Value, Price, And Perception: The Economics Of Art
- Efe Metin Çetin
- 4 days ago
- 11 min read
Art and economics rarely share a stage, yet both attempt to answer the same question: why do we value what we value? This article brings those two worlds into conversation. Through an extended dialogue with contemporary artist Erin İlkcan Aslan, this article examines how emotions, intuition, scarcity, reputation, and narrative influence the art market, just as much as pigments, canvas, or time. Erin speaks of creation as fire, an inner pressure that erupts into form, while economics traditionally speaks in functions, utility, and prices. But as his reflections show, the forces that move collectors, investors, and audiences are far from rational. They are driven by status, story, memory, fear, and desire. By pairing the artist’s own voice with an economic framework, this piece examines art both as a creative act and also as an ‘experience good’ whose value is revealed through exposure and interpretation. Price, perception, scarcity, cultural inflation, behavioural biases, Veblen dynamics, and wealth effects all appear in the background of each brushstroke he describes. What emerges is a portrait of art as both an emotional experience and an asset class—one that stores identity as much as value—and one whose meaning evolves with each viewer, each market cycle, and each narrative that surrounds it.
Introduction: Erin Ilkcan Aslan
How did your journey as an artist begin? Was there a specific moment or experience that made you realise this is what you wanted to do?
For me, art was not a choice but an inevitable destiny. Since childhood, I have had a connection with fire, light, and shadows, one that eventually found its expression on the canvas. There was not a single ‘aha’ moment; it was more like a constantly growing inner pressure, a state of rebellion. The day I irreversibly reached for the brush, I stepped onto the stage of my life. Just as there is no turning back once the first chord is struck on a Rock'n'Roll stage, from that moment on, there was no other path left for me.
When you create, what usually drives you first: an emotion, a concept, or a visual image?
Everything begins with emotion. That first spark, a moment! Then comes the concept, because without giving emotion a framework, expression remains powerless. And finally, the visual image steps onto the stage and turns on the spotlight. So my process is like a rock concert: first an explosion of feeling, then arrangement, then the visual show. Emotion comes first; explosive, fierce. But right after, a concept and a visual image start to flirt with it. It is a love triangle: the fire of emotion, the intellect of the concept, the beauty of the visual.
How would you describe the essence or recurring theme of your work, in your own words?
My works are always about transformation: burning, turning to ashes, and being reborn. Sometimes rebellious, sometimes fragile, but always strong. My works carry both the Rolls-Royce and the Harley Davidson at the same time. This duality has always been at the core of my art.
If your art could speak, what would it say about you?
Take it, because this is not just a painting. This is a spark from his fire. When you own it, you will not just be a collector; you will become part of his story, part of his stage.
Before we analyse prices, incentives, markets, and narratives, we must begin with the tension that defines the entire art economy: the meeting point of emotion and rationality. Art is created in a world without equations (mostly), yet it enters a marketplace obsessed with them. The collector, the gallery, the investor, and even the casual observer all assign value long before a price is written on a wall. This valuation does not come from a calculator; it emerges from story, identity, memory, and desire. Yet, economics offers us vocabulary that comes surprisingly close to explaining such impulses. The two fields, seemingly distant, constantly circle one another. Economists prefer equations; artists love fire. Yet both speak of energy. In markets, utility measures the heat of desire: in art, emotion does. The two are almost the same function under different names. For a buyer i:
The economist quantifies it; the artist feels it. Both chase the same invisible variable: why we care. In truth, every market is a theatre of emotion wearing the mask of reason. Thus when narratives shift the weights of the α, β, and γ over time, the piece of art does not change, though its value does because art is categorised as an experience good: its utility is learned through exposure.
I. Value and Pricing
When you create a piece, do you already have a price in mind, or does the price emerge later, as a kind of market signal?
The price does not originate in my mind. I first ignite the fire; the work creates its own energy. Only when it steps onto the stage do the market, collectors, viewers, and my own state at that moment give signals about its value. The price emerges from this encounter, like the applause at a concert.
What are the key factors that determine your pricing? (Time, materials, reputation, emotional weight, uniqueness, scarcity?)
Everything comes together:
Time and effort, because every brushstroke is a moment taken from my life.
Materials, because the ones I choose, from natural pigments to digital canvases, are each a form of luxury investment.
Reputation and past, because an artist’s history appears to the collector like a guarantee.
Uniqueness and scarcity, because no work is ever born again.
But above all: the emotional resonance of the piece. If it shakes me, it will shake the collector too. So briefly: time, material, reputation, emotional weight, uniqueness… But most importantly, the mark it leaves on me. If it burns me, it will burn the collector as well.
Do you ever think of your artworks as assets rather than products; something that holds, or even appreciates in, value over time?
Absolutely. My works are an investment, but not only a financial one—also an emotional, cultural, and existential investment. They are certainly not only pieces hung on a wall; they are reservoirs of value that the collector passes on to the future, to their children.
Have you noticed collectors treating your work as an investment, almost like they’re trading in ‘shares of your career’?
Yes, I see this often. My collectors sometimes tell me, ‘I’m investing in you.’ In fact, they are growing their own portfolios alongside me. Watching my rise also means watching the value of their investments increase.
How do you feel about auction results or secondary-market prices that might differ drastically from your own valuations?
Sometimes it shakes my ego, and sometimes it flatters my pride. Because when a work is sold for a price much higher than the one I set, it shows that it resonated far more deeply in someone else’s eyes. This is the free dance of art in the open market.
II. Inflation, Currency, and Value Stability
Art often holds value when currency weakens. Do you think of art as a kind of alternative currency or a store of value, similar to gold or Bitcoin?
Art is not like gold or crypto. Those are cold metals and codes. Art is written with blood and soul. That is why it is a safer store of value. Money collapses, but true art remains.
How do you think inflation, being both monetary and cultural, affects the prices of contemporary and modern art?
Inflation operates not only in the economy but also in culture. At times, ‘trends’ inflate certain kinds of art, while at other times they make the value of true masters shine even brighter. The contemporary art market can sway in the winds of cultural inflation, but timeless works always endure.
Do you ever adjust your pricing consciously in response to inflation or market trends, or do you prefer to let value remain ‘intuitive’?
I do both. I do not ignore the economic realities of the market, because one must survive in this life. But the final word belongs to intuition. Whatever value the work holds within me, the price eventually gravitates toward it.
If you were to express the ‘value’ of art in economic terms, what would it be? Utility, scarcity, or sentiment?
The economic formula of art: scarcity + emotion + timeless utility. Utility, because it nourishes the soul. Scarcity, because it cannot be reproduced. Emotion, because without it, no value is real.
Before discussing inflation, returns, and wealth effects, we ought to recognise that art lives in a different temporal rhythm than financial assets. A stock responds to interest rates within seconds; a painting responds to centuries of taste, memory, and shifting cultural climates. Economists see inflation as erosion of purchasing power, yet artists experience a different kind of erosion: when meaning dilutes, when images become endless and weightless, when attention becomes cheap. The art market, therefore, does not simply follow monetary cycles: it follows cultural tides. Economists write:
real value is roughly the nominal rate minus inflation. But in art, inflation is not just prices rising; it is meaning thinning. When every image becomes scrollable, the value of silence rises. When every NFT claims immortality, the ephemeral becomes rare. And unlike conventional assets, art doesn’t generate steady cash flows unless it is exhibited, licensed, or loaned out. Its ‘return’ is mostly the change in its perceived worth over time, with any exhibition income simply adding a small echo to that movement. In this sense, the artwork behaves less like a bond and more like a narrative asset. Its price moves with the stories told about it.
As global wealth grows, demand for art intensifies; the wealth effect means that higher fortunes translate directly into higher willingness to pay. But this isn’t simply economics: it’s psychology. Cultural inflation acts like a narrative shock, shifting tastes, amplifying sentiment, and occasionally turning a quiet painting into a sudden cultural phenomenon. Art prices stretch and contract not only with money but with mood, fashion, memory, and collective longing. And in this dance, value becomes something deeper than numbers: it becomes a mirror of what society chooses to care about at a given moment.
III. The Market & Behavioral Economics
Do you think art buyers behave rationally, or are they guided more by social signalling and emotion?
Art buyers are mostly irrational — but that is where the beauty lies. They fall in love with a painting and are willing to risk everything to have it. It is not an investment decision; it is a decision of passion.
How do galleries, exhibitions, and social media shape the perceived value of art? Do they act as ‘market makers’ in a sense?
Absolutely. They are the spotlights of the market. But light can only illuminate a star that already exists. If there is no light within the work itself, even the gallery windows remain empty.
Would you say pricing art is closer to pricing luxury goods, financial assets, or emotional experiences?
Art embraces all three worlds. It grants status like a luxury bag, gains value like a financial asset, but most importantly, offers an unforgettable experience.
Is art luxury?
Yes, but not an ordinary kind of luxury. It is not consumed like a watch, a car, or a wine. Art is the most refined luxury of the soul.
Before we enter the behavioural side of the art market, it helps to remember that art does not behave like ordinary goods. Most products respond predictably to price: raise the price, and demand falls. But art slips away from this logic. It lives in a world where desire, status, scarcity, and narrative twist the basic laws of economics. Buyers don’t simply purchase a canvas—they purchase belonging, prestige, mythology, and sometimes even a version of themselves. This is why the usual diagrams of demand and supply feel insufficient; art obeys a different geometry. The economists measure elasticity with:
Though with art, higher the price, the stronger desire. So by asking how quantity reacts when price moves, we conduct our analysis. In most markets, higher prices cool desire. But with art, higher prices often ignite it. This is the Veblen curve—a reminder that some objects become more desirable precisely because they are expensive. Yet even this model falls short, because art is not about elasticity but about gravity. It pulls certain people in. The more expensive it grows, the more it becomes a mirror: not of value, but of identity. Every purchase asks a quiet question: Who am I, when I stand before beauty? Following Keynes’s beauty-contest logic, buyers often try to anticipate not their own valuation, but the valuation of others. Instead of looking inward, they attempt to read collective desire, estimating what other collectors believe a piece is worth. Social proof, scarcity cues, and loss aversion distort rational expectations, making demand for art curve and bend in ways no textbook graph fully captures. In a world obsessed with measurable returns, art remains one of the few places where irrationality feels almost sacred.
Following Keynes’s beauty contest logic, buyers estimate
where we see that the consumer in this context does not do inner reflection to determine the value of an art object, it rather tries to determine someone else’s valuation. They guess others’ valuation rather than finding the value themselves. Social proof, scarcity cues, and loss aversion distorts rational expectations, making art demand non-linear in price. We then can say that in a market obsessed with return, art remains the last place where irrationality still feels holy. This is why the art market so often behaves like a psychological arena rather than a financial marketplace. Prices move not only with wealth or scarcity, but with whispers, reputations, exhibitions, rivalries, and the stories collectors tell themselves. A painting can double in value not because it changed, but because its narrative did.
IV. Ethics, Speculation & Tax Heavens
There’s a growing debate about art being used as a tax shelter or vehicle for wealth storage. How do you feel about that?
I am not surprised that art is used for this purpose; power always finds its own ways. But for me, art is not a means of storing wealth; it is a song written into collective memory.
Do you think the commercialisation of contemporary art undermines its meaning, or is this just a reflection of how all value systems evolve?
We live in an age where everything is commercialised. This does not destroy the meaning of art, but it sometimes covers it. The true artist is the one who tears that cover apart.
In your opinion, what separates genuine collectors from financial speculators?
The true collector falls in love with the artwork. The speculator falls in love with the price chart. The sparkle in their eyes is different: one is the light of the soul, the other merely the reflection of the dollar.
Do you think there should be more transparency or regulation in the art market, or would that destroy its mystique?
A bit of transparency is good, but too much of it breaks the magic. The art market draws part of its enchantment from mystery.
V. Reflections on Value Creation
If the value of art is partly subjective, what does that say about our broader economic systems, that maybe all value is narrative?
In fact, the entire economy is made of stories. Money is a myth, and so are markets. Art reveals this myth in its purest form: value exists only because we all believe in it.
When someone buys your work, what do you feel they’re really buying; the art, the story, or a piece of your identity?
All of it. The painting is only the beginning. The collector buys the story, a piece of my identity, and their own reflection. That work becomes the bridge between us.
Do you think art will ever fully detach from material exchange, for instance, through NFTs or purely digital art economies?
The digital world is powerful, yes. But the essence of art is to connect with the soul. It can be an NFT, a digital exhibition — but if there is no emotion, it remains nothing more than pixels.
Finally, if your artworks were a currency, what would they be backed by: emotion, time, or truth?
All three. Time, because a work matures with the years. Truth, because there are no lies in my art. Emotion, because without it, nothing has meaning.
What this conversation ultimately reveals is that art lives at the crossroads of emotion and economics, of fire and formula. Erin Ilkcan Aslan speaks from instinct, rebellion, and his inner ignition while the economic lens speaks from models, incentives, and rational structure. Yet both perspectives point toward the same actuality of value never being static. It moves with us, our narratives, our identities, our wealth, our fears, our longing to belong to something greater than ourselves. Art then, thus, becomes a vessel that carries all of these forces at once. In the end, the price of a painting is only the surface. Beneath it lies the story of how meaning is made, how desire forms, how culture inflates and deflates, how we search for ourselves in the objects we choose to keep close. In a world that increasingly quantifies everything, art remains one of the last domains where the unquantifiable still matters.
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