ingegné wrote:aethelwulf wrote:The auction estimate does seem overly ambitious, but its the chance to own "the most valuable object in the world". That's quite a bragging point.
That's wrong, as you can see in the video I linked, many small objects, other than stamps, have been sold at much higher prices: Sotheby's record seems to be $ 57.2 Million for a 3,2" high limestone statue called
"The Guennol Lioness"
This is not the highest price for a sculpture anyway and I think that impressionist paintings sold for even higher prices.
What really puzzles me is:
a) How much rich should I be to spend such a huge amount of money on a masterpiece?
b) There is a substantial difference between objects I can easily show to friends (paintings, statues) and others, like this stamp, that will suffer any time I will take them out from the air controlled vault;
c) When it comes to wines, that are sold by Sotheby's at even more than $ 10,000 a bottle,
do they drink them?
Not the outright most valuable object, as there are many many works of art and collectables that have sold for more, but as was discussed earlier in the thread, the most valuable by weight--gram for gram, more valuable than a pink diamond or a rare element (and how exciting would it be to have a bunch of powder in a tube?).
The Qatari royal family holds the art market record, they paid $250m for a Cezanne. But nobody is going to cut up a stamp or a painting and offer little squares of it, so it can't be sold piece-meal like a raw material commodity.
My thoughts to your questions,
a) Its all up to someone how they spend their money. There are people in some countries who drive a BMW, but live in a shabby house, or carry an LV bag yet live in a low-rent flat--driving around town in a fancy car, or walking around the mall with a luxury handbag, you'll project the image of being rich. So you could spend 10% of your net worth on a masterpiece, or 0.1%, its your choice, as long as you have the money to pay the bill.
b) Some works of art have conservation sensitivities--watercolours, textiles, lacquer. Stone sculptures are pretty easy to collect, as are ceramics, the environment won't hurt them easily. But one doesn't want to have a stamp hanging on the wall in the light all day every day. And besides, a lot of people won't be very impressed with a little piece of paper like this, as they would be by a Picasso.
c) If you have something really special to celebrate, you might crack open the bottle. I've never really understood wine collecting--how exciting is it to have bottles stacked up in the basement? Wine is an interesting area--while more of a vintage can't be made, just as more of an old stamp can't be made, we don't
consume stamps. Every bottle of wine drunk means that's 1 less bottle that exists.
but at least I managed to get some nice colours into my post 
