We can buy art for love, but also hope for profit. It’s only natural.
How likely is it?
Here’s a fun story of a $129 Montici mosaic that grew to $4,500.
“Three Women and a Ball” was created in Richard Blow’s Montici workshop in 1960. We don’t know the original price it sold for. But eight years later, on Aug. 21, 1968, it popped up for sale at the Stonington Art Gallery (Connecticut) where a collector named Rosamond Mattiello bought it for $129. We know because she tucked her cashed check in the back of the frame.
It’s a charming piece; good size at 8.5 by 10.5 inches. It’s unsigned, but incised on the reverse “MONTICI/FIRENZE ‘60”
What happened to the mosaic for the next 50 years?
We don’t know. Perhaps the buyer hung it on her bedroom wall and enjoyed it for a half-century, but when she passed away her heirs shopped it. In any event, on June 10, 2018 -- almost exactly a half century later – a buyer paid $4,500 for the mosaic at Auctions at Showplace, a Manhattan, NYC gallery.
Out of curiosity, I checked a website that calculates the value of a dollar, adjusted for inflation. You would need $969 today to buy what $129 bought in 1968.
Bottom line: If you bought it in 1968, your return on investment more than beat inflation. You covered your original cost and netted a profit of $3,500 (in today’s dollars). If my math is correct, that’s a 364% return, representing an average annual return of 7.25% -- a bit better than the stock market at 6.8%.
Not to mention the pleasure of having three beautiful ladies entertain you daily for a lifetime.
Michael Schmicker
P.S. Montici prices have accelerated in the last two decades. If you’re a Society member, see “Report #1: Historical Market Analysis 2000-2019”