SUPERCOLLECTOR:
A Critique of Charles Saatchi (4th edn)
(Press release) (2010-11)
artdesigncafé | café library | Published 13 February 2010
SUPERCOLLECTOR: A Critique of Charles Saatchi (4th edn)
Rita Hatton & John A. Walker
Esher: Institute of Artology, 2010 (November), 400 pages, 68 illus.
Paperback £25; ISBN 978-0-9545702-4-8 ; Distributed by Turnaround
The Institute of Artology is pleased to announce the release of the 4th edition of SUPERCOLLECTOR: A Critique of Charles Saatchi, which remains the only in-depth, independent study of Charles Saatchi as an art collector to date. This unique book tells the story of the Saatchi advertising agencies, and the effort of Charles and Maurice Saatchi to achieve global domination by means of take-overs and acquisitions. Hatton & Walker argue that advertising values permeate the kind of art that Charles supports. The 4th edition builds on their previous research updating the Saatchi story since 2005 including Saatchi’s new gallery in London, his exhibitions of Chinese, Middle Eastern and Indian art, his television series, website, publications and the exhibition of new British art called Newspeak.
For John A. Walker, “The book spotlights how Saatchi devised a whole value-adding apparatus— by buying art, marketing it, exhibiting it, and publicising it— in order to boost the monetary worth of the art objects he purchased cheaply from young artists desperate for fame.”
SUPERCOLLECTOR also discusses previous exhibitions of the YBAs such as Sensation in London and New York which generated full-on publicity and the invention of spurious marketing-oriented “art movements”, such as New Neurotic Realism, which also aimed to steer the course of art history. Also discussed are the Momart fire, complaints by anti-Saatchi Stuckists, artworks critical of Saatchi by Hans Haacke and Jamie Wagg, and the influence Charles Saatchi has exercised on public galleries and institutions.
This text is informed by the political and sociological writings of Baudrillard, Bourdieu, Marx, Veblen and Raymonde Moulin. While it cites a wide range of opinions about Charles Saatchi, it is primarily a hostile critique written from an anti-capitalist perspective. This book illuminates the process of control.
About the authors
SUPERCOLLECTOR was initiated by independent researcher Rita Hatton. John A. Walker has published many books including Art and celebrity, Art in the age of mass media, Art & outrage: Provocation, controversy and the visual arts, Cross-overs: Art into Pop, Pop into art, Arts TV: A history of arts television in Britain, Cultural offensive: America’s impact on British art since 1945, Left shift: Radical art in 1970s Britain, Art & artists on screen, and a monograph on John Latham. Walker has also contributed numerous articles in a range of international art and design magazines. He is also a contributing editor of the critical Art Design Publicity magazine online at artdesigncafe.com.
Contact
For press queries, please contact Institute of Artology at (44) (1372) 465-119, or email projects [-at-] artdesigncafe.com . To order a copy, go to the ordering page at Turnaround Publisher Services.
Note to editors:
What critics have said about previous editions of SUPERCOLLECTOR:
“Small and malignant, this book slots into the pocket as snugly as a
gunslinger’s Bible”.
—Keith Miller, Times Literary Supplement.
“Takes a fresh look at the shadowy world of private patronage as it operates today”.
—Steve Jones in Socialist Appeal.
“A thorough-going account of Saatchi’s rise to the status of
Supercollector and an indictment of the role of advertising in the
advancement of capitalism and how this implicitly endangers the field of cultural production.”
—Roger Cook in Art History.
“A valuable counter balance to the weight of vanity publications
associated with the subject.”
—Colin Gleadell in Art Monthly.
“Simultaneously entertaining and relentless in its structure … good value for money.”
—Julian Freeman in The Art Book.
“… an absolutely brilliant piece of investigative reporting and
documentation of the Saatchis from the very beginning and with artist’s comments about what it is like dealing with them; just well researched like you’ve never imagined … The book on Saatchi is just incredible. Saatchi got where he is through advertising. He invented Margaret Thatcher. Walker documents this.”
—Donald Kuspit in Chicago Art magazine.
Comment on the 4th edition:
"First, anything negative said about my lovely colleague Patricia Ellis is misguided and needs a rethink. But for the rest of you publicity seekers in the book, a completely fair and insightful media analysis."
—R.J. Preece, editor, Art Design Publicity.
Institute of Artology
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Esher, Surrey KT10 9NX
United Kingdom
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