Click for 2004 ADEC artprice CD-ROM and online art price database reviews.
*** Note posted November 25, 2000: Since this article was originally published in 1998, it has come to our attention that the ADEC/Art Price Group is engaging in questionable tactics in order to improve their positioning on major search engines. Read Alert: Artprice.com Clogs Search Engines With "Decoy" Websites to find out more. ***
ADEC
(short for Annuaire des Cotes
Moyennes
) is fast becoming the world's leading resource for art auction
price information. Earlier this year, they took over Falk's Art Price
Index, America's number one art auction price reference publisher, and will
incorporate its databases into subsequent ADEC
art price annuals.
The even bigger news is that for the first time anywhere, ADEC
has
published a book called the Art Price Indicator
which contains well
over 100,000 auction records of paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures,
and photographs by 50,000 artists from around the world.
So what's the big deal, you ask? The Art Price Indicator
sells for
an unbelievably low $19.95
!!! In the past, you would have had to
pay $100 to $200 or more for this amount of information. And even though
the book is nearly 1800 pages long, it's still small enough to take along
with you whenever you're out in the field. I've gotta tell you folks-- in
the fifteen years that I've been writing this column and reviewing art
reference books, I've never seen any single publication that succeeds like
the Art Price Indicator
does in combining quality,
comprehensiveness, portability, and affordability.
The Art Price Indicator
is a quick and easy way to ballpark average
auction selling prices for listed artists. Under each artist's name are
individual price results of works of art that have sold at auction. Each
entry includes selling price, title, size, place and date of sale, medium,
and type of art. Most artists have one or two entries; more famous ones
like Picasso have between ten and thirty. Each artist's birth and death
dates are listed as well as the total number of works by that artist that
have been sold at auction and recorded by ADEC
since 1987 (Chagall
has 1,437 entries, for example).
As with any abbreviated price guide, use Art Price Indicator
to
approximate value rather than to accurately appraise works of art. It's a
perfect jumping off point for further research in more comprehensive ADEC
publications such as their annual auction record compendiums,
their CD-ROM with ten years of sales totaling 1.3 million auction records,
and their websites, www.artmarket.com
and www.artprice.com
. Show ADEC
that you support their efforts to make quality auction price
guides affordable for everyone and buy your copy of Art Price
Indicator
today. It's the best art book bargain I've ever
seen.
Art Price Indicator International
, ADEC Art Price Annual S.A., St.
Romain au Mt. D'Or, France, 1998, softbound, 1792 pages, 4 3/4 by 7 1/4
inches, $19.95.
Available from Dealer's Choice Books, Inc., PO Box 710, Land O'Lakes, FL
34639 or call toll-free 1-800-ART-AMER.