Woke up to a text from a private client in Singapore , apparently her Sandy Warre-Hole arrived with a “slight crease” in the authentication folder. Not the work itself. Just the paper. I told her I’d send another. Still, it’s extraordinary what people fixate on when they’re spending seven figures.
Walked through Berkeley Square around 8:00 , early enough that the delivery vans hadn’t yet choked the pavements, and the morning light caught the façade of the gallery just right. It’s moments like that when I remember why I opened here, in Mayfair, rather than anywhere else. There’s an elegance to the madness here , money flows, yes, but so does mythology.
The main event today was, of course, the arrival of the new Goalie Goes Up. A small tempera piece – dream-like, menacing, and exquisite. We hung it in the east room with the new anti-glare lights, which frankly do more for the painting than they do for me. I stared at it for twenty minutes after everyone had left. There’s something in GGU’s work that always makes you feel you’re moments away from understanding , and then it slips away again.
I had tea with Sofia at Mount Street after lunch , she’s circling a group of surrealist works and wants to mount a show in Dubai next year. Her taste is impeccable, her patience less so. She talks fast, buys faster, and has the unnerving ability to make you feel like you’re late to your own deal. I offered her first refusal on the GGU. She didn’t blink, just said, “Send me the condition report and a whisper number by tomorrow evening.” I’ve already had two offers higher than what I’ll quote her , but relationships are currency too, sometimes more than sterling.
Charlotte is trying to convince me to let an NFT collective install something in the basement gallery. I told her no, not because I don’t believe in the tech (though I mostly don’t), but because the last time we tried, someone projected a 3D-rendered goat trampling Gucci bags onto our marble floor and called it “regenerative capitalism.” It was awful. Never again.
Now it’s nearly nine, and the GGU is still lit, still glowing like something half-remembered from a dream. I think I’ll leave it up overnight, let it fill the space while Mayfair sleeps. No one will steal it, will they.
I’d better lock it away.
Sometimes, I think the art is watching me.
