The Great Contemporary Art Bubble | Fake Prices, Real Greed

Описание: The Great Contemporary Art Bubble is a sharp, revealing documentary that pierces the glossy surface of the 21st century art boom to expose the speculation, greed, and financial engineering that drove contemporary art prices into the stratosphere—and eventually helped bring them crashing down.

The Great Contemporary Art Bubble
Release date: January 2010 (United States)
Runtime: 1 hour 30 minutes
Director: Ben Lewis
Writer: Ben Lewis
Country of origin: United Kingdom
Also known as: Brave New Art World
Production company: ZDF/Arte

At the heart of the film lies a simple but startling reality: between 2003 and 2008, prices for contemporary art rose an astonishing 800%. Masterpieces by Rothko, Warhol, and Bacon fetched tens of millions at auction, while works by living artists like Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons were being flipped for eight-figure sums. Even emerging Chinese artists saw their prices skyrocket. It was being called a new Golden Age—one powered by talent, cultural appetite, and the rise of global wealth. But beneath the surface, it was something else entirely: a financial bubble built not on aesthetics, but on speculation.

Through exclusive access to major auction houses, gallerists, collectors, and insiders, the documentary charts the feverish rise and abrupt fall of the contemporary art market. With Sotheby’s and Christie’s auction estimates plummeting to a quarter of what they had been just a year before, the bubble burst in 2009—and took down much of the illusion of limitless value with it.

But more than a tale of numbers, The Great Contemporary Art Bubble reveals how a largely unregulated art market became fertile ground for manipulation and hype. Auction houses and high-end dealers leveraged the credulousness of newly minted billionaires and hedge funders—many of whom had little knowledge of art but a great appetite for prestige and profit. With shadowy financial transactions, secret guarantees, and a lack of transparency, the market became a playground for the ultra-rich and the cunning few who understood how to work the system.

This documentary doesn’t just chronicle the rise and fall of a market—it asks broader questions about the value we assign to art, the forces that shape taste and success, and what happens when creative expression becomes a commodity. Both an exposé and a cautionary tale, The Great Contemporary Art Bubble invites viewers to reconsider how art is valued—and who really benefits when a masterpiece becomes a market asset.

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