HOWZAT

The art-buying frenzy swirls on all morning. Upstairs, Nick Serota is participating in a round-table discussion about the future of the museum. In an adjoining warehouse, Sam Keller, director of Art Basel, is giving a press conference to announce his departure after nine years of running the fair, to become director of the Bayeler Foundation. René Kamm, Keller’s boss, sums up the appeal of contemporary art. “Art is the ultimate in luxury consumer goods. It is sophisticated. It needs education, information and reflection. People who already have the watches, cars, yachts and jets move on to art. That is the top of the tree.”

Well, it probably is when a Damien Hirst diamond-studded skull can fetch £50 million. Prices at the fair aren’t quite that high. There’s a Rothko for $4.85 million (£2.4 million), a Giacometti for $7.8 million (£3.9 million). Then there is William Hunt’s installation, Put Your Foot Down. It is a black 3 Series BMW, completely filled with water. The water is murky, and the sunroof is open. Each day at set times Hunt walks out into the gallery wearing black jeans and a black shirt and climbs into the car through the roof. He sits down under water in the driver’s seat and, using an oxygen supply and microphone inside the car, sings a song which is broadcast, with bubbles, to the surrounding crowd. People giggle. Some walk away. A cheer goes up when Hunt finishes, clambers out and walks away, as water gushes on to the floor. This art work costs £60,000. Apparently if you want performances from Hunt, this can be arranged – but you have to pay more.

Eli Broad, a property billionaire and very big fish for the dealers at Art Basel, won’t be spending his money on that. He has just announced a $60 million (£30 million) donation to build the Broad Contemporary Art Museum in Los Angeles. Into his museum will go some of the 1,800 artworks that he has been collecting for the past 34 years. “I want my collection to be a kind of lending library of art works. I have Richard Serras, Jasper Johns, Warhols, Basquiats, and the biggest collection of Cindy Shermans anywhere. I’ve got seven Damien Hirsts. I’ve bought a Jeff Wall at the fair today. It’s definitely an addiction, but I’m not worried about it.”

For some, the appeal of collecting is found in just this international social whirl of fairs, gallery dinners and parties, and the opportunity for one-upmanship. For others, it is a business venture, and a chance to meet and engage with artists working in a completely different world from their own. For a serious few, collecting becomes a lifelong endeavour, an obsession. But with price records for modern art being broken at auction virtually every week, prices are inevitably on people’s lips, and “money can overshadow the art,” agrees Keller. “If you stand in front of a masterpiece and all you can say is ‘It’s worth x’, then that is a shame. But there will always be art lovers, and many artists make a good living.”

By mid-afternoon, the second preview, for lesser VIPs, is rolling on, large sums of money are being handed over, and a man is walking around swigging from a bottle of champagne. The gallery teams cannot be seen to flag for a minute. At 5pm, the vernissage opens and the really loud outfits walk in: the leopard-print dresses, the stratospheric heels, the wide suits. But by the following morning, the serious players have done their business, attended the key parties, recovered from their hangovers and are taxiing their jets on to the runways of Basel airport.

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