Seven Days in the Art World: Chapter Six

• "While Blum may be a generic leading man, Poe resembles the Dude as played by Jeff Bridges in The Big Lebowski."
• "'When people think of artists' studios, they imagine Jackson Pollock dancing around a canvas,' says Poe grumpily from under his beige baseball cap. 'Dealers are editors and conspirators. We help determine what gets shown and how it gets shown, and we help put art in production.' Poe turns around and looks at Blum, then at me. 'At the end of the day, our business is to sell symptoms articulated as objects,' he declares. 'I like to think that I have a more honest relationship with our artists than some other dealers, but I don't want to be anyone's shrink.'"
• " A total of eighty-five canvases were on the way to becoming what Murakami casually calls "big-face flowers" but are officially titled Flowers of Joy. Gagosian Gallery sold the fifty on display in its May 2007 show for $90,000 apiece. (The official price was $100,000, but everyone who's anyone gets a 10 percent discount.)
• "I don't really want to work in a company, but I have big desire for making many pieces."
• "I don'y know how to operate Illustrator, but I will say 'yes, yes, yes, no, no, no' when I check the work"
• "Kanye was a big fan of my big breast sculpture."