Since then, works have been quietly available for purchase if collectors contact the artistsвЂ™ gallerists. вЂњIt was considered an instrument of the commercialisation of art,вЂќ explains the biennialвЂ™s website. WileyвЂ™s distinctive realist portrayals of Black Americans have been selling for as much as $650,000 atВ auction.ДЄrt and money have enjoyed a covert relationship at the Venice Biennale since the early 1970s, when the event got rid of the official sales office that had been a fixture since the founding edition of 1895. The Oscar-winning actress Tilda Swinton was seen trawling the Kehinde Wiley show in the Cini Foundation at San Giorgio Maggiore, вЂњlooking for exactly which canvas she wanted to take home herselfвЂќ, Baer revealed. New canvases by the young British-Nigerian abstract painter JadГ© Fadojutimi, four of whose works have sold for more than $1m at recent auctions, were вЂњcausing a collecting crazeвЂќ last month in the central exhibition, Milk of Dreams, according to the Baer Faxt market newsletter, the mouthpiece of Josh Baer, the New York-based art adviser and commentator. While the Venice Biennale has for many decades been regarded as the most prestigious and comprehensive overview of the latest state of chiefly Western visual culture, the richest 0.1% also continue to treat it as the worldвЂ™s most exclusive and discreet art fair.

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