The drowned and the saved: the determinants of success in the Italian temporary art and cultural exhibitions market

This paper develops an empirical analysis of the determinants of the length of temporary art and cultural exhibitions. Using a sample of 659 exhibitions that took place in Italy in the period 2001–2010, a generalized linear model with a logit link and the binomial family was estimated. We also focus on the subsample of prolonged exhibitions, using a logistic accelerated failure time model. The empirical evidence supports the relevance of the subject, location and timing of the exhibition on duration; however, differences in the estimated impact of explanatory variables seem to suggest alternative marketing strategies for prolonged exhibitions.     

Price determinants and genre effects in the Korean art market: a partial linear analysis of size effect

This paper examines the price determinants of paintings in the Korean art market in the context of a hedonic price regression to investigate whether the hypothesis of the modified unit pricing system holds for the pricing of Korean modern and contemporary paintings. Using Korean auction data, I show that the parametric results provide overwhelming evidence that Korean art pricing does not function in accordance with the modified unit pricing scale. However, I re-examine this hypothesis using a semiparametric partial linear regression that does not require the prespecification of a functional form prior to estimation. Rather, the semiparametric approach allows the data to determine the exact form of the size-price profile. This result confirms that the modified unit pricing system applies to the Korean contemporary and modern painting market.     

The value of a good reputation online: an application to art auctions

Using a unique dataset of art auctions on eBay, we conduct an empirical analysis of the value of a seller’s online reputation. Several aspects distinguish our work from most existing research. We analyze a heterogeneous panel data consisting of a large number of observations over a large period of time, including significant variation in reputation across and within sellers. The panel structure of our dataset allows us to employ fixed effects techniques to control for observed and unobserved differences across auctions. Our results point to a highly significant, and sizable, impact of a negative reputation on the behavior of market participants and on market outcomes. Negative feedback is associated with a significant reduction in the number of bidders and a reduction in the probability of sale; negative feedback is also associated with a significant reduction in sale price. Consistent with previous research, the impact of additional positive feedback on market outcomes for the seasoned sellers in our sample is not statistically significant.     

Estimating the real growth effects of blockbuster art exhibits: A time series approach

This paper addresses the evaluation of real growth forecasts made by impact studies. Intervention analysis is used to estimate the ex post impact of blockbuster exhibits on economic growth in Jackson, Mississippi (chosen because state and local governments provide regular subsidies to finance the exhibitions). Non-farm employment measures real economic growth and dummy variables capture the occurrence of the exhibitions. Univariate time series techniques identify and estimate a stationary process after filtering the data for seasonal and cyclical effects. The analysis estimates the short run impact on Jackson’s filtered employment series due to the blockbuster exhibitions as approximately 700 jobs.     

The relationship between reviewer judgments and motion picture success: re-analysis and extension

The relationship between the judgments of professional reviewers and the economic success of cultural products, such as motion pictures, has been the topic of controversial debates involving both scholars and industry experts. This study builds on previous research that distinguishes an ??influencer effect?? of reviews from a ??predictor effect.?? By empirically separating consumers?? and reviewers?? perceptions of movie quality through an auxiliary regression approach (and thus effectively controls for consumers?? quality perceptions), this study advances the discussion by investigating whether and how isolated reviewer quality perceptions are associated with box office results. The authors empirically test a non-linear effect of reviewers?? quality perceptions on box office returns, including a comprehensive investigation of the moderating forces of this relationship, using regression and simple slope analyses. Data from all 1,370 narrative films released in the United States between 1998 and 2006 reveal that though the short-term box office generally is not influenced by isolated reviewer quality perceptions, a non-linear relationship exists between reviews and long-term box office returns, such that films rated highly by reviewers are more strongly influenced than those that are not. In terms of moderators, the authors find evidence for several arthouse and mainstream characteristics to moderate the relationship between isolated reviewer quality perceptions and box office results.     

The importance of quality: How music festivals achieved commercial success

This paper examines the characteristics that are important to current commercially viable massive music festivals when making decisions on who to hire while facing horizontal and vertical quality differentiation with heterogeneous preferences among intended consumers. A model of customer demand motivates the empirical analysis using a unique bundling problem in which the consumer faces an unknown element, depending on festival reputation for expected utility. The empirical analysis utilizes characteristics important to the negotiation between the festival and the band as input. Musical acts with an album recognized as being of a high quality are about 33 % more likely to be hired by a festival in the year of release and 50 % more likely the following year. A top touring band is 40 % more likely to be hired in the first year, but 45 % less likely to be hired in the following year, likely due to an increased cost of hiring. Festivals hire quality, unknown bands to take advantage of the lower costs of lesser known acts by leveraging a reputation for evaluating quality before the consumer. Other industries face similar input decisions, giving the results a broader application.     

From Van Gogh's museum to the temple at bassae: heidegger's truth of art and schapiro's art history

This essay revisits Meyer Schapiro's critique of Heidegger's interpretation of Van Gogh's painting of a pair of shoes in order to raise the question of the dispute between art history and philosophy as a contest increasingly ceded to the claim of the expert and the hegemony of the museum as culture and as cult or coded signifier. Following a discussion of museum culture, I offer a hermeneutic and phenomenological reading of Heidegger's ‘Origin of the Work of Art’ and conclude by taking Heidegger's discussion of the strife between earth and world to the site of the ancient temple of Apollo Epicurius at Bassae as an example of the insistent foreclosure of the ancient work of art and the conflicts of the pervasive efforts of modern conservation.     

Economic valuation of a contemporary art museum: correction of hypothetical bias using a certainty question

Biases in contingent valuation exercises are often difficult to quantify and to correct due to the hypothetical nature of the method itself. One common problem is hypothetical bias, which in recent years has been addressed in various ways, particularly through the inclusion of a certainty question in the questionnaire. We analyse the impact of applying differing corrections based on the certainty question for double-bounded dichotomous economic valuation exercises. The empirical application is based on data gathered from four surveys conducted with various groups to obtain the value allocated to a modern art museum: the Museo Patio Herreriano de Arte Contemporáneo Español, in the city of Valladolid (Spain). Findings indicate that estimates of Willingness to Pay are significantly reduced when a higher certainty threshold is required, in other words when individuals are more certain of their choices. Furthermore, correction through recoding proved more severe than correction through exclusion.     

The analysis of polychrome works of art: 40 years of infrared spectroscopic investigations

In this paper a synthetic chronological survey of analytical applications of infrared spectroscopy for the characterization of the materials of polychrome works of art and archaeology is outlined. Various sampling methods are described and some relevant examples, drawn from the published cases, are presented. The various methods prove to be very effective in characterizing both the inorganic and organic constituents of a wide variety of artworks, giving an insight into the materials and techniques of execution of the artifacts and, in the case of infrared mapping techniques, pinpointing the analytical data within a precise layer of the stratigraphy of the cross-sectioned samples. Overall, the great analytical potential and wide field of application of this technique is fully brought to light.     

Arts and craftiness: an economic analysis of art heists

We study the incentives that museums face in determining how much resources to invest in the protection of their artwork from theft. We present and analyze a game-theoretic model of art heists that accounts for the strategic interactions between museums’ and art thieves’ decisions and that incorporates several key features of the black market for stolen art. We find that the equilibrium level of security museums choose need not be monotonic in the true market value or the black market value of artwork, i.e., increasing the value of an art piece—whether it is the true market value or the black market value—does not necessarily lead museums to invest more in protecting their artwork. The effects of parameter changes in the model that reflect a shift of public policy depend critically on what type of policy change is considered. For instance, an increase in the penalty imposed for committing art theft cannot raise the amount of theft in equilibrium and could in fact lead museums to increase their level of security. On the other hand, investing more resources on law enforcement agencies so that they are better able to solve art crimes can actually increase the amount of theft in equilibrium by causing museums to spend less on security.     

The welfare and equity implications of competition in television broadcasting: the role of viewer tastes

This paper studies the behavior of commercial television broadcasters in markets where the distribution of viewer tastes varies. Our results show that a highly “clustered” market enables the broadcaster to offer a program of a popular type but with lower quality (i.e., lower production values) than is the case when viewers have more diffused tastes. We find that viewer equity in the television market (i.e., the percentage of all potential viewers who have at least one program they consider worth watching) and viewer welfare (i.e., total consumer surplus) may not coincide. Depending upon the distribution of viewer tastes and the cost of providing quality programming, the number of broadcasters required to fully cover the market to avoid market failure may be greater than the number of broadcasters that produce greater viewer welfare. The study suggests that regulatory bodies need to pay attention to the distribution pattern of viewer tastes and the broadcasters' desire for return on programming investments, since both factors have important implications for competitive outcomes and viewer well-being.