Crack in the Art market?

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"As a Christie's sale is criticised for not offering enough 'trophy property', it's clear to see what the art world has become" writes Jonathan Jones in his Guardian blog on art:

What a marvellous term – "trophy property". It immediately conjures up art collectors for whom beauty is a stag to be machine-gunned on a private hunting range. Get your trophy wife, your trophy yacht, your trophy Picasso.[...] Is the boom in art prices that has defied a wider economic stagnation about to end? [...] A fall in art prices would be good for museums, good for public collections and good for the mental health of our culture. At least we know now whom art collectors vote for. One reason for the flat sale at Christie's, it has been suggested, is that buyers were depressed by the re-election of Barack Obama. The art market, it seems, may be the Republican party at play, to add to its other charms.

Though as readers of this blog will know i am not a fn of treating dugup artefacts as (only) "art" there seem some parallels. Certainly, on reading what dealers and colectors over there write, and how, the connection in the US between Republican (not to mention loony right) mindsets and collecting seems pretty clear. As is the attitude of treating dugup artefacts as trophy geegaws.

 Judd Tully, 'Christie's Limp $205-Million Sale Prompts Talk of "A Crack in the Market" ' , Blouin Art November 8, 2012

 Jonthan Jones, 'A Monet for £27m? The real price of the art boom is its sleaziness', Guardian blogs 8th Nov 2012.