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Overview
An extraordinary memoir of fortune, fraud, and the master of modern art
Art dealer Stan Lauryssens made millions in modern art, but he sold only one name: Salvador Dalí. The surrealist painter's work was a hot commodity for the newly rich, investors, and shady businessmen looking to launder their black-market cash. Stan didn't mind looking the other way; he just hoped the buyers would look the other way as well. The artworks he sold came from some very questionable sources, but he soon discovered that the shadiest source of all was Dalí himself.
The more successful Stan became, the closer he came to Dalí, until he found himself living next door to the aging artist, in the Catalonian hills. While hiding from Interpol's detectives, Stan spent his time with the artists, musicians, business associates, and eccentrics who surrounded Dalí. He learned about Dalí's secret history, the studio of artists who produced his work, and the moneymaking machine that kept Dalí's extravagant lifestyle afloat long after his creativity began to flounder.
Dalí&I offers a behind-the-scenes view of the commerce and conspiracy that go hand in hand in the international art world, written by a man who has been to the top only to discover that it's not so different from the bottom.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781429986601 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 07/08/2008 |
| Sold by: | Macmillan |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 304 |
| File size: | 270 KB |
About the Author
Belgium-born Stan Lauryssens was an art dealer specializing in works by Salvador Dalí for over a decade. After spending time in prison for the sale of bogus Dalís, he turned to writing crime fiction. He won Belgium's Hercule Poirot Award in 2002 for best crime fiction of the year. He now divides his time between Antwerp and London.
Belgium-born Stan Lauryssens was an art dealer specializing in works by Salvador Dalí for over a decade. After spending time in prison for the sale of bogus Dalís, he turned to writing crime fiction. He won Belgium’s Hercule Poirot Award in 2002 for best crime fiction of the year. He is the author of the book Dali&I: The Surreal Story. He now divides his time between Antwerp and London.
Read an Excerpt
Dalí & I
The Surreal Story
By Stan Lauryssens
St. Martin's Press
Copyright © 2008 Arendsoog Ltd.All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4299-8660-1
CHAPTER 1
McDalí
This is how it started: I was twenty-two and worked in a Belgian cheese factory. I'm not a poet and I can't sing, yet I wrote poetry and sang in a rock band at night while I spent my days in the underground cold store, making holes in wheels of Emmentaler cheese. One day, I got a phone call from the editor of Antwerp's weekly Panorama magazine. He'd seen me onstage and read my poetry and wondered if I would be interested in a job switch. Of course I was. Wouldn't you be?
Panorama asked me to become the weekly's correspondent in Hollywood. In an attempt to boost the magazine's circulation and sell more printed paper, the editors had hit upon the idea of splashing the finest film stars of the day — a very young Al Pacino, Faye Dunaway, Robert Redford, Barbra Streisand, Paul Newman — on the cover. As I understood it, I had to interview the Pacinos and Dunaways of this world, then and there, in Hollywood. Would you have hesitated a single second? I didn't. I'd made enough holes in Emmentaler wheels. I immediately quit the cheese business and signed my contract as the magazine's correspondent in Hollywood.
There was one problem, though: Panorama didn't have the necessary funds to send me to California. We worked out a compromise. They gave me an old desk, a chair, a manual typewriter, a stack of Variety and Hollywood Reporter back issues — this was the early seventies, well before the Internet and Google — and a pair of scissors with a pot of glue, and asked me to cook up, invent, fabricate, or dream up interviews that would read as if I wined and dined with the stars of the silver screen every day of the week. Instead of languishing next to my swimming pool on Melrose Place, I would be slaving under the leaking roof of an editorial office on an Antwerp backstreet.
I was good at my new job, and for years I fabricated "live" interviews and wrote glamorous cover stories about leading ladies Barbara Hershey, Karen Black, Anita Ekberg, and Anne Bancroft, as well as actors like Nick Nolte and Robert De Niro, among others. Week after week, I found my name on the printed page under the pumped-up byline FROM OUR MAN IN HOLLYWOOD, which pleased me enormously. One week I concocted a story about Kojak, the week after that, I fantasized about Salvador Dalí. Though not a movie star, Dalí was as famous as Kojak and had more facial hair.
This is how I did it: I collected exhibition catalogs, old Life and Paris Match articles, Reuters dispatches and secondhand art books and hit upon the idea of situating Dalí in Hollywood, where he was helping Walt Disney create the most scandalous and scabrous animated porn cartoon ever — or so I had people believe. It was all fiction and fantasy and a figment of my imagination. Dalí looked good on the magazine's cover, in close-up, rolling his bulging, fishy eyes. His famous waxed mustache had never been in better shape.
To see which covers — and which film stars — were the bestsellers, I regularly made the rounds to newsagents and booksellers that had the magazine on display. I soon learned that, on a cover, a female star is superior to a male star for sales — Mia Farrow beats Woody Allen and Ali MacGraw beats Steve McQueen — while a blond female star far outsells a dark-haired beauty. Faye Dunaway and Farrah Fawcett beat Liza Minelli and Audrey Hepburn ten times over.
But the biggest surprise was still to come. To my amazement, the balding, mustachioed, wrinkled Salvador Dalí, weary with age, far outsold superstars Warren Beatty, Raquel Welch, Ursula Andress, Dustin Hoffman, Woody Allen, and even Elizabeth Taylor, the all-time beauty queen.
That's when I got my first lesson in life.
Dalí sells.
Another unexpected phone call. The president of Money Management Counselors urgently needed to see me, seven o'clock sharp. No discussion. I knew that MMC was the brainchild of an American financier who — all through the sixties — sold bonds to American soldiers stationed in Germany. Other MMC investment branches included works of art, diamonds, and real estate in Dallas and Canada.
I had never met a president, so I agreed to meet him at the Century Center Hotel, in the dining room, right at seven. As could be expected from the president — any president — of a multimillion-dollar company, he was already spooning heaps of beluga caviar on buttered toast when I arrived at his preferred table. A waiter in evening dress brought me an ivory spoon, butter, some very thin slices of lemon, an extra rack of white toast, and half a kilo of choice caviar.
The president told me he was a financier. He was also a playboy. He was restructuring his company's art-investment branch. "It's all about making money, and I'm fed up with all these con artists trying to fool the art world," he said. "I want you to run our fine art–investment branch and supply our wealthiest clients with the finest artworks available."
"Why me?" I asked. "I know nothing about art."
"You know Salvador Dalí," the president replied. "You interviewed him in Hollywood, didn't you? Boy oh boy, that was one hell of an interview!"
Then and there, I got my second lesson in life.
Anyone — even presidents — can be taken for a ride.
From one day to the next, I became an art consultant and investment broker. I couldn't believe my luck. My job description was simple: Talk as much cash as I could out of the greedy suckers of this world. I read. I studied. I traveled to Sotheby's and Christie's in London and New York. I bought my first Dalí in Paris. A 1937 futuristic ink drawing representing what looked like a mass of swirls and ovals or fried beans. I didn't ask for a certificate of authenticity — supposedly, the drawing had been commissioned for American Weekly, a rather famous magazine in the forties — and I sure as hell didn't check the credentials of the snooty gallery owner who sold it. For all I knew, there might have been a warrant out for his arrest. Why else would he sell a genuine Dalí at half price, if it was true that — as he'd explained to me — the famous Paris auctioneers of the Hôtel Drouot had estimated its retail value to be almost double the asking price? It was a bargain and I went for it. You see? That's how unsuspecting and inexperienced I was.
I paid and took possession of the framed drawing and then had a stroke of beginner's luck. Unknown to the seller, the Dalí drawing was reproduced in an official museum catalog, in black-and-white, on a half page. The next day, I tripled the price I had paid for it, hung the swirls and ovals and fried beans on the wall in my brand-new executive office in the President Building in Antwerp, and although I'd never actually done this before, I sold the drawing to the first "art investor" who walked through the door.
That's how a local undertaker carrying a plastic shopping bag became my first client.
I told him it must be a sad way to earn your money when your clients have all died.
"That's life," the undertaker replied. "Today you're on this side; tomorrow you may be on the other side. A dead person is a wooden plank and I'm the carpenter. I plane and polish and when it looks more or less decent, I bury the plank. If you think of it, the deceased are not my clients. I've got only one client: the good Lord in Heaven, he who governs life and death. As long as I've got the good Lord on my side, there will be dead people around."
I asked him to sit down.
He was wearing the uniform of his profession: dark gray suit, white shirt, gray tie, and highly polished black shoes. He sat perfectly motionless, his back straight as a rod, the plastic shopping bag in his lap, never once crossing his long legs.
"My bank manager said I should talk to you," the undertaker said. Only his mouth seemed to move. "What can you do that my bank manager can't?"
"Launder your money," I said.
"What have you got to sell?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"I'm not a salesperson. I'm an art dealer, and my only client is Salvador Dalí. I'm selling works of art not for their artistic value or their sheer beauty but purely as an investment. The art market is global and has been growing by thirty percent a year for the last five years. New money from China, India, and Russia is joining the chase and pushing prices up. One day, I will resell for you, at a profit."
"How much profit do you guarantee?"
"The sky is the limit."
"At long term?"
"There is no long term. We'll all be dead planks tomorrow."
"I've got ten thousand dollars for you," the undertaker said.
I shrugged. "Dalí is not a clearance sale," I replied.
"Fifty thousand. What have you got for fifty thousand?"
"Nothing. I told you: Dalí is not a clearance sale."
"Make it a hundred thousand."
"Now you talk like a man."
"If Dalí dies," the undertaker chuckled, "I will gladly fix some wax on his mustache. He'll be as good as new."
"When will I get your money?" I asked.
"Now," the undertaker said, and shot into action, emptying the plastic bag on my brand-new mahogany desk. Suddenly the desktop overflowed with British pounds, greenbacks, French francs, German marks, kroner, pesetas, and an assortment of Belgian, Swiss, and Russian currency.
"Where did you get all this?" I asked while trying to act natural, stifling my laughter.
The undertaker apologized. "People die everywhere, all the time. Being in the service of the good Lord in Heaven is an international business, you know," he replied, and briskly walked out, carefully clutching his little Dalí masterpiece.
So began my introduction to the world of art. My first sale had come so easy to me, no effort at all. Beginner's luck. I thought I would be on a high for weeks. The scene in my brand-new office reminded me of the title of a Woody Allen film I had seen a few years previously, Take the Money and Run, a classic presented as a documentary on the life of an incompetent petty criminal called Virgil Starkwell, played by Woody Allen. I felt like an incompetent petty criminal myself. I had taken the money, but now that it was time to run, I didn't run. Though I was unsure of the morality of what I had just done, bluffing the undertaker out of his hard-earned cash, my MMC president was delighted. He shot me a wide smile. Next day, he took me to his own personal tailor, who fitted me with a custom-made suit while enjoying an afternoon coffee.
"You're a natural, Stan! Fantastic," the president exclaimed.
"I'm puzzled. Why do these rich people buy art?" I asked. "To beautify their lives?"
"Fuck beauty!"
"To add to their cultural ... pastiche?"
"Don't make me regret hiring you, Stan!"
I sighed. "I don't know ... do they really buy as ... as an investment?" I asked.
The MMC president nodded and smiled.
"How far can I go?" I asked.
"The only limit to what you can charge is what the buyer is willing to pay," the president told me. "If you're good, there's no price limit. None. Rich people need to flaunt their wealth without appearing to be vulgar. I mean, they can't hang their cash on the wall, can they? Always remember that (a) rich men respect you when you don't bullshit them, (b) the wives are your secret weapon, and © don't show pity, take the money without remorse, and take as much as you can. Always remember that every great fortune in the world is built on a life of crime."
"Okay. Time to go to work," I said.
The MMC president cocked his head. "Now we're talking."
"I need more Dalí paintings," I said resolutely.
Easy come, easy go. I pocketed the undertaker's money, and smartly dressed in my new clothes, I hired a private plane and flew to London. A small Dalí oil on paper titled Don Quixote was pictured in a Sotheby's sales catalog. It represented a man stepping out of the ocean, foaming waves sloshing around his legs. He didn't have a torso; he had a ship's mast and bulging sails instead. Why it was called Don Quixote was a mystery to me. I told you, I was simpleminded: I relied on the sales catalog and took it for granted that the oil on paper was a genuine Dalí stage design for the Mad Tristan ballet that opened in New York in December 1944. At the famous auction house in New Bond Street there was a packed sales room, but no hands or sales paddles went up. No one was bidding but me. In the end, I paid starting price for what I thought was a charming little gem.
The hired plane — a Cessna, if I remember well — had been waiting for me at London Airport. I tucked the Dalí under my shirt and walked through Her Majesty's Revenue & Customs. Back in my mahogany-and-leather office, I displayed the oil on paper in exactly the same spot where Dalí's fried beans had — with a little help from the good Lord in Heaven — brought me such good luck.
It wasn't long before the next investor knocked on my door and walked in, flush with money.
He had big ruddy hands — to me, his hands looked as if they'd been soaked in hot soapy water for a week or two — and came to the meeting wearing white rubber boots and a white apron sprinkled with blood. He told me he had started off as a small-time butcher, and although he now owned a nationwide chain of butcher shops, he still loved hacking and sawing dead carcasses into steaks and cutlets.
"I make so much money that it fills my Chinese vase to the rim," he said.
"A Chinese vase? What Chinese vase?"
"The one in my bedroom. Antique, Chinese, traditional. That's where I hide my money," the butcher said. "Gray market money, unofficial money, black money not reported to the government for tax purposes. Illegal and 'funny' money. I'm anxious to get rid of my hidden fortune. I don't trust the government or my banker, you know."
He glanced at Don Quixote on the wall.
"A masterpiece?" he asked.
"Um, okay ... Uh ... Well, this is certainly a fine example of Dalí's work ...," I replied. "It deals with common elements in the artist's oeuvre, as you can see: the sea ... the ocean ... which symbolizes his desire to return to the womb ... a landscape ... bulging sails as the universal symbol of the future ... various deformities."
"Would you advise me to buy it?"
"Certainly."
"Why on earth? It's ugly."
"Because ... because it's a Dalí!"
The butcher raised an eyebrow. "What does it cost?"
"Stupid question," I said.
"Why?"
"How much cash have you got in your Chinese vase? That's a better question."
"Fifty thousand," he quickly replied.
"Fifty thousand what? Dollars or Japanse yen or Russian rubles without any monetary value?"
"American dollars."
"Only fifty thousand?"
"Fifty thousand every month, at the end of each month."
"Empty your vase," I said, "and I'll give you this Dalí masterpiece."
"Who says it's a masterpiece?"
"I do."
"If I buy now, when will I make a profit?"
"A British investment magazine has calculated that the art of Salvador Dalí has gone up 25.94 percent per year between 1970 and 1975, and that's only for starters. When Dalí dies, prices will skyrocket."
When it came to Dalí, I already knew my sales talk by heart.
These days, we all wear jeans. Back then, I didn't. In the seventies, when I was working for MMC, I dressed like a banker: striped shirt, stylish tie (no Windsor knot), a three-piece suit made to measure, leather belt, and leather-soled suede shoes. I behaved like a banker, too. I collected money and gave nothing in return. In life, it's important to dress the part. The undertaker did, the butcher did, my president did, and so did I. One day, I had taken off my jacket. In shirtsleeves, I was dozing in my snug leather office chair when a young man and his pretty wife walked in, both dressed in well-tailored jeans. He was carrying a suitcase and introduced himself as a manufacturer and wholesaler of counterfeit luxury goods — primarily Gucci and Louis Vuitton handbags, but also Dior lipstick, executive Fendi luggage, Prada shoes, Chanel dresses, and Armani and Ralph Lauren jackets. He explained his business to me: he bought the cheapest fabrics in low-cost countries like China and India and had them stitched together in sewing studios in Africa, mainly in Tunisia, Nigeria, and Senegal. He was in praise of Tunisian women, who are pretty good seamstresses, especially competent in stitching labels on all kinds of Chinese and Indian-made goods. You name it, they did it.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Dalí & I by Stan Lauryssens. Copyright © 2008 Arendsoog Ltd.. Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
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What People are Saying About This
"Crass, callous, sordid and cynical—-thus, utterly true to the spirit of Dali and a certain bestseller." —-Kirkus