Cristina Guerra works with contemporary art since
1983-84. Cristina Guerra Gallery opened in 2001, alone. Before she worked with
Filomena Soares, 97-99. And before that worked at the Cultural Center which led
to the Centro Cultural de Cascais. At this time she had artists going outside
to make museums. When they started working with her the artworks coasted 500€
and now cost 20,000€. But it takes a very long time, is 10 years. The galleries
have the actual quote of the artist, the real price of an artist is in the galleries.
For her the triangular system of the gallery, the critic / curator and
collector remains valid and essential. A curator theorizes what the artist does
and so there is a better understanding of the work by the collector.
Until 97 people just wanted canvas and started buying
papers. Nowadays the paper can be as expensive as a canvas, the main interest
is the artwork itself.
The Americans, British and a bit the French art
collectors if they appreciate an artwork they buy. The Swiss and Germans want
to know what the artist did, studying the artwork and only then they buy.
From 2004 everyone is already on the internet and it's
easier to know what artists are doing.
Cristina Guerra states that nowadays we have a problem,
there isn’t a museum with a permanent exhibition of Portuguese artists, there
are only temporary exhibitions and we see very little Portuguese artists. There
are many foreign collectors who ask her where they can see Portuguese art and
she have to take them to other galleries. At the Reina Sofia Museum there is a
floor where is seen only Spanish art. Nowadays we don’t see half career artists
or we see the older or the very young. What happened was that the directors of
the museums prefer foreign things than the Portuguese, she thinks it should be
the middle term, which is to perceive, to contextualize. The Serralves Museum
is at four years to buy. She usually says that "we are now a cultural
center." There are many people who come to see but not buy. Passos Coelho
went to Serralves the first time in his life a short time ago. This is amazing,
isn’t it? The current Secretary of State is a person who understands, at least
he knows everything. But the guy who is directing the Institute of Arts doesn’t
know anything at all. Mário Soares, António Guterres and Durão Barroso were
educated people, interested who visited the galleries.
Cristina Guerra states that, in 2007, the strategy of
the gallery with a view to greater international visibility of our artists in
the international market began to put some artists she worked with and had
exhibited to international collections in auctions at Christie's and Philips:
"what happened is that I had to put an artwork at auction and then I would
have to buy through other people who bought them.” Because we don’t have art
market many art collectors see the catalogs of auction houses, especially
international. There are many people, even in Portugal, studying art, even some
galleries, trough the auction houses to see the evolution of the rising price
of an artist.
Cristina Guerra believes that there is an evolution of
private art collecting in Portugal towards greater social and cultural
responsibility. The interest of this new collecting is that the Portuguese art
becomes more internationalize and therefore they offer works of Portuguese
artists to some foreign institutions: "right now there are collectors who
buy now artworks, to be in the Tate. In which they don’t benefit as patrons. It
is something that is common practice in almost all countries, including Brazil,
in Portugal that practice doesn’t exist. "
Cites several reference collections, such as the
recent collection of Miguel Rios Foundation, Elypse collection is closed, has few
Portuguese artists, is very mainstream, there is another collection, but with
few Portuguese, he is Brazilian, but the idea is more South America and Middle
East which is the art collection of Luis Augusto Teixeira de Freitas, the
Cachola collection is the only exclusively of Portuguese artists, and he isn’t
a private banker or businessman, is an employee, can make a collection that
every agent respects, and some institutional collections, BES Art collection,
EDP, and others who have made collections but have stopped buying a long time,
cases of PT and Culturgest . "I can’t understand the lack of interest from
institutional, or governmental or State funding for this area of contemporary
art. Because economically are tradable. Why there is no more support in
acquisitions, we must do something about the culture, as cultural tourism
exists and is increasingly implemented".
What happens is that usually comes a crisis and all
the collectors disappear and others appear, we are always in a new beginning.
Cristina Guerra states that have 70 square meters in
Basel, and the whole operation costs 90,000€, which is nonsense. Most artists
that exposes are Portuguese, costs about 10,000 €. Less discount of less than
half, which is what she earns, typically has a loss. Unless you sell a foreign
artist, are pieces of 80,000 € 90,000 € 100,000 € 200,000 €. Looking at the
financial and economic side I ought to have given up long ago. The Portuguese
Galleries normally goes to the art fairs of: ARCO, Art Basel, Art Basel Miami,
Art Forum Berlin, FIAC, Vienna Art Fair, Art Rio and Shanghai. I went into
Miami in 2002 and 2003. The collectors go all to the same art fairs. Our rulers
if they go to ARCO is already very good, but some don’t go. When I was in APGA
with Pedro Cera, the State rested for 2 international fairs with a minimum
stand. In the first year, four years ago, there was 200,000€, has now been
reduced to 100,000€. Sometimes the State support an artist, occasionally, like Joana
Vasconcelos at this moment, I think this exhibition completely idiotic.
