The G Manifesto

Is the Art World’s Bull Market Over?

Everyone who is anyone in the art world was in London last week for a series of sales and fairs.

The trouble is, too many collectors left their checkbook behind in the clearest sign yet that the global financial crisis has finally caught up with the art world. Experts warn that things are likely to get tougher.

A far bigger test for a market which had largely defied the gravity of economic gloom comes next month, when Sotheby’s and Christie’s, the two dominant auction houses, hold major sales in New York. The Art Basel Miami Beach show follows in December.

“Now is not a brilliant time to be selling — people are facing such a complicated financial situation they are not prepared to do anything,” said Philip Hoffman, chief executive of the Fine Art Fund Group.

“The market place is much tougher, and in light of what’s happened in the financial markets, the art market cannot be immune to it. Liquidity is tighter everywhere.”

Source

Art world’s test

I think Sotheby’s and Christie’s will undoubtbly be effected by the Down Economy.

But like anything, if the price is right, now is the time to be buying.

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA Your favorite International Playboy’s, favorite International Playboy
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Banksy’s Bomb in London

Five works by cult graffiti artist Banksy failed to sell at a weekend auction after doubts were raised about their authenticity.

On its website, auctioneer Lyon & Turnbull said that the five top lots by Banksy with a combined estimate of 200-275,000 pounds ($360-495,000) and called “street works” because they were removed from their original urban settings, went unsold.

It was unclear whether their failure to find buyers was a result of the row over authenticity or reflected broader uncertainty in the contemporary art market caused by the financial crisis. Lyon & Turnbull were unavailable for comment.

Before Saturday’s London sale, the auctioneer said the five main Banksy’s on offer were genuine, even though the only authorized verification body had declined to confirm that they were by the hugely successful British artist.

Pest Control said it would not approve any street pieces removed from their original settings, partly to crack down on fakes and partly to protect the original concept.

His work became so valuable that several street pieces were salvaged, including a painting attributed to Banksy on a wall in London that fetched 208,100 pounds ($383,000) in an online sale. The cost of removing the wall and replacing it was not included.

Source

The pieces didn’t sell because of authenticity, not the worlds financial situation. In my opinion.

The Rest is Up To You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA The Seventh Letter
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - The Message

Only Stock up today: Campbell Soup

The only stock to rise in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index today was Campbell Soup Co. (NYSE:CPB), which edged up 12 cents to $37.75.

Soup lines in our future?

Click here for Top Ten ways to Make Money in a Down Economy

Only other stock that did “decent”, Hormel Foods Corp.(NYSE:HRL), which slipped just 13 cents to $36.25, which of course is the maker of Spam.

Spam Musubi is so Ono.

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA The Seventh Letter
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Rick James - Ghetto Life lyrics:

When I was a young boy
Growing up in the ghetto
Hanging out on corners
Singing with the fellas
Looking for the cute chicks
Trying to find a bit of fun
Looking for some trouble
Or anyone who’ll give me some

When I was a young man
Kind of free and fancy
Met this little cute girl
She said her name was Nancy
She had pigtails to her shoulders
She couldn’t have been much older
She taught me what I had to know
To make a girl not want to go

She was very kinky
In the ghetto
She laid her pigtails down on me
In the ghetto
And I was feeling oh so sneaky
In the ghetto
I had to see what love could be
In the ghetto

Rick James - Ghetto Life

Banksy Bombs New Orleans

Banksy gets up in New Orleans for the third anniversary of Katrina.

Abe Lincoln pushes a cart

Patriot

“I must not copy what I see on the Simpsons”

Boy swings on a Life Preserver

Heist

Peace to the people of New Orleans. Going soon.

Source

The Ritz Carlton, New Orleans

The Rest is Up to You…..

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA The Seventh Letter
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

GEORGIA BUSH - Lil Wayne

Georgia Bush - lil wayne (longer version)

Miami man arrested in Picasso heist

A Miami man was arrested on Friday for stealing Picasso paintings from Gallery Biba, in Palm Beach, four months ago.

Police believe the man broke into the gallery in the middle of the night May 22 by breaking a glass by the rear courtyard door. He took two framed Picasso etchings, ”Jacqueline Lisant” and ”Le Repas Frugel”, valued at $145,000 and $395,000.

He then tried to sell one of the paintings to a California art dealer, authorities said.

The owner of the Gallery Biba got a call from the California art dealer about an offer to purchase Le Repas Frugel. When the dealer checked the Art Loss Registry, she found that it was stolen.

The Suspect shipped her the painting.

The California art dealer told police said she had previously purchased another painting from the suspect which was stolen from a gallery in Washington D.C.

Source

Amateur moves all around.

The Rest is Up to You…..

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
AKA The Seventh Letter
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Nas ft. The Game- Hustlers

Monet’s Water Lily Pond breaks record at auction

“Le bassin aux nymphéas,” or “Water Lily Pond,” sold for 40.9 million pounds (51.7 million euros, 80.5 million dollars) at Christie’s in London by an unidentified woman in the front row.

This piece was part of a four-work collection of water lily paintings Monet busted out.

The painting fetched a pretty heavy price since it had previously sold purchased in a 1971 New York auction for $320,000. It had remained in private hands since.

This painting shattered the auction record for the French impressionist artist. Last May, “Le Pont du chemin de fer a Argenteuil” sold for $41.4 million.

Monet painted the masterpiece at his crib in Giverny in 1919, and it is one of four that he signed and dated that year.

Of the other three, one is kicking it in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, another has been divided, while the third is in private hands.

The art world keeps on plugging away despite the weak world economy.

The disparity between rich and poor grows wider….

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Wiz Khalifa - Say Yeah

The Scream by Edvard Munch to go back on the Wall

“The Scream” (1893) and “Madonna”(1893-94) by Edvard Munch will go back on display at the Munch Museum in Oslo. Both paintings were stolen and unfortunately damaged in a 2004 heist.

Repairs to the paintings, that were damaged as they were torn from the walls of the museum, are almost complete.

Heistmen gaffled the paintings during the day, during museum hours in a daring if not artistic heist (no pun intended).

The two espressionist masterworks, valued at 110 million dollars at the time of the heist, were later recovered in 2006. Two men involved in the heist are behind bars.

Security is now increased at the Munch Museum.

This heist was considered wack by most pros since the masterpieces were damaged. It doesn’t matter if you are heisting fly girls or fly paintings, you need to respect your target and The Game.

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

Rob Base and DJ Easy Rock - It takes Two

Banksy’s piece of Kate Moss sells for $191,000

Street artist Banksy’s screen print of supermodel Kate Moss sold for US$191,000 at a recent “street art” auction in London. They sold for more than 5 times the expected.

Some people are suprised by the high prices (last week’s charity Red Auction at Sotheby’s in New York one was sold for more than $1.8m (£921,000). But many who grew up with graffitti, hip-hop, and skate culture are now older and have dough.

The Kate Moss piece, inspired by Andy Warhol’s iconic portrait of Marilyn Monroe, was one of 75 pieces of “urban art” on sale.

New pieces are on sale at the Andipa Gallery.

I still prefer the street art.

His street work is of course For the People.

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

OGC - No fear

Two of Four Stolen Masterpieces found in Zurich

Two masterpieces that were peeled from the E.G. Buehrle art museum last week were found in good condition Monday in an unlocked car parked outside a nearby psychiatric hospital.

The two other paintings are still Swayze.

The recovered paintings were Claude Monet’s “Poppies near Vetheuil” (1879) and Vincent van Gogh’s “Chestnut in Bloom” (1890) were found by a parking lot attendant who contacted police about 4 p.m. Monday.

The two paintings, which have a combined value of about $64 million, were among four stolen on Feb. 10 by three masked men in a dope daylight robbery at a private villa housing the E.G. Buehrle Collection. It was Switzerland’s largest-ever art robbery.

The two paintings were found Monday in a white Opel Omega with stolen license plates. They were found less than a mile from the museum.

The museum had offered a $91,000 reward for information leading to the recovery of the four paintings, but neither police nor museum officials would say Tuesday if the parking lot attendant, who was not identified, would collect part of it. Or if he was part of the heist, on a flip the script move.

Authorities are continuing to search for the two other stolen paintings, “Count Lepic and his Daughters” (1871) by Edgar Degas and “Boy in a Red Jacket” (1888) by Paul Cezanne, which is the freshest piece in the museum.

Sounds like someone in the crew caught some nerves. Remember back in third grade when you heisted the test answers from the teacher? Someone in the crew always wanted to turn themself in when the heat came down.

That is why I prefer working Dolo.

Or with G Manifesto Certified PIC’s.

The Rest is Up to You…

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com

(Want to see something in The G Manifesto? Send suggestions to thegmanifesto@yahoo.com)

Papoose - Man Of The Year

Papoose - fuck the hip hop police

Paintings by Old Masters Heisted in Zurich

Four oil paintings worth more than $163.5 Million (£80m) by Monet, Degas, van Gogh and Cezanne were taken in the weekend robbery from the E.G. Buehrle museum.

The heisted pieces were Claude Monet’s “Poppy field at Vetheuil” (1880), Edgar Degas’ “Ludovic Lepic and his Daughter”(1871), Vincent van Gogh’s “Blooming Chestnut Branches” (1890), and Paul Cezanne’s “Boy in the Red Waistcoat” (1890).

Three G’s wearing ski masks and dark clothing ran up in the museum half-an-hour before closing on Sunday. This was largest art robbery in Switzerland’s history and one of the biggest ever in Europe.

While one of the men used a pistol to force museum personnel to the floor, the other two heistmen went into the exhibition hall and collected the four masterpieces. They were said to have spoken German with a Slavic accent (but of course they might have been disguising their voices).

The FBI estimates the market for stolen art at $6 billion(£3bn) annually (making it a very robust industry) and Interpol has about 30,000 pieces of stolen art in its database.

Three other versions of the stolen Cezanne painting — perhaps the most famous of those seized — exist in the National Gallery in Washington, the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. Its value alone is thought to be $90 million.

Last week, two Pablo Picasso paintings were stolen from a Swiss exhibition near Zurich.

The two oil paintings, Tete de cheval (Head of horse) and Verre et pichet (Glass and pitcher), were on loan from the Sprengel Museum in Hannover, Germany.

Again, authorities are talking about “entirely new dimension in criminal culture” which I talked about in Criminality in The Luxury Sector.

Swiss Police called it a “spectacular art robbery.” This is one of the few times I agree with police.

The three G’s are at large and presumibly living large.

No one was hurt.

The Rest is Up to You………..

Michael Porfirio Mason
AKA The Peoples Champ
The Guide to Getting More out of Life
http://www.thegmanifesto.com/

(Want to see something in The G Manifesto? Send suggestions to thegmanifesto@yahoo.com)

Intelligent Hoodlum- Grand Groove (Bonus Mix)

Joe Budden - Broken Wings