Fleecing The Sheep and Laughing All The Way To The Bank

"He's probably an artist who's in more demand today than any other."
"He's so good that he controls everything. He controls when galleries make shows, he controls who they sell a painting to -- he's on top."
Alberto Mugrabi, mesmerized 'art' collector

"Artists whose work is in great demand are in charge."
"They can call the shots and Mark figured that out pretty early."
"Who says he can't [break with tradition and sell directly out of his studio rather than through an agent]? It's an unwritten rule, but he's breaking the rules." 
Ann Philbin, director, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles

"He's the most important artist of his generation."
"I have bought works out of his studio; I've also bought works privately."
"I bought a sculpture of his for the Museum of Modern Art. He tries to sell them to people who are collectors rather than investors."
David Geffen, media mogul, owner of six paintings by Grotjahn

"There was always a conscious conversation about the importance of placing pictures in museums and in great collections."
"It becomes a pretty precise methodology."
"Artists like Mark -- they run their own show, as they should. They're the ones who've taken all this risk and stared into that void."
Timothy Blum, founder, Blum & Poe

Mark Grotjahn Credit Monica Almeida/The New York Times  The artist proudly stands before a sculpture of his that sold at auction for $16.8-million

Leonardo da Vinci, could he but foresee a time in the future when unscrupulous pretenders to art would successfully manipulate greedy acquisitors to believe that faux art reflects talent and original vision, would never have believed that intelligent human beings could stoop so low as to scrape the barrel of credulity and do it willingly, besides. Creating an atmosphere and a culture where the recognition of non-objective art bespeaks the genius of the few, and the challenge is to the viewer to admit that though the work is not visually or aesthetic leasing, it is original.

Its origins, needless to say, in the minds of flim-flam entrepreneurs who have recognized the cupidity and stupidity of a segment of the population that will believe anything that 'experts' in the field of art curation convincingly inform them. While beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, so is a natural inclination to recognize what it truly is. And nothing that this man produces, just like the 'art' produced by so many of his contemporaries in 'modern art' represents beauty or the originality of vision accomplished through a master's hand.

Create it, and they will come is his obvious mantra. But not without having first carefully set the stage. To convince the willingly gullible that what this man has produced (like, for example, Jackson Pollock) represents an authentic work of art, unequalled in bold design and execution by any of his contemporaries and as such a rare opportunity to acquire a colossal work of art whose value, both aesthetic and financial, can only increase in an art-hungry world.

"Untitled (Orange Butterfly Blue MG03) #1"  in his “Butterfly” series, 2003. Credit Douglas M. Parker

The gullible include art dealers whose discerning eye and bumph antennae distinguish them somewhat from enthusiastic art collectors only in that they instinctively know that any artist in their stable who gains the confidence of the art world and those who can afford the absurdly exorbitant prices to claim the prestige of ownership of such artistic nonentities as this respond to his clever pretense, inspiring their confidence and willingness to part with their expendable wealth.

Public and private art galleries succumb just as do those who style themselves connoisseurs of art; they have the academic papers to prove their studies resulted in moving to the head of the class. The prestigious vote of confidence in an artist such as this that results from his splendid art works being acquired to hang on the walls or grace the marble flooring of acclaimed galleries such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, let alone New York's Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Museum 'prove' the value of this execrable work.

Works in Mark Grotjahn's studio headed to the Nasher Sculpture Center. Credit Monica Almeida/The New York Times

The now-49-year-old Mr. Grotjahn has managed skilfully to influence the value of his works to an  unusual extent. Perhaps it was the psychological trauma he suffered when at an early show one painting only sold -- and for a miserly $1,750 -- that drove him to 'take charge' of his career in such a masterful manner as to create a legend about himself drawn from his own ego and masterfully parlayed into a general acknowledgement that his supremely gifted talent simply cannot be overlooked.

To those of a skeptical bent who fail to credit his 'art' with a simulacrum of rare artistic brilliance, they must understand the sad depth of their philistine ignorance.

That experience appeared to have soured  him indelibly with the convention that an artist was meant by unwritten rule to be faithful to a one-dealership representation. He has chosen instead to use the services of a number of recognized dealerships, all of whom boast well-heeled clients. And nor does he neglect the impact it can have on collectors to deal directly with the artist himself, a rare privilege he generously grants on occasion to various clients, even permitting them the privilege of buying art directly out of his studio, an unheard-of practise.

He had at one time himself, after earning his Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of California, operated an art gallery in Hollywood. He is intimately acquainted with the trade from both perspectives. The coincidental Hollywood conception of life in America, raucous, uninhibited, violent, sexy, criminal, addicted and wealthy, is a fitting metaphor for the claims that what this heralded artist produces represents the pinnacle of creative art.

"Untitled (Circus No. 1 Face 44.18)" in his “Circus” series, 2012. Credit Douglas M. Parker

Artists producing work of actual merit reflecting their special abilities in the creation of realistic renditions of landscapes, portraiture, allegorical and historical paintings whose artistic expertise speaks to the core of the aesthetic bestowed upon most discriminating viewers must wince if and when they become aware of such shameless charlatans perverting the very substance of art and authenticity in its production. It is this corruption of the beauty and meaning of art that speaks to the degeneration of its recognition and appreciation of its rightful place in our aesthetic.

"Untitled (African, Gated Front and Back Mask M34.b)" is a 2014 bronze based on a cardboard box and tubes. Credit Monica Almeida/The New York Times

"Pink Viagra"

"Where are the crowds of women with low libido clamouring for Addyi?"
"They never existed, except in a public relations firm's fantasy."
PharmedOut, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington

"The FDA is being responsible ... yes."
"[However], some people are now arguing REMS [risk evaluation and mitigation strategy] was a scare tactic the FDA imposed because it didn't particularly like being dragged back into this whole debate about whether HSDD [hypoactive sexual desire disorder] is truly an unmet medical need."
"[Female sexuality is] a much more sophisticated process [than what Viagra overturns by increasing blood flow to the penis]."
Dr. Jim Pfaus, professor of psychology, Concordia University, Montreal

The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2015, approved the first prescription drug designed to boost sexual desire in women, a milestone long sought by a pharmaceutical industry eager to replicate the ockbuster success of impotence drugs for men. AP Photo/Allen G. Breed

Professor Pfaus has a personal interest in the debate, having led some of the earliest studies to determine effects of flibanserin [Addyi] on female rats' sexual desire and resulting copulation. And while he conducted research for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, he also was in receipt of consulting grants from Addyi's original formulator, Boehringer Ingelheim, before it was bought out by Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, headquartered in Quebec.

There are those who claim that governmental drug regulators have set up barriers for access to this 'pink Viagra', restricting access by requiring doctors and pharmacies to obtain certification to prescribe or dispense the pills. Instructions that accompany the drug include the warning that women using it must never drink alcohol while using the drug, which has the capacity to cause low blood pressure and syncope, a sudden loss of consciousness.

When Sprout Pharmaceuticals obtained FDA approval for the Addyi it was producing, realizing success on the third try after the drug had seen rejections over safety concerns, Valeant bought the copyrighted formula along with the company itself for $1-billion. That gamble rested on the assumption that Addyi would turn out to be as successful on the consumer market as its male predecessor has been.

However, there is a world of difference between the two drugs' interaction with the human body; Viagra's effect was mechanical, while Addyi's is psychological, in essence sending its message to the brain. Addyi must be taken daily, unlike Viagra whose calculated use is just before sex, to increase blood flow to the penis. Unlike Viagra which sold over a half million prescriptions in its first month on the market in 1998, a mere 23,000 prescriptions were dispensed for flibanserin in the U.S. since 2015.

When it was approved in August 2015 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, it was said to be with the proviso that advertising on television or radio not take place for the first year-and-a-half of its commercial availability. In Canada the drug remains in uncompleted review status by Health Canada, though it had been submitted over a year ago for approval. Critics of the drug feel its lackadaisical uptake reflects women's unwillingness to use Addyi.

It comes at quite the cost; $800 (U.S. monthly), and nor is its effect particularly assured. It is recognized as a risky drug which produces an average single extra "sexually satisfying event" per month more than would a placebo replacement. Valeant is now free to begin advertising its controversial wares through "education awareness" campaigns to convince women that their sex problems are commonplace, and they can rely on a pill to achieve the quality of sex they deserve.

Sex on the brain -- Irving Penn

Their public relations advertising campaign is entitled Find My Spark, offering a sex health quiz and video clips where doctors who see women with low sex drive empathize with those who feel "inadequate -- as a woman, as lovers and as partners". "Information" campaigns with subtle messages such as: "that it is imperative that women be sensitized to this public health problem" are now on the horizon.