Why Artists Need Dealers
- 1 day ago
- 5 min read
Updated: 25 minutes ago
People sometimes ask me whether artists really still need go-betweens like me. After all, in a world of social media and direct sales, it can often seem as though everything could probably happen without intermediaries. But, after a lifetime spent working closely with the artists whose work The Tolman Collection handles, I’ve come to believe strongly that supportive art dealers play a very real, and very human, role in the wonderful world of art.
I grew up in an art obsessed family where relationships with our artists were not purely transactional. They were personal, long-term, and trust was built slowly, often over many years. If no grain of friendship developed from the initial relationship, then my parents didn’t represent the artist, no matter how wonderful the work. This was certainly a luxury, but also about integrity (and truly enjoying what they did for 16 hours a day.)
The Tolman Collection wasn’t created just to sell art, though obviously that was (and is) my family’s livelihood. My parents were fanatical about contemporary Japanese art and felt strongly that their role was to support their artists, to stand beside them, and to promote them by helping to carry their work into the world in a way that felt thoughtful and sustainable.
Over the years, that belief took a very concrete form. My mom made countless dinners for our hungry young artists who were just getting started. My parents worked tirelessly to find creative ways of introducing these amazing artists to a a larger, more international stage. My dad traveled constantly to share the artists' works with new audiences. The Tolman Collection worked with some of our artists in exclusive relationships, paying them a monthly salary. We mostly buy entire editions in order to better support the artists financially. The original idea for all this was simple: if we could take some of the financial pressure away, our artists could devote themselves fully to making the work they creatively needed to make with no distractions or compromises. And, yes, not being a philanthropic organization, we therefore have the absolute best of their work available for our clients.
Having these close personal relationships has been an extraordinarily fulfilling way to work. As a second-generation dealer, art thus became not just about promotion and sales, but somehow a bit of a shared project. I am invested, not just in the outcome, but in the entire process. I see the experiments that never leave the studio, the ideas that took years to mature, the stretches when nothing seems to work and then, suddenly, when something does.
Making art is obviously a solitary thing. But even the most confident artists spend long stretches alone in their studios, wrestling with ideas, materials, and doubt. I offer not just exposure and sales, but a form of companionship during that process. I look closely, I listen, I encourage, I believe in The Tolman Collection’s artists’ work even during those more uncertain periods when they don't believe in themselves. I help decide when something is ready to be shown, and sometimes, just as importantly, when it is not. I believe that my role as a dealer is to be the honest mirror that reflects an artist’s work back at them and demands the best.
I also create context, especially through the educational way in which I show the limited edition prints for which The Tolman Collection is known. A work on paper doesn’t exist in isolation. It occupies space among other works, other voices, other conversations. Part of my job is to help place my artists’ work in a broader story, to show how they relate to what came before and what is happening now, and to present the art in a way that allows it to be seen clearly and seriously.
There is also a very practical side to the artist/dealer relationship. Most artists want to spend their time making creative work, not promoting themselves or scheduling interviews, or figuring out how and where to sell their art and pay their bills, or answering emails from galleries and museums, arranging shipping for shows, negotiating special projects, or worrying about how and where their work will be received in different parts of the world. Art dealers like me become the protective bridge between the studio and the public, between the artist and the collector, between one country and another.
As with artists, for collectors, a dealer is also a relationship of trust. When someone buys a work through The Tolman Collection, they are not just buying a pretty piece of paper that sometimes they could also buy elsewhere. They are participating in an existing relationship: not just buying into artistic tradition, or a small piece of the story of an artist’s life and work, but also the history of my family’s many years of commitment to that artist. The Tolman Collection stands behind the work we sell, not just at the moment of sale, but for decades before its creation, and for long after it leaves the gallery for its new home with you.
I know that my artists don’t need me as their dealer because they can’t survive without me, but ours is a symbiotic relationship. I exist so that the talented Tolman Collection artists can concentrate on what they do best while the gallery staff and I handle the rest. My artists need me because I believe in their talent and accomplishments more than anyone else does. Their creativity thrives because my care of their artistic excellence supports their belief in themselves and my sales record allows them to continue to create the beautiful work for which the Tolman Collection has made them known.
