 This is Startup to Storefront. When it comes to the art world, you have artists, dealers, and collectors. Dealers have been around almost as long as humans have been selling art, linking buyers and artists together all over the globe. The relationship between an artist and a dealer was originally based on commerce, but eventually evolved into one that included sincere advocacy and patronage. The art dealers of today are just as much talent managers as they are brokers. This is very much the case for our guest today, Arushi Kapoor. Arushi has been involved in the art world since her teenage years, starting with an internship at Sotheby's and launching from there into opening up her own galleries all over the world. She's a champion of artists both upcoming and established, and she's here today to talk with us about the contemporary art world, both analog and digital. So Listen In has recovered everything from why an artist needs around a thousand pieces before they have a recognizable style, the frustrations of being a financial coach to artists, and why you don't need to have a great business mindset to get represented as an artist, you just need to be better than the most awkward person in the room. Now, on to the episode. I work with artists in the secondary market with clients. I buy and sell artworks. I do alternative asset divisions with large family companies. I provide artworks to museums. The whole deal in the art world. I do anything related to art. How did you get into this world? I got into it very early. How early? Because you're young today. So people, for those listening, how early? 16. Wow. It was honestly because I needed some project for my university. So I was like, what am I going to do? Were you here in America or were you somewhere else? No, I was interning with South Bees in London. And then I went to India and interned with the Indian Express Newspaper Rare. I was writing small snippets of things happening in town. And then right after that, I actually wrote a book called Talking Art by Rushi Kapoor, which was a book that is studied in colleges. And now is a part of a bunch of museums now. So I got very lucky with it. But it was basically 16 Southeast Asian contemporary artists that I spoke with. And the premise of the book was, what are the barriers to entry for them to actually blow up in the Western world? The Western art world is miles ahead in terms of value and valuation not in terms of aesthetics, but in terms of valuation of art. Was it because of the exposure? It's because of the exposure. Does it also have to do with colonization? I would say it does, yes. Because due to colonization, a lot of the times we were told as non-Caucasian people that we were not good enough. In India, for example, they would say that dogs and brown people or dogs and Indians were not allowed in certain places. So I think a part of it is definitely that barrier to entry created due to colonization, not directly but indirectly. But that gives a barrier to language. And even if people don't actively think about this right now, it has been ingrained in previous generations. So you think that if you're a lighter skin colored, you're in some way superior. But in the art world particularly, in this book, that is not exactly what we were speaking about. We were speaking about more present day scenarios that like international artists. Now I'm talking about the top artists of India at the time that I was very lucky to hound and get an interview with. Talking about how they are not able to converse in the Western world and explain their ideas and their paintings the same way that the Western artists would. Or even that like they aren't given the same chance in like the galleries, in like the larger galleries, the Gagosians and the David's Werners and the Hauser and Wirtz because their valuation of their artworks is a lot lesser than like what the valuation of their counterparts that were making similar artworks in the Western world at a similar period of time would be. If I'm an artist, there's people listening. So I'm an artist. I've decided to create art, call myself an artist. I'm making stuff and at some point who decides what it's worth, right? So is it that I have maybe a team behind me and I'm getting some exposure and I'm doing small galleries and people are liking it and they're selling it for like hundreds of dollars or is it the complete opposite where I'm in a lab working for five years, ten years. I get my art to a point where I'm like, okay, I want to go big. Nothing has sold yet and that's been intentional and now I need like a dealer. So both of those ways realistically are options. What I tell my artists that I work with as their dealer is if you actually want the valuation of your artworks to go up, you at least need a thousand artworks out there so people recognize your style. You can set a price yourself as an artist but people are not going to buy it for that price unless there's something backing it up, right? Unless there's a track record of sales. You can't just wake up one day and be like, oh, my artwork is a hundred thousand dollars because I spend this much time on it but like, okay, for sure, you have the right to price it that way and it may sell but will it continuously sell at that price? Probably not because there's not a track record of it versus if you're an artist that's starting out and you're first pricing it at five and then $7,500 because you've sold a couple of works at five and then going to $10,000 and then it goes into auction and goes for $50 and then you're pricing yours according to the auction. There's like a trajectory that's being followed and a lot more people would be likely to consider your artwork an asset if that's the way you go about it rather than if you just price it in a way that you think is fair. And just from the market perspective, like here we have James Peter Henry who's an artist, he has got a bunch of murals in LA. I like his art. I'm a fan. But is art a function of just like perceived value or is it a function of really understanding the artist and so understanding that James likes African art and so where he draws inspiration, does that matter at all? A hundred percent. A hundred percent matters. What the artist is inspired by is how relevant it is in the world today. That's what people are responding to. People aren't just responding to how it looks physically. I mean, you got him to do this mural here. I'm sure you researched something about what his background was before just putting it out there for aesthetic purposes. So like it definitely promotes people buying it according to what they're standing for. At what point do they find you? Or at what point do you find them maybe is the better question? For every million artists, there's only a hundred thousand collectors and ten thousand dealers and galleries. Collectors are like people just buying the art. Collectors are people just buying the art. Not many people, a hundred thousand people. What is there an entry point for being considered a collector? Like you have to have so many pieces by so many... If you're buying an artwork, you're a collector. Am I a collector? Because I have this? Yeah. I mean, if you collect artworks, you're a collector. Now there's different levels within collectors that are like... I mean, Larry Gagosian just bought that Marilyn Monroe piece for 195 million. I mean, I would say 99% of this world cannot afford that. So like, I mean, he's a collector, but he's obviously in a different level than like you are even me as a collector. So there's definitely different levels of collector, but if you buy an artwork, you're a collector for sure. But in terms of just people finding me or me finding them, I get sent emails from artists all the time. I get sent artists on Instagram all the time. It really depends... What are they asking you for? To be represented. So once an artist is represented by a gallery, typically the gallery is more or less responsible for placing the artworks and pushing the artist's career. So I would say it's almost an equivalent of an artist manager in the music industry, where it's our responsibility to make sure that the artists... And not only like you can have one representation, like one gallery that's representing you, or you could have multiple galleries that's representing you. And in both cases, like either as a collective we're responsible for it, or the gallery as an individual is responsible for it. The best way to get represented by a gallery is to probably attend the art shows and like introduce yourself to the gallery director personally before sending an email. If you're just sending a cold call, unless your artwork is exceptional and I've seen nothing like it, I mean that happens very rarely. And a lot of the times you'll also see artworks are similar, but an artist is better than the other artist, just objectively from a dealer's perspective, because I see artworks every day. So I just think that unless your artwork is extremely special and individual and you're cold calling me, you're going to get a response from me. Yes, but you're going to go in a big file of artists that are wanting to be represented by the gallery and you won't get a time of the day. Versus if you actually attend a couple of the gallery show and the director knows you and then you send them an email, like chances are they're going to be like, oh, I recognize this name. This person's come to the gallery. They've supported the gallery just from a perspective of a viewer, even if not as a collector. I'm happy to call them in and have a conversation with them. Are artists good at that though? I can't imagine an artist is very business minded or they haven't learned that yet. So are you hearing from their manager? Do they even have a manager yet? Until and unless you've reached a certain established level, you don't have a manager. And this is why it's hard to get represented by artists, because most artists do not have that. And they're not good at it. Well, not even not good at it. I don't think most artists understand that that's the way of going about it. I mean, this is not something that you need to be specifically business minded to accomplish. You just need to be not the most awkward person in the room to go and introduce yourself to someone else. But I don't think most artists know that this is also a part of their job until they get represented. Once they do get represented and they do have management or a gallery, then things change and then they don't have to do it. Their manager or the gallery has to think of their placements and where they're showing in group shows and all of that and getting deals. But until you're at that level and you're a brand new artist, even a brand new music artist or a brand new dealer like me, I had to go to every single gallery and introduce myself to people. When I started, I was waiting under collectors' houses as a very creepy person, but I was young and looking innocent so it wasn't as creepy. But I was trying to catch collectors, the top collectors, on their way in and out of their galleries. What would you say to them? I would introduce myself to them and tell them that I'm a young art dealer and I would like to show you artists that I have. What happens if they say yes? Well, a lot of them actually decided to have tea with me. That's the thing, unless you put yourself out there as an entrepreneur in any industry, you're not getting anything in return. You've got to become a salesperson. Yeah, everyone needs to be a salesperson no matter what industry they're in. Speak on it. I can imagine there was some pushback though because you're a young art dealer. Then you have no track record. So it almost seems to me like it would fall in the line of you have no track record, therefore no one's sure whether they can trust you or not. So how do you build that confidence that you can? But it's inspiring though. You're crazy enough to think you are. That's how it works. If you're crazy enough to think you are, then you probably might be at some point in the future. I 100% agree with that. As opposed to what? He thinks he's fast on a bike. He's not fast, but he thinks he's faster than him. I don't know about this. That's exactly right. I don't know. But you believe me more than him. And that's all that matters. It's objective here. It depends on who's selling it more. I'm always going to sell it harder. So they give you a chance. You have some tea. Do you explain your grand vision? What are you saying? You show your artist. You need people to give you a chance in any industry. If someone comes to me. So how do you pick your artist then? Same. I'm giving them a chance. Someone that I think has potential and that I have clients for, I'll give them a chance. I want to do this real time. He's a friend of mine. I don't really care if he's a good artist. I just like him. When you look at this, is it objectively? What is it that runs through your head here? Are you going, okay. I'm just trying to gather your analysis of this piece, which is representative. A lot of his pieces are similar in terms of style. So for his artworks in particular, from what I'm seeing, is he's abstract, figurative right now. So there's figures, but like most of it, when you see it in the first glance, it's abstract. Figurative artists are doing absolutely amazingly well right now. As a genre? Yeah. As a genre. And like more than that too. Right now, the artists that are blowing up are in the African diaspora. So you see that. You go, okay, there's a market for this. There's a market for this. So it's relevant. It's very relevant. It's a very quick market for it. Okay. I like the analysis. Aesthetically, I like it. I would have to see his portfolio. Sure. So I want to see if... You see those thousand works of art. Not a thousand works of art. I mean, I say that like... You want to see range? When you see portfolio, are you looking for range? I'm looking for, say, 10 to 12 artworks. And I want to see that when I see your artwork, it's recognizable. For example, when you see a Pollock in a museum, you know it's a Pollock. Totally right. When you see a Baskia, you see it's a Baskia. If an artist is making a work, but the style is 10 different styles and 10 different works, that's not going to work because no one's going to recognize his style then. The whole idea of seeing the portfolio is, can I see a pattern? Is there a repetitive pattern? Or is there anything that is repeated in the work that could stand out and be like, okay, I know that this is so-and-so's work. So once that's done, I would call the artist in or take the artist out for lunch or just hang out with the artist. It's very important for galleries or gallerists or dealers to actually have a relationship with the artist if I don't get along with you as a person. Our business relationship's not going to work. So at that point, I have no option but to move on to the next artist even though everything lines up and everything else. And the artist will find someone else because obviously I'm not the only person who's thinking like this. Most galleries are thinking in a similar manner. Are there some intangible things you look at that might matter if they've done a collaboration or if they've done a celebrity collab or something? Does that give any, does it matter? 100%. I've placed artworks with numerous celebrities. It definitely pushes the career up. Where do you get placed? I mean if Justin Bieber posted an artwork, Justin Bieber posted an artwork of Mr. The Artist and I had so many people asking me for artworks by him right then and the younger music generation from LA. So 100% if an artist is promoting you, obviously Beyonce and Jay-Z promoted Basquiat for the Tiffany campaign and even if people who were completely oblivious to the art world did not know anything about the art world. They looked at that and they were like, who is that artist? It educated a bunch of people that didn't. It educated younger people that might have been familiar with the luxury world like Tiffany as a brand but didn't know or knew of Basquiat as a name but were not familiar with his artwork. The billboards kind of made them familiar so absolutely it helps. So recognizable, there's some market, so it's relevant at the time, maybe some endorsements, maybe some not and then you gotta like them, make sense, you wanna like people you work with and then what happens? So then they just become part of your portfolio? I mean the cherry on top would actually be to like finish the last part would be if they actually have a track record of some sort of sales. It doesn't have to be like sales that are like in the 10,000 range or 20,000 range. It could be sales for like a thousand, two thousand dollars. Okay, so it's pretty low. It doesn't matter. It could be very low. I mean it's our job to like price it the right way and like push the artist up but like if there is a track record of sales we know there's a market out there even more in a more so concrete manner. So then you start working with them and then you're showing them off to your network? So then we start working with them so different artists have like a different plan so this is where we have a coffee, we sit down, I like them, we like decide to work together, we send them a representation agreement. So once we are in that agreement them and us would sit down and we would make a plan for their year. So how many group shows do we want them to be in? When would be a good time after this many group shows to have a solo show? Do we want to put them on artsy and online platforms so people who don't know their work and like access it online or is it like do we want it to be more just controlled or do we want it to go just to our network and just to like certain top clients? What the artist wants? Like this plan that we're making is very much a collaboration between the artists and us. So like it's how the artist sees their market growing and what the artist wants in addition to what the gallery thinks is beneficial for the artist. Give me an example of something like an artist might want or in your experience it's some like crazy thing that you've never even heard of. I mean like some artists would be like I want my artworks to be in the most exclusive celebrity homes and like highest collector rankings. I don't want random people to have access to my artworks even though the artwork will only the artworks are only $5,000. And in that situation I have to honor that I might have a whole wait list of people that are emerging art collectors that want the artwork but because the artist wants a certain kind of collective I tell the artist where we are placing the artworks every time so the artist knows where the artworks are. In that situation I mean I'm placing the artworks with only the top collectors and like it's a much more restrained market. In that case I'm not putting it on artsy or online platforms and I'm not marketing it in a way where like it's not even accessible to most people so if like I get them an interview with Flound magazine and people who are reading Flound magazine or most people that are reading it are like coming to me and like saying I want this artist I'm not even able to provide it but like there are people that are reading Flound magazine that are obviously top collectors and like happy to like give them the artworks but like chances of getting to those collectors through some public source like that is very low. It's usually personal relationships and you send PDFs to them personally and that's how they get it. Now a completely different requirement for an artist is like I want to be a hype artist I want to be like known by everyone I want my artist to be like in the public eye I want to sell it to as many people be democratic in that case we want to like market it as much as possible in magazines and like online platforms so like we can give the artist the market that they are desiring. So you have to be protective of it in a certain sense and you know I do know that Sotheby's, Christie's they will have auctions and they'll have a high price like the thing it will go for and a low price and often times if it doesn't if whatever the bid doesn't meet that low price they won't sell it like you said you want it in certain celebrities homes or certain collectors homes and not some random person and what interests me is that it goes against basic economic theory of an object is worth whatever someone's willing to pay for it and it's almost like there's a certain member of the art community who's like well we don't care that someone's not willing to pay for it now because we think someone will pay for it later. Well so auctions are something that like artists get into when they're a little bit more established artists want and it's beneficial for the artist to have a controlled market and not go into auctions for as long as they can frankly and the reason for that is very simply that like once artists go into auctions it's kind of like out of their control they can't control their market anymore it's open source and it's public when an artist does very well an auction obviously it's very it's beneficial to them because then they can like push up their primary market prices to a certain extent and you have to repeatedly do those high prices like Jordy Kerwick right now he's a very hot artist and like his auction prices are consistent and up there every single time if you just have one big auction record and you're not getting the same auction record again again that's a really bad look and actually harmful for your market. Now completely opposite to that is if your artwork does not do well say it goes in the lower estimate or less than the lower estimate so typically in an auction there's a reserve price that is the minimum price that like they would accept for the art to be considered sold which is less than the minimum estimate the low estimate so if it sells lower than low estimate it's actually also not so great for the artist market because now they have to sell less than like whatever the estimated value is in the market because that's what so auctions are like open source anyone can go see what prices it went for it's just like the stock market I mean if you see that a stock is going for $10 you're not gonna go buy it for $50 right then you'll wait for it to come to the market for $10 again and try to buy it for that price so it's very tricky on hand if it does really well it's beneficial to you but if it doesn't do that well it's breaking your market and on the contrary if it doesn't sell at all that's a B.I. that means the lot has been passed that's even worse for you because I mean that like shows that like there's not enough people in the market that's your reputation nobody cares no one wants your painting how do you structure your deals with them and so for all the work that you're doing setting them up what's the fee you're taking and is it based on sales? exclusively yeah it's based on sales exclusively sometimes artists can sign works for more established artists sometimes we'll like pay them half upfront sometimes we'll buy them outright it's different ways to deal with different artists depending on the level obviously if I go to like a cause you know a huge artist and very well known I'm gonna have to buy the artwork upfront he's not gonna give it to me in consignment unless he's in a very very very good mood you know he might if you're listening it's like it never hurts to ask as an entrepreneur that's my number one rule that like it never hurts to like put yourself out there so if you're listening please give me a consignment but like 30% 30% so it ranges between 5% to 50% and it depends on how established the artist is obviously if the artist has a market and he's very established we would get a lower percentage versus a brand new artist that doesn't have any market we would get a higher percentage because we have to put that much more effort and it's more on my name that the person is buying an artwork rather than the artist name they trust you like it really depends it can even defer work to work it doesn't even have to defer person to person like sometimes if we're doing a exhibit a show with them I'm putting a lot of money in for marketing and like putting it all up installation there's a lot of costs so like obviously we get a higher percentage out of like the show versus in general when we work with the artist we get a lower percentage compared to do any of those things then so like it really depends on what their current situation is in the market and what we require for the gallery and the things so it's all situation based so there's no one formula for it it's an art and a science there's general principles but like you can put the wrong chemical in and everything could blow up do you have like you personally do you say okay this year I'm gonna sign up 10 new artists or do you go this year I'm gonna focus on I'm gonna like cut the fat let's say let's say you work with 100 but you really like just 20 of them and 20 of them are selling I always put like a maximum number that I'm going to represent within the year of new artists I'm not gonna tell you that is it like hundreds though or is it like tens no it's not hundreds it's like the tens and are you cycling through or is it like you're adding tens to the portfolio every year I'm adding tens to the portfolio every year so like the reason for that is as the artist gets more established it's easier for me to like place their artworks so it kind of goes on almost autopilot I still have to place the works with museums I still have to place the works like get them new projects and like still have to work with them but that initial stage of building an artist is 100 times harder than like once there's a track record and then like the artist already has some sort of a market that like we're selling to what are things that make your job hard like really hard so an example that comes to mind in my head is you're repping them you're about to do a gallery and they're selling art on the side for cheaper that's 100% a big no no yeah and I've dropped so you established rules up front of like these are the that's one of the things not to do what are some of the other things that are like huge red flags well I mean so there's so there's several several different red flags right I understand that like selling artworks on the side is a big no no again this is why it's important to have a relationship with your artist I'm very happy to have a chat with the artist and like if there's one friend of theirs that they really want to give the artworks to I'm very happy to forego my commission for that one artwork or two artworks to their friends but it's my responsibility to keep the prices up high in the market and a lot of the times when artists do that and sell artworks in the side for cheaper the artworks show up in auctions for a lot cheaper because they want less money because obviously they got it for lesser money so they're okay to like sell it for lesser and that hurts them the artist market overall and like I don't want to be dealing with someone who's doing that I mean this is very much like any other business they're like our partners so we need to have that established trust with them so if they do that like that's a very big no no another thing that's a very big no no for emerging artists is if they have too many demands right if you're not in a position to make demands and you're like being an annoying little shitty thing like I will drop you because that means in the longer term does that happen a lot it happens often enough yeah I was gonna say I can see it happening in a good amount yeah so like which is why which is why like most galleries and like representation contracts if they have a period of time and the artist is being annoying they won't renew the contract again so it's harmful for the artist they think they're being a cool little thing but like also always remember this world is very tiny all the museum people all the art galleries all the dealers everyone is friends we're all doing business with each other we're all working in the secondary market it doesn't matter if you're the top gallery or the bottom gallery everyone is working with each other on commissions so like as an artist if you try to fuck with me and like other dealers are my friends they're not gonna want to work with you because of what you do to me it's a great way to get black bald it's a great way to get black bald and like everyone is yeah we're all competing with each other to get like the best thing and like get the best artworks and be the best gallery but on some level like we have loyalty towards each other because we're supporting each other's market I'm buying works from their galleries to like send to my clients and they're buying works from my galleries to send to their clients so like we have a longer term relationship so like if an artist does that it's like very harmful to them so like that's some situation another situation is an artist like and this has happened too like you know a lot of artists start together and some become bigger than other artists and like if you start comparing yourself with the person who's done the best in your group and start pricing your artworks according to that like you're a fool because you don't have the same market as them so like if an artist tries to go and do that like that's a very good way to like not get your contracts renewed we'll be right back to the episode after this quick break this episode is also brought to you by Fightcamp they offer thousands of classes with new workouts added each week so you'll always find something new you can get a killer workout done in as little as 20 minutes and don't worry if you don't have any boxing experience because Fightcamp has your back they've created programs specifically designed to teach you the basics of boxing and kickboxing so you can build a strong foundation Fightcamp even comes with all the gear you need to start boxing from home including a freestanding punching bag boxing gloves quick hand wraps and smart punch trackers that provide real time data during your workout so head on over to joinfightcamp.com slash start up to storefront and get free shipping with your first order now back to the episode when you meet a new artist has it ever happened where you're blown away you're thinking so they're not signed yet and you're like this person's gonna blow up and I'm gonna help them and then you almost like an early NFT you're like I'm gonna buy 5, 10, 20 pieces I've done that, I've 100% done that I've had like sold out shows with these artists too so you're like creating a market there is something to go about this as art dealers we're going to art fairs every other month if not every month we're going to art shows every Thursday we are is that the day of the week that there are Thursdays as the show the day the art shows open globally that's the day so like I'm going for art shows every Thursday I'm going for private viewings I'm seeing the market I'm seeing a lot of artworks you guys like I see like hundreds of artworks with daily basis like fingers on the poles so like there's some sort of inclination to know what market is actually like doing well when I'm seeing an artwork that's like blowing me away there's definitely something to it I'm not saying that like I'm the be all and end all of like but like I have enough experience to like realize that there's something to it and there's something that can be done and like for us like if artists are signed with us if they're in a situation where they're unable to buy higher and art supplies the gallery would help them to do it and like there's always contracts where like we'll front them money and as the artwork sell we get reimbursed for the money that we are putting in them upfront there are situations where like we might loan them money to make a body of work there are situations where we'll commission artworks specifically for the gallery and we'll pay the artist upfront like again everything is situation based but like the best way to explain the art dealer or gallery and like an artist's relationship is they're both two halves of like the same pie symbiotic relationship how has the NFT movement changed things from in your world if at all in what you do specifically in terms of like galleries I am actually one of the largest female collectors of NFT in the United States I'm very bullish in it is it the same analysis you do is it the same like so instead of the artists you're looking for teams quite similar so with NFTs so first let me go into what I my perspective on NFTs is the art world has historically had really high barriers to entry so you might be the richest person and you still would not get preference to get like a particular artwork because that's not how the art world works we cater to our long standing collectors before brand new collectors just throwing in the money because in the primary market the prices are quite set we don't want to sell artworks for double of what it's actually worth because that hurts the artist market too so for a long time tech world which has a lot of money in there had to overcome these huge barriers of entry and start collecting from a lower level from like artists that they might not actually want but like to get into the galleries program to like get to a level where like they can buy the artworks that they want and there's always been that kind of aversion to selling to that clientele in the art world now the art world is very small it's very click we're all amongst each other and everything and that's how like it's historically worked and it's changing now and we're letting more people in but it's a slow change so what NFTs did was created a whole new genre of artworks that were dealing with the discrepancies within the art world like having an open leisure so everyone can see what it's like bought and sold for and the art world that's not typically how it's done like everything is done very hush hush like it's not very open for people to see so like NFTs you can see how much it's like bought and sold for and like you can track provenance all the way back to the first owner provenance is very important paper work to see like if the art artwork is even authentic or not the tech world created this whole new genre of art works that like they have accessibility to but not only them they've opened the accessibility to a whole new world that wouldn't usually be purchasing artworks because like they didn't know how to they didn't know if it was an asset and they very clearly stamped it as an asset which all artworks are assets but like it's hard to convince someone unless they know that they can make money off of it or there's a chance that they can make money off of it I think there's a phenomenal thing and a phenomenal new addition to like the art world the NFT artists also came up with making artworks which is called profile picture artworks that means several different editions of the same artwork which are each unique which was absolutely amazing because usually in the traditional art world those works are individually considered unique or if they're all the same they're all considered in addition so this was something new so like definitely I think the acceptance in the older generation of like the art world is lower but NFTs are here to stay they are here to stay it's like bitcoin in 2014 and 2015 like I mean people were buying it people knew it was going to become like an asset that was a whole crew of people that was buying it but it wasn't as widely as it is today so in 10 years NFTs are also going to be we'll see more real world benefits of NFTs I mean Web 3 will see more Web 3 companies coming out and Web 3 companies and like knowing a lot of people in banking I know like a lot of people in banking are trying to see what these Web 3 companies are doing and they're interested so like I think like in the next like 5 to 10 years NFTs and Web 3 companies is going to be a big part of the art world as well as a collector so from your perspective so let's call this like this is the beginning of this new art renaissance we're in this NFT tech enabled era like I'm very much holding everything I own I don't think there's a single I also do realistic development and so that concept for me is not crazy of holding for like a minimum of 2 to 5, 6 years like that's easy and so when I think about this time NFTs today are like very much representative of early new stuff and so to me I don't know why people are selling them but there's so many people flipping them well I mean at the end of the day everyone loves money it doesn't matter who you are but I think long term right like what is your stance on it do you flip and also hold or are you 99% of the time so you're holding but like can you explain to people why since you're in the art world and so you've seen well I mean like for example you're young like I'll give you an idea of like board a peat club right I mean I put into it very early earlier than most people and like I my NFTs and my apes and everything are worth a lot more money and like I would say like I've made millions of dollars of not profit of like perceived profit on paper like you know like it's not like I don't really know how much I've made but like I would believe if I sell them I would have made some kind of profit in them I'm holding them because I don't want to make a profit on them I want to see what their long-term benefits are like board a peat club just came up with like this whole metaverse thing which is cool I mean to us at a certain extent you have to buy NFTs because you're genuinely in it and you enjoy it I mean like a gamer like you know where's this gonna go what are they building? I mean it has to excite you if you're just doing it from the money perspective there's a lot of flippers and there's a lot of people that are doing it from the money perspective and like honestly that's good for me as a long-term holder of these things I like they're creating a market and they're pushing the prices up so the flippers are good for the market for me because that means more and more people are coming into the market to like make a quick dollar but at the same time like I'm always a long-term investor in everything I don't think of like short-term things and it's worked in my favor and I will sell things if I see like a NFT project that like has no backing to it so like even with like an NFT project there is a formula or basic principles to see if this is going to be like a long-run project or not What's your formula? Well the first thing is I always check the roadmap and what where the roadmap ends How big are they thinking? How long do they think they can accomplish these things in? I would say roadmap is the same thing as like a business plan for startup. If you're investing in the startup you're going to look at the business plan so if you're investing in an NFT don't be blind like look at the roadmap. Do you track it though? Do you track to see that they're actually hitting the points that they set out to do? So yeah I would be tracking to see if they're actually hitting the points that they set up I would track the developers and see what the developers are saying Are they doxxed? Are they not doxxed? Yeah like are they like talking about the project? Have they just gone silent after there's a lot of cash grab projects and NFTs which is definitely what I would like if there's a cash grab project like I would sell it like if there's a project that I don't actually believe in I would sell it so I'm but like if I believe in your project then I won't know the developers personally there's no way if I get an NFT for free that's gifted to me there's no way I'm selling it but like if there's I will buy and sell projects that are like quick money makers because like I mean at the end of the day I still have to like make sure that I'm recovering the money that I put in right but at least recovering the money that I put in I mean I think in the long term you'll obviously gain a lot for most of the projects not all of them another thing that like you need to look at is the volumes are the volumes high are a lot of people wanting to get into it what is the post launch marketing that they're doing what are the things that like are they giving free airdrops to you are the free airdrops worth anything are they planning to develop a gaming software or are they planning to incorporate the NFT as a pass to a concert or like give people some real-world experiences like what are they doing to actually make money within like their own ecosystem are you within the art world that you're in are you someone who's like crazy in terms of NFTs like are you would you say you're an early adopter and everyone else is skeptical or would you say most of the people understand it because they're in the art market I was an early adapter I've been in it for almost two years now so I was an early adapter I still think we are in the early adapter stage so it's not too late to get yourself immersed in it like it's the same thing if you wait for if you waited for bitcoin to get to $30,000 to buy it I mean you were making a lot less money than the people who got in it for at a thousand dollars or like a hundred dollars so like I mean there's definitely a risk factor to it but there's a risk factor to everything and like in finance high risk high return so like you have to like be a smart investor and look at your position and make sure that your portfolio of artworks is some that are safe and some that are higher risk and some that are medium risk like that's on you personally as a collector of how risk a verse you are and how safe you want to be that's like the general theory right like if you don't risk it like you're not going to get the biscuit on the other side you have master works right which is like fractionalized but original arts yeah fractionalized original art honestly I am not a big user of it a lot of people are and the reason I'm not a big user of it is very simply frankly I can buy emerging artists myself and I own the whole artwork I would rather have something that I can put in my wall rather than like say that I own a percentage of an artwork at some point somewhere and that's just me personally now it's a filling yeah I mean but like there's a lot of just finance based investors too like just like stocks like I mean if I buy a stock of Apple that doesn't mean I actually own Apple but like I mean as an investor that would make sense for me to do it so there's a lot of people that are doing that too to be a bit diplomatic if you would say but like there's a lot of people that are doing that too that like are just in it for like the prices to go up I mean if you bought an Andy Warhol on Masterworks and like now like the 195 million Andy Warhol sold naturally your token is going to be worth more today and you can sell it and make some money so like no judgment to people who are doing that for sure but like me personally I'm not very into it so I can't really give you the logistics or walk through the statistics of like how to like navigate that world yeah well one of the things while we're on the subject of NFTs I've always been fascinated by the ability of NFTs to kind of level the playing field in terms of what artists can make after the initial sale of their piece so as an example I just listened to a story about this artist who his friend was a collector and so his friend really liked his work wanted to purchase some of it so he purchased one piece for let's say $50,000 and then a couple years later he ended up selling it for like $1,000,000, $3,000,000 like an incredible escalation of price and that sale right there broke their friendship because the artist felt like his friend had robbed him of profits where his friend felt that the artist should thank him for boosting the value of his work and what I think the potential of NFTs to do and I'm curious to hear your perspective on this the potential of NFTs is that you could theoretically have a problem where the artist will get a percentage of every sale going forward well so in this case the artist was stupid because NFTs are a smart contract and you can put in a resale royalty in it and most artists do put in a resale royalty in it so like technically he should have gotten a percentage of the resale royalty well this was before NFTs yeah this was a regular art sale so if this is a regular art sale again now this is something I don't know when this artist did this or whatever but this has been an ongoing problem in the art world since the 70s so like Rauschenberg back in the first auction that he was in he sold his works for hundreds of dollars and they went for several hundreds of thousands of dollars and he made a huge he threw a huge fit and he was like I didn't get any money of this hundreds of thousands of dollars but like it was the exact same thing you said and the collector was like I made your market like I don't care if you didn't make money from this piece but you're going to make money from future pieces and going back to what I said like NFTs are solving certain principles in the art world that you couldn't actually fully do it I mean you can't you don't know if an artwork is selling privately the artist will never know even if there's a contract of getting royalty from it the artist can not like there's a good chance that the artist will never know if a collector sells it to another collector so like the collector is not going to give you any extra money on the other hand as well like music NFTs are revolutionary right now I mean Snoop Dogg it's something that like is changing the music world very fast like sound XYZ he's crazy he's so at the forefront he's I mean it's like bananas aside from him being one of my favorite artists I like love you Snoop if you're listening to this but like I do think like he is a revolutionary 100% especially right now I bought into an NFT project on the Cardano blockchain and then Snoop so I bought in and then like maybe three weeks later Snoop announced this huge partnership with this project it's called The Claymates and I was like holy shit I mean that's it and now you see all the prices going up they're building a it's called Baked Nation they're building this metaverse with Snoop I mean like think about this right the music industry like the labels take a good chunk of like what you're trying to what like you deserve like if you're an artist like labels are betting on hundreds and thousands of artists on an every single day basis I personally know music managers that are not like focusing on a lot of artists they're like kind they're focusing on their main artists but like they're like taking a bet like if one of them like blows up my mistake they make a lot of money out of it I mean for established and non-established artists like if you're buying a Kanye album like you don't care who's the person promoting it like you're buying it because you want to hear Kanye's music and like that's what he did last time and like did it on his own platform and he made a lot more money than he would have if he was like going through a record label and the same thing with like Snoop like with like his NFT sound XYZ NFT that he took out like he made so much money but like he deserved it like at that point the labels aren't really giving these artists too many things they're not giving the artists a lot of support yeah if you're a mid-curry artist and just starting up and like yeah you're getting support yeah they're boosting your sales but after a certain point they're like basically just taking advantage advantage of you and like the resell contracts I'm definitely going to be blacklisted from like the music industry after this like it's great because like I think I think it's time for like the labels to get into the NFT industry and like work with the artist so then the artist can get their resale royalties and like hire resale royalties and stuff like that as well like I mean otherwise these very popular artists are free to just like take out like their own NFTs and like have actually and like now people are selling the NFTs as if like you actually own a couple of seconds of the song so if the couple of seconds of the song is used at like an advertisement you're actually making money it's like the same thing as like franchising a song like I'm thinking about doing a project where it is a part of me that really wants to in another part that doesn't but it's basically this concept where like we built the brewery and so we own the building and on the outside of the building it's like obviously great for art and so there's all these street artists I know that have never understood the concept of making NFTs but they have like a lot of cred but in the street art game like their legends in the street art game which for the sake of markets let's call it a niche market but they don't know anything about wallets or anything about like web 3 and so there's this bridge we have to build with them and then the concept is we have them do this huge I mean huge like way bigger maybe like three of these in terms of size and then every quarter we change it when they're done we take pictures of the NFT we sell them and then we invite new artists on a quarterly basis to basically create new arts and we just have lists like it allows more people to come it it's like a gallery in the sense of but we're but it's a real life it's like real estate and so but I don't know what do you think what are your thoughts I think it's a good idea like again we're so new in the web free space anything that you try right now even if it fails it's like it's worth it to go and try it just in case like you never know what's going to blow up and like in a market that's so early stage like it's worth it taking a chance for me it's just like fun you know it's like we have new technology let's try it let's get it is and the thought of like so like my life today is I can put my energy into things that I know will work I want to do that like that's high yield and so then it's like to do something that it's not I don't care about failing I'll be wrong none of that bothers me but it's to put energy into something that I know might never work because it's so early is like do I really want to be it's almost like a dumb business decision you see what I'm saying I yeah because I and the odds of it hitting are let's call it monumentally low so I don't even think about the hitting I just go eh I mean you know the odds of any new startup hitting right zero is very monumentally low yeah so like I mean I just think it's good for the like a part of me just feel like this is good for the artists it's it's a new way for them to get exposure it's a potential revenue maker for them if we do it correctly and if they understand like we should market this let's mark I agree with that but like also something that like comes up in mind that I've been discussing a lot in the past few days with my artists is that most artists have terrible finance management yeah terrible I obviously try to help my artists to like figure them I like tell them or whatever but like and like try to like tell them how to deal with their finances but I've seen like artists make $5,000 and then they'll go spend $5,000 and I'm like why like why not like save or anything so like that's something of like that also needs to be like added to the art world and I'm actually thinking of like starting a division for that separately within the gallery because it's not that much money for me to like make but like I feel terrible about these artists I mean these are I know artists that have made hundreds of thousands of dollars with me in the last year that are like absolutely broke right now and I'm like how how do you spend that much money in a year because you're going to buy a freaking Bottega Veneta pants and Balenciaga jackets like dude like see your situation save and like go buy a house if anything like if you've bought a house and you're in a position that like you know you're like yeah I got like I'm struggling to keep up with the payments it's okay you bought an asset but if you're going and buying a depreciating asset to look cool like artists really like this is a PSA for everyone like please please please when you're making money save money and like look at your future this is your business keep money aside for your business so like if there ever is a rainy day I mean we're talking about recession coming in the next couple of months or like soon in a recession typically the artists that are established do really well because more people want to invest in like the art world it's a safer bet but like for the emerging artists that's a very hard world because no one wants to take a chance or like it's harder to take a chance in a market that's like so volatile like that so like it's important for artists to keep some money away like it's smart finance management buy assets that are going up in value invest in crypto invest in stocks invest in like gold invest in silver invest in bonds invest in anything that can like that's going to hold value but like do not be an idiot and like spend I'm not saying don't go buy these things I mean I understand you need like a lifestyle live your life and like live your life but like live your life where it's in a way where it's smart to live your life yeah like don't like go and spend everything on like something that's not going to give you a yield let's do some hot takes as we finish what are your favorite NFT projects today that you're looking at? Board AP Art Club is my absolutely favorite NFT project another one that I really love is Inbetweeners by Gian Perro another one that I really really am bullish on is Proof Collective and Moonbirds those three are probably coming to my mind as like the top three NFT projects I'm very excited to see in the NFT world what the fashion NFT world comes up with I've been hearing a lot of echoes there's things that have come out but like nothing has like come out that's like crazy revolutionary right now so that's what's like exciting me and like music NFTs have you ever met Banksy? No. Has anyone ever met Banksy? Does anyone know what he looks like? Yes. People have met him Banksy had a show in LA years years years ago where he was selling artworks and prints for two three hundred dollars and there was an elephant at the show it was a huge show and people have met him but he's from my understanding a lot older than me so I haven't like come across him at least knowingly in the art world I do sell a lot of Banksy works. Does he work with dealers or no? He does. He does so he has a team. There's a huge secondary market for Banksy works so like most of the sales I would say right now is done through the secondary market dealers now. Yeah the Sotheby's thing was I mean definitely planned I can't imagine that was an accident. Oh he planned that I mean. No I know he planned it I mean like but as a whole. You think Sotheby's are just skyrocketing. Yeah of course that's the coolest thing that ever happened. It was a cool event it was a really really cool event but he also doesn't work with dealers like when he was selling paintings out of Central Park for like ten bucks each and then the next day posted about it. He's not represented by anyone particular but he works with a lot of dealers. Seems like it would go against his mantra to be represented in like a binding contract. That's the beauty of what he's trying to create. I mean like his authentication body is best control and they do a phenomenal job in like tracking the artworks working with dealers like I feel no resistance into like if I'm selling an artwork to a client just emailing them and telling them who the client is and who the artwork is going to because they're so easy to deal with. Banksy is like an amazing artist anyways he's a revolutionary in the British art market like I think Damien Hearst and like Banksy are the people that like completely move the art market into like Damien Hearst did it for the contemporary arts in the UK and like UK obviously and like Paris and Europe in general has a longstanding reputation for being very immersed in culture and art. But like they got it out of like those traditional artworks into like something more contemporary and then Banksy took it further and took street art in UK into like a realm that's like considered like very pristine and sought after. What's next for you personally? We have an NFT project that's coming out called Shama Shorties. When is it coming? When does it drop? Well, so we haven't decided a final drop date. Can we get on the white list? You can get on the white list. Yes, you can get on the white list. The whole team we'll buy. Yeah, the whole team What are you selling? Do you know your price yet for your initial? You'll know week before we come up. Are you doing a discord all that? We're marketing. We just had like a Forbes article that was written about it. So like if you google it you could like find all the information there. It's called Shama Shorties. So that's coming up. We have shows at the gallery with artists like every other month. Okay, so this is like a real life utility you get to see the art in person. Love it. Who's on the team? You have an artist Yeah, we have an artist called Lindsay Dawn on the team and she is very, very popular. Everyone from like Russ Westbrook to LeBron to like Kylie Jenner LA based. Is she LA based? Oh, she is LA based, yes. And you have Dev? Yeah, we have a Dev. The cool thing about this is it's actually female lead, which is a very small percentage of the NFT world. And then on top of that we are also at 50% sales of the project. We are going to be donating money to certain anti-trafficking charities around the world. So like it's utility based. You get and like with this NFT you'll read about it. You get a percentage off depending on rarity of the NFT to buy like real world artworks from our gallery and like prints and everything. Oh, look at that. That's what's up. It's kind of cool. You'll get like exclusive streetwear that like the artist is designed and like cool like things like that. So that's like a project that's coming up and after that we're going to be having, we're going to be in Art Hamptons. We're going to be doing in August and then we're doing an all-female show group show with a lot of very cool artists in August. So we have shows every couple of months at the galleries. How can people get on your email list or your newsletter? You could just go to Arushi Kapoor.com and like put your name in and you get on like the email list automatically or at Arushi Gallery on Instagram or you could follow me on Instagram and I usually respond to as many people as I physically can. The gallery is a better bet because like people are responding there too but like if you ever want to reach me directly like you can find, you can email me. I usually respond to emails within like a week. I love it. Right on. Thank you for coming on the podcast. Well thank you for having me. I had like a blast like talking to you guys. Yeah, pleasure. That was our conversation with Arushi Kapoor. If you enjoyed this episode don't keep it to yourself. Share it around. Recently we started putting out a bi-monthly newsletter. In the newsletter we highlight certain moments in our podcast episodes that you may have missed along with little tidbits of behind the scenes information about the recording. You can find the newsletter and sign up for it at our website www.startupstorefront.com Another way you can support the show is to leave us a review wherever you listen to podcasts. We are found at Startup Storefront on every social media platform except for Twitter where we are found at STS Podcast LA. The team consists of Diego Torres Palma Natalia Capolini, Lexi Jamison Owen Capolini, and me, Nick Conrad. Our music is by DoubleTouch. Thank you for listening and we'll see you next time.