In the lower value bucket, they typically have a trade or product with no scarcity, and no market. They try to sell based on a multiple of their effort. This is everything under $1,000. Prices adjust based on volume sold and desperation of the artist, by artist. So therefore yes prices are more arbitrary at the beginning of an artist's career, and at an art show there would be no rhyme or reason between artists. Perhaps some competition and a race to the bottom at a bazaar. This is the same as pretty much any other trade or contractor that is always testing their market. These artists aspire to be in higher tiers, but largely don't act like they understand what drives the value in those tiers. If they do understand and realize they aren't eligible either way but still spend their time on trying to monetize art, then that is a good objective lens. People with other marketable skills will just resign their art to a pasttime and forget about the monetization goals.
In the middle value bucket, it is mostly fine art with low worth, and a very different market. The market forces to create the arbitrary prices are different and mostly correlated to the artist's network when they were alive. Typically there is something undermining the scarcity of these works, but that can also be just demand. Galleries arbitrarily raise the prices over time until a private seller undercuts them.
In the high value bucket, it is mostly fine art with high worth. The market forces to create the arbitrary prices are different and mostly correlated to the artist's network when they were alive. Here it is rarely about the aesthetics or the discipline involved in a piece, but the eligibility of a piece even appearing in this market is again based on the artist's network while they were living. Most of the high value bucket is a product of monetary policy and there are whole books about it.
In the lower value bucket, they typically have a trade or product with no scarcity, and no market. They try to sell based on a multiple of their effort. This is everything under $1,000. Prices adjust based on volume sold and desperation of the artist, by artist. So therefore yes prices are more arbitrary at the beginning of an artist's career, and at an art show there would be no rhyme or reason between artists. Perhaps some competition and a race to the bottom at a bazaar. This is the same as pretty much any other trade or contractor that is always testing their market. These artists aspire to be in higher tiers, but largely don't act like they understand what drives the value in those tiers. If they do understand and realize they aren't eligible either way but still spend their time on trying to monetize art, then that is a good objective lens. People with other marketable skills will just resign their art to a pasttime and forget about the monetization goals.
In the middle value bucket, it is mostly fine art with low worth, and a very different market. The market forces to create the arbitrary prices are different and mostly correlated to the artist's network when they were alive. Typically there is something undermining the scarcity of these works, but that can also be just demand. Galleries arbitrarily raise the prices over time until a private seller undercuts them.
In the high value bucket, it is mostly fine art with high worth. The market forces to create the arbitrary prices are different and mostly correlated to the artist's network when they were alive. Here it is rarely about the aesthetics or the discipline involved in a piece, but the eligibility of a piece even appearing in this market is again based on the artist's network while they were living. Most of the high value bucket is a product of monetary policy and there are whole books about it.