STREET WISE INVESTMENTS
Goldie’s words of wisdom for potential art buyers
Is purchasing the work of street artists a reliable option for art investors?
Like Bitcoin, there’s been a lot of fluctuation, but I handpick these artists [at Aurum] because they’re already established. Nick Walker is established. He’s not going down he’s going up. Same as Barry Reigate. Same as Pam Glew.
You have some works by Portuguese graffiti and street artist Vhils, who is certainly very hot at the moment.
Anyone that buys a Vhils now is making a very smart investment move. If you think about what Vhils did around the corner at the Portuguese Embassy in Bangkok, in 2017, and you think, ‘no one knew him then when he came to Bangkok’. And now you look at what he’s done in Paris, and this year at the Contemporary Arts Center of Cincinnati... you’d be a fool not to invest in Vhils!
Are there any other artists in the collection you’d single out?
There’s Belin, from Spain, who’s being cited as the new Picasso, but I think he goes beyond that. His take on the human figure is unreal. Same as what I think of Mode2, whose work would have been in Aurum Gallery but it got stuck in Italy, and we couldn’t get it out. He’s another prolific figure for me.
How about the works of up and coming artists?
Supporting the up and coming is my investment and part of what I want to put back into this thing. Showing a Jay Adams next to a Pam Glew is a really bold move. Same as with Toni Cogdell, an amazing female artist who’s really working in an amazing way with her portraits. And showing an artist who’s pretty much unknown, like Jecks and that world, that’s a good move because I think it’s very important we do that.
What’s your take on the local street art scene?
I think Thailand’s art scene is brilliant! There’s some key players spread across the city that are doing mad stuff, like Headache Stencil and all those guys. And to be honest, the difference with that generation is that they don’t have the same venomous distaste for galleries my generation had. Now it’s like ‘You wanna put my stuff in a gallery? Yeah, cool’, but I remember we were like, ‘F— galleries! F— the establishment! Rebel!!