Most
of the time, when you successfully bid on a piece of art, you will not actually
receive the piece of art that you saw in front of you during the auction. For
example, the largest auction house on board cruise ships only guarantees that a
similar version of the art being bid on will be sent to the buyer. In most
cases, the actual piece of art is in a warehouse and will be shipped to the
passenger once they return home. This is another fact that makes one wonder how
original pieces of art could be in two places at the same time!
Art
auctioneers working on board cruise ships are not usually licensed as actual
art auctioneers. They are not required to be since they do not have to follow
the legal codes found on land. So you can definitely classify an on board art
auctioneer as more of a salesman/saleswoman than an actual certified art
professional.
Each
piece of art for sale must be appraised. However, those for sale at a cruise
ship auction can be appraised by anyone. And that is usually what happens. For
example, the largest art auction house operating on cruise ships has every
piece of art they sell appraised by the owner of the auction house himself!
They do not use a certified and independent appraiser at all. As you can
imagine, given their direct interest in earning money from the artwork they sell,
they can virtually claim that a piece of art is worth as much as they want to say
it is worth. How convenient!
If
you decide to participate in an art auction, you are usually asked, or even
required, to complete a ‘registration form’ before the auction starts. This is
really just a way to obtain your credit card information so that as soon as you
successfully bid on a piece of art, the charges can be automatically applied to
your credit card. Art auctioneers do not want the charges to be put onto your
on-board account. By avoiding this method, a buyer will not actually see the
total charges (with all of the added fees thrown in) until they receive the
final invoice that arrives with the piece of art once they get home.
You
will almost never find any documents of authenticity or other information prior
to the start of a cruise ship art auction. Of course, having this information
would be useful by allowing you to learn as much as you can ahead of time about
any piece of art you are interested in. Instead, you are forced to blindly bid
on artwork that you cannot confirm is authentic or as ‘valuable’ as the art
auctioneer claims it to be. If they can’t provide the documentation, you should
definitely be suspicious. If they do provide you with some ‘official’
paperwork, look it over as closely as possible and read every single line. Keep in mind that most of the above would
violate US laws and regulations regarding the manner in which art auctions may
be held. But again, since these auctions do not answer to the United States (or
any other) legal system, they are able to get around almost every rule, forcing
anyone to conclude that the ethics of such art auctions are quite questionable.
In
the end, passengers have been spending thousands and thousands of dollars
simply by being convinced that they are making an ‘investment of a lifetime’.
When they find out that what they bought is worth nowhere near the amount they
paid, it is too late.
If
you want to avoid having this happen to you, it’s best to take the free
champagne and just walk away…or not even go near the auction in the first
place.
Contact
us at Travel Tours & Cruises to plan your next vacation.
