Monday, March 11, 2002		Article

SPENDING on art has trebled to more than $ 4.3 billion in the past year, as Britons abandon stuffy galleries and rush to snap up bargains at art fairs and on the Internet.

The scale of the spending has taken experts by surprise and triggered a boom in sales, with the public becoming far more adventurous about what they buy. People spent $ 1 billion on art in the year to February 2001, but research carried out on behalf of the annual Prospect Prize for contemporary drawing has found that expenditure in the 12 months since then has leapt to $ 4.3 billion.

The consumer boom marks a growing confidence in artistic taste, as buyers replace old prints with genuine paintings to hang in their homes.

'Visual art is now the fashionable thing to spend money on. It is much more hip than theatre, and this is reflected in the look of advertising and design, so people are more open to it all,' said Will Ramsay, who founded Affordable Art five years ago. `The change in the housing market over recent years has also made a difference,' he added. `More people own their own homes, so they are spending more on decor.'

Affordable Art holds public art fairs in London, Bristol and New York every year. Prices range from $ 45 to $ 3,500 and income from the works bought at their fairs has risen from $ 1.4 million in the first year of trading to $ 4.3 million in 2001. "Last year we had 18,000 visitors in London over the weekend, and we are hoping for the same this year," said Ramsay.

The new research into domestic art buying, funded by Pizza Express, sponsors of the $14,000 Prospect Prize, has also revealed that 10 per cent of people have more than 15 pieces of art of some description in their home, and that 31 per cent have between one and five pieces.

The survey also suggests that people are now spending larger amounts on fewer pieces. The arrival of popular Internet art galleries is part of the key to understanding this growing appetite for original art and contemporary prints. Snooty high street galleries with unpriced paintings on the walls are no longer the only way to buy a masterpiece.

Affordable Art has its own Website and - along with rival online galleries such as Bowieart, easyart.com and britart.com - the art market represents one sector of the dot.com world that has avoided financial disaster. "Last month we had 7,50,000 page views on our site, and we make it clear you don't have to be an art expert to buy or appreciate art," said Victoria Powell of BritArt. com, the virtual gallery which also has premises in east London.

`Over 20 per cent of our customers are first-time buyers and we offer a 14-day home trial, which gives customers the security to return the art work if it isn't right for their home.'

The decision to buy an unknown artist's work can be financially advantageous too. Works by Rob and Nick Carter - represented by Britart.com - have tripled in value in two years, the sale price of a 55ins x 55ins work rising from $ 1,800 to 5,700.

Easyart.com sells prints rather than original works, but has also benefited from the boom. `We are amazed by the popularity of contemporary work,' said Steve Learmond, of easyart.com, `but we sell a lot of old favourites too, such as Gustav Klimt's The Kiss.'

Easyart.com is 100 per cent up on income this year and visits to its site are 85 per cent up. `We have had over a million visitors since we launched two years ago,' said Learmond.

The Prospects 2002 prize short list will be announced next month . Shortlisted work will be shown in a final exhibition at The Essor Gallery Project Space in south London. - ONS