The Economist‘s coverage of the Old Master sales paid particular attention to the dealers in field. The auction houses may have succeeded in drawing in collectors directly in other fields but Old Master works–with their tricky attributions–are still dominated by dealers who buy for clients or stock. A dealer can buy a picture a turn around and sell it in part because their willingness to risk their own capital is a powerful form of validation that the work is authentic and esteemed. That, or it is the sign of a dealer with very strong nerves and a poker face. Bullets are quotes from the Economist:

• Konrad Bernheimer, who heads a four-generation Old Master firm
• Philip Mould, founder of Historic Portraits and better known as the BBC’s “art detective”
• Johnny van Haeften, the leading Dutch specialist in London
• Alfred Bader, a rich American art-market broker and former chemist
• the heirs to two important art-dealing businesses, William Noortman and Simon Green.
• Other dealers proved nearly as determined in their own specialities. Simon Dickinson, a London dealer with connections in the British (and especially Scottish) aristocracy, bought Sir Edwin Henry Landseer’s five-foot-long romantic Highland clan scene
• Luca Baroni and daughter: The Baronis are known for their courage, and their private client list; in July 2008, again at Christie’s, they paid a record £12.6m for a little caprice by Jean-Antoine Watteau that had been found in an English country house.)

Opportunity Knocks (Economist)