Temperament: Money, Mind & Emotions · Personal Finance TV

Investing in Art: Only for the Rich?

·27 min·1 clip

Ashwini Kakkar says Indian works once sold for thousands of rupees and later became multi-million-dollar assets.

1. Temperament: Money, Mind & Emotions focuses on art investing, using Salvator Mundi at $450 million and a Basquiat that rose from $19,000 to over $110 million. 2. Ashish Chawla hosts the episode and speaks with Ashwini Kakkar, Sneha Shah of Curatee.co, and contemporary artist Prateek Sharma. 3. The episode asks whether art is reserved for billionaires or whether ordinary buyers can treat it as an investment. 4. ArtTactic is cited for a roughly 12% compound annual growth rate in the Indian art market over the past decade. 5. The Indian Ministry of Culture is cited as projecting about 12.5% CAGR between 2020 and 2025 and a market size around $2 billion by 2025. 6. Ashwini Kakkar says art in India is becoming more democratized as middle-class buyers begin looking at art seriously. 7. He says people are buying art not only for decoration but also for the aesthetic value of having beautiful pieces at home. 8. Sneha Shah says artwork value depends on the artist, the material, the number of works produced, and the rarity of a particular period. 9. She compares valuation of younger artists to angel investing, where ambition, shows, and trajectory matter. 10. She says not every Picasso is equally valuable and contrasts his blue period with his nude figure works. 11. Kakkar says the first step is to initiate yourself into art by visiting catalogs, exhibitions, and galleries. 12. He breaks appreciation down into line, form, color, and strokes as the technical vocabulary for developing an eye. 13. Shah says contemporary buyers should purchase from artists or galleries, while modern art requires a stronger paper trail. 14. She says provenance can be shown through bills, press articles, bank transfer receipts, museum catalogs, and auction-house vetting. 15. Shah argues that museums, biennales, and non-commercial institutions often affect price more than dealers do. 16. She says museum acquisition gives a work permanence and helps fix an artist's place in the market. 17. The episode notes that social media and press now help artists charge more even outside the gallery ecosystem. 18. Prateek Sharma says some artists set firm prices and will not budge, while others make work to order for the amount offered. 19. The conversation keeps a practical interview tone, with Ashish Chawla guiding each guest through valuation, authenticity, and resale. 20. Listeners interested in collecting, pricing, and provenance will get the most value, while people wanting pure theory may skip it.

As heard by us

A grounded look at how art becomes value, and why that value can be fragile.

The episode treats art investing as a market story first and a taste question second. It moves from headline sales like Salvatore Mundi and the Basquiat example into the mechanics of valuation: galleries, auction houses, artists' studios, museums, and institutional collectors.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Want the money side of art, minus the gallery fog?

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Temperament: Money, Mind & Emotions