Art possesses a value in a capacity that many other items in your home do not. The value is intrinsic, and whether the artwork is an investment piece or a passion purchase, the buying, inheriting or creating process art is, and always has been, special. I spoke to Robert Soning, a culturally-led property developer and Founder of Londonewcastle, who is a strong believer in the intrinsic value of art, especially within the home setting. We discussed the relationship between property and art, and how both are tied up in aesthetic preferences and financial, emotional considerations.
ANYA COOKLIN-LOFTING: How would you describe the relationship between art and property generally?
ROBERT SONING: Whether you’re filling a home with art to help it sell, or specifying a property to house your art collection, the relationship between art and property is symbiotic, complex, emotional and financial. It involves the tricky link between finance and emotion. Both property and art are tied up in the aesthetic preferences of the potential buyer and the type of money they are willing to spend.
ACL: What does that relationship look like today?
RS: Where property sales have spiked, the art market has been notably impacted. Investments in passion including, but not limited to, artworks, have become more common amongst high net worth individuals in the wake of an unstable stock market and political climate. Such individuals perceive these assets as more secure, but it’s more complex than that. Investment artworks provide the buyer with a sense of fulfilment that goes beyond the knowledge that their money was spent wisely. The procurement of art, whether for your own property or to sell a property, has an added intrinsic value.
As the financial Times reported a few years after the financial crash in 2008, the art and financial markets appear to possess mutual exclusivity. For example, Damien Hirst’s two-day sale at Sotheby’s London saw £111m worth of sales the same day that the Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy.
ACL: How does this sit within the property developer framework?
RS: Buyers have been known to purchase all the artwork displayed within the dressed-to-sell property. Depending on the worth of the collection, in some of the country’s most luxurious developments and homes, this extra cost can rival the deal on the property alone. Cost equivalents in art and property can also be reversed when you consider the phenomenon across the millennia of building properties to suit pre-existing art collections. From the Florentine Medicis to the property developers of the modern day, homes are often designed with the art collection of the buyer in mind.
ACL: So does the phenomenon of creating a property for artworks exist today?
RS: Extensive wall space for artwork is one of the top requirements amongst buyers in the luxury property market. Property developers use a curated selection of artworks a dress-to-sell tactic, helping to encapsulate a lifestyle that buyers aspire to achieve. Ultra-high net worth individuals are looking for more than just a great location and high-specification finishes when it comes to buying property.
