[lstamour]

I'll definitely have to see these. I'd perhaps point out that there was a lot of older, bad art. It just didn't survive. ;-) And that a lot of post-modern art really does require ... either reading the labels or finding other ways to understand the art conceptually as well as from a technical perspective. Consider the entertainment value of critically acclaimed Hollywood blockbuster versus a new, experimental film: The older works tend to work better because they fit into patterns. "They are what they seem." The new ones take some getting used to: what you see isn't always what you're supposed to get. Neither has anything to do with fine art markets. Frankly, most fine art valuation seems to be like any other resource -- priced for its scarcity. Sometimes, an artists' works, and I really should look it up to see if this is true, an artist's works will increase in value when it's clear there will be no new works forthcoming. Which makes no sense if you consider that famous artists had other artists working for them, and if Apple can continue to produce great works after Steve Jobs, why can't we have a Picasso Inc. doing the same? But that's a different point entirely.

Trying (and failing) to get back on topic, 95/5 was probably unfair of me. Part of why I skewed to 95 was that I've seen most of the permanent collection at the AGO enough to discount it for that overfamiliarity alone. I mean, I'm still struck by minimal, early Canadian works by the Group of Seven, yet since that part of the gallery never rotates, it becomes part of the 95% eventually.