truly professional appraisers from the mass of others who claim to be appraisers, but fall far short of what they should be.

In other words, the "ARTPRO-on-the-go" is moving ahead. yesterday I arrived in San Francisco on my 1,017th airplane flight.

LETTER FROM DUBAI

2008-12-08T13:38:00.001-07:00

LETTER FROM DUBAI

Thanksgiving in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. No, we’re not talking roast camel with all the trimmings. Little did I think that I would ever cook a turkey in a 7,350 square foot apartment on the 40th floor with four balconies overlooking the famous man-made Palm peninsula and the Dubai Marina home of some of the world’s biggest yachts. Especially just one day after fighting the traffic and pollution of Bangalore, India.

In fact, as we sit down to the meal with our son Jeff, daughter-in-law Lena and her mother from Ukraine as well as a group of international friends, the television in our bedroom is filled with scenes of trouble and terror in India and Thailand where we have spent the last couple of weeks. As my wife Melinda says, “we have good travel karma.”

The circumstances and contrasts of this trip are typical of our travels (we’ve been out of the US for twelve weeks this year). One morning we wake up in Mysore, India and have breakfast with five Tibetan Buddhist monks whom we sponsor. One, Wangchuk Dorgie, is, like the two other non-monk Tibetans at the table, one of our mutually adopted children.

By noon we are on the train to Bangalore with Wangchuk and Gelek, who recently earned is law degree, is a magnificent young man and will soon be in the US working for his Masters degree.

We hurtle past rice paddies, blooming sugar cane and bullock carts and through crowded rural villages toward Bangalore City Railway Station where we will have to fight our way off the train against a tide of pushing, shoving people trying to get into the car for the trip to Chennai. This is raw India.

Within the hour we are sinking into the unparalleled luxury of the Taj West End Hotel. Little do we know that the next day, as we fly to Dubai, the sister hotel—the Taj Mahal in Mumbai—will become a scene of murder and terror. Between that and the takeover of the Bangkok airport (which we traveled through four times) my office and our house sitter would field a flood of calls from concerned friends.

Now here we are in amazing Dubai, surrounded by one third of all the high construction cranes in the world with twenty-four hour building on three neighboring towers making the balconies of the apartment noisy places to read or smoke a cigar. In a few days we’ll fly to London for the night and then on home to beautiful Santa Fe and our quiet canyon.

2008-11-07T11:58:00.002-07:00

NOTICE TO YOU, DEAR READERS:

I shall be traveling in Asia for the next three
weeks and shall not do any new postings
during that time.
Anything I can bring you from Thailand,
Cambodia, India or Dubai?