FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DENVER, CO, May 21, 2001 -- The Investor’s Shop at Wall-Street.com began keeping track of businesspeople’s art preferences during the Christmas 1999 season.
This unique survey has now recorded almost 250 preferences. As you would expect, William H. Beard ‘s paintings of bulls and bears have been popular with 27 pictures chosen in this category, plus 18 pictures of just bears, 1 picture of a bull and 1 of a cow (which looked a lot like a bull).
Almost as popular were Susan Stuart’s Wall-Street-themed collages “Money Exchange I and Money Exchange II” with 15 chosen. Six people liked classic Moses King photos of Wall Street and 3 wanted LeRoy Neiman paintings of the stock market. In keeping with a theme of classical architecture, 2 people selected pictures of Raphael’s “School of Athens”. In related choices, 6 people preferred pictures of money, 8 chose “Fortune” magazine covers with various subjects (tickertape being the most popular), and 6 wanted reproductions of stock certificates.
Depictions of commercial life were popular including 15 pictures of cities, shops, offices and urban life. In addition, 4 people selected patent posters while 14 chose vintage posters depicting many products and patriotic themes. In the “executive leisure” category, 4 people liked pictures of horse racing, 4 jazz music, 3 golf and 2 dance.
Six people selected abstract paintings with varied themes and 8 chose humorous or satiric art from Pieter Brueghel to Michael Bedard. Ten pictures could be classified only as “miscellaneous”. Some examples are O’Keefe’s “Red Canna”, Wyeth’s “Master Bedroom”, Toulouse Lautrec’s “Moulin Rouge” and Van Gogh’s “Almond Blossom”.
The biggest surprise was in the category of Transportation”. Traditional wisdom holds that the average businessman will choose a picture of a ship to place on his wall. Only one person wanted a picture of a ship; though, in a related theme, 8 people chose a picture of a bridge. Amazingly, 46 people selected a picture of a train, making this by far the most popular theme! Most were by the noted photographer , O. Winston Link. And of these train pictures 10 also had a bridge in them! What would Freud make of this?
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