Comparing & Contrasting Authorities - Essay Example

The "Boy with a Pipe" has been one of the most 'talked about' & heavily debated works of art between late 2004 & 2005. This has been the case owing to the fact that this particular painting holds the world record of being the most expensive painting ever to have been sold through an auction at a staggering price of $104.2 million (US dollars). The authors of these three articles have expressed their opinion on the pricing of this specific piece of art and have done so by citing & comparing the painting with other pieces of art that command similar attention in the art world.

My argument on this particular discussion is that the price of an art piece is not in direct relation to the quality and fame attached to it. I have chosen the first article because I find it to be a fair report of the incident. It simply reports the price of the painting (Boy with a Pipe) and provides an insight into the brief history of artwork being sold through auctions. In the second article, the author strongly concludes that the society is spending money crazily in an effort to buy these pieces of artwork and investing money into this domain right from the beginning.

In fact, the author for this second article has included as many as twelve quotes from professionals of artwork in an effort to provide support to his point of view. It is evident that the author is obviously trying hard to influence his audiences in an effort to make them agree with his point of view that stresses that there is a major trend that the society is now investing in arts for money. I have found myself to have a sense of understanding with the author of the third article and in fact, this is what my argument has really been about.

My opinion is that the price of an artwork is very dependent on the nature of the buyer. After all, a piece of art will remain a piece of art no matter whether a person likes a piece of art and would like to keep it to him/herself. If a person is rich and can afford to pay millions of dollars in order to buy it, then one could say that's how much it's worth. The hard truth is that a person who really appreciates art would not consider as an avenue of investment. In Sotheby's, the author compares the price of the Picasso painting with the most expensive piece of artwork by Van Gogh.

He has simply reported this as a piece of fact. The story from Investment News has mentioned about the staggering price of the Picasso painting. The author has an opinion that it seems to be a trend among people, especially the rich, who regard works of