Archive for category Photography and Art
Art As Investments
Posted by Jeff Awesome in Photography and Art on February 10th, 2011
Buying art as a financial investment has always been something I’ve thought about because if I am going to be saving money I’d much prefer said money to be hung up on a wall in the form of a picture than it to be a bank statement through my post every month.
Is this £1700 Banksy print worth investing in?
However I thought it probably wouldn’t be an investment unless you had some serious money to get down, a £50k painting will always be worth a lot of money but a £50 picture is never going to rise in price (unless you are very lucky!) I recently came across an old Guardian post on their readers advice column asking the same sort of question. The person wanted to know if a £1,500 painting by a recently deceased well known painter would be a sound investment or if it would just be money down the drain.
A lot of the replies went along the lines of ‘if you like it and you can afford it, buy the piece, the enjoyment you get from owning it should be foremost with any financial gains a possible bonus.’ People were very wary to advice buying it purely as an investment because unless you have a very detailed knowledge of the art world it is very hard to get it right.
However there were some good pieces of advice such as searching out the artists other works and see what is happening with them price wise, as this would give you an idea of what value the piece you are looking at is. Another thing to look out for is to check you are getting an original print which will be in a small run and it isn’t a reproduction of a painting that will be far less limited.
Overall then it seems art as an investment isn’t the best option for your money but if you genuinely like the piece you want to buy then by all means go ahead, if the price of it goes up then consider it a bonus.
The Photography Of The Dakar Rally
Posted by Jeff Awesome in Photography and Art, World and Travel on January 17th, 2011
The epic Dakar Rally event once known as the Paris to Dakar has been happening since 1979 when a few well off people gathered together in a group and decided to have a bit of a race from, obviously, Paris to Dakar in Senegal. Over the years the event has grown into a million dollar event with huge corporate teams and a lot of people taking part and being very competitive about it.
It has also changed locations quite a bit throughout time and in 1995 it changed from the Paris Dakar to just the Dakar as they stopped starting the race in France due to political reasons. It was always held in Africa until 2008 when they had terrorist threats against the rally, so in 2009 the rally moved to South America and now starts and finishes in Beunos Aires.
This new location however means a lot more unexplored area for all the very good motorsport photographers to explore and take pictures of some extremely intimidating landscapes. They have several classes of vehicle that take part in the race and they all make for some interesting contrasts to the scenery, such as the bikes looking lost and tiny in a grand desert scene or the vans and trucks jumping through big sand dunes. My favourite picture though are the big arctic lorries that take part because they kick up so much dust behind them it makes for some fantastic photographs.
These photos are all from Tim Reese who does an excellent photo blog of world events on Sacbee.com