How to Start an Art Collection Without Knowing Everything About Art

You walk into a gallery and something happens.

One painting catches you from across the room.

You look at it. Walk away. Look at three other paintings. Somehow you end up standing in front of the first one again.

Congratulations. You may have just encountered the beginning of an art collection.

You Do Not Need to Become an Expert First

One of the great myths about collecting art is that knowledge must come before ownership.

Usually the opposite happens.

You buy something because it speaks to you. Then curiosity begins. You learn about the artist, the medium, the movement, the gallery and other artists working in similar territory.

Your first purchase becomes an education.

Start by Looking

Before worrying about investment value or which artist is supposedly “important,” see as much artwork as possible.

Visit galleries. Walk through museums. Attend openings. Visit art fairs. Follow artists online.

Pay attention to what repeatedly stops you.

Perhaps you gravitate toward landscapes with enormous skies. Perhaps abstraction begins making more sense after the twentieth painting. Maybe you discover that you love small, intimate paintings far more than dramatic statement pieces.

Patterns emerge surprisingly quickly.

Establish a Comfortable Budget

A collection does not need to begin with a five-figure painting.

Original drawings, plein-air studies, works on paper and smaller paintings can offer an accessible entry into an artist’s work.

Set an amount you can spend comfortably and then look for the strongest work available within it.

Buying one excellent $800 painting generally produces more satisfaction than filling a wall with eight things you never really loved.

Ask Questions

Ask the gallery or artist about the work.

When was it created? Is it part of a larger series? Where has the artist exhibited? What materials were used? Is the work framed? Are there care considerations?

Good galleries welcome thoughtful questions.

Then Trust Your Eye

There is one question we especially like:

Would I still want to look at this ten years from now?

Art will live with you through different furniture, different houses and different chapters of life.

Choose something capable of surviving all three. 

Your collection does not need to impress anyone else.

It needs to become yours.