Why should only deep-pocketed millionaires enjoy the sorts of profits that can come from investing in high-end art?
That simple, rather noble-sounding premise has propelled the rapid expansion of Masterworks, a company that solicits investments in works of art.
Masterworks democratizes the art market by offering average investors an opportunity to buy $20 shares in individual paintings by Warhol, Picasso and others that the company has agreed to purchase.
In just eight years, it has become one of the art market’s biggest buyers. Its collection of 500 artworks is now valued at more than $1 billion and its platform has drawn 70,000 investors.
“No art investing experience? No problem,” the company’s website has advertised.
“Our question is: How do we expose more people to art and how do we make it more investable by everyone than what has historically been available?” Scott Lynn, the company’s founder, said in an interview.
Some art market experts, though, suggest that the company can be too optimistic in its marketing of artworks, a practice that understates the potential to lose money, especially for art market rookies.
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