What?

Charles Saatchi recently purchased an entire exhibition from an art student. "James Howard, a student at the Royal Academy Schools, was shocked to discover yesterday that Britain’s most influential collector of contemporary art wanted 46 of his – an entire graduation show. Howard, 26, one of 19 students who have just completed the RA Schools’ postgraduate course, was fast asleep when Mr Saatchi popped into the academy last week.

The young artist found out later that his digital prints – each one a collage of photographic images made up to look like a typical internet advertisement – had caught the collector’s eye."

I have more than a sneaking feeling that as Clement Greenberg helped define the modern era through his writing and collecting, so Charles Saatchi will help define the post-modern era through his collecting of art. Wait and see. Indeed, he already is.

What do I mean by 'Saatchi as an Institution'?

Following the definitions of the word 'Institution' from dictionary.com (below) it is easier to explain my meaning.

Definition no.1
Saatchi has established a sort of foundation devoted to the promotion of a particular cause, esp. public and educational - that of the growth and popularization of conceptual art.

Definition no.2
He has also devoted a building and a website (which feels a bit more like an online world) to this.

Definition no.6
Saatchi is definitely an 'established person' whose name is associated with the patronage and promotion of conceptual art. He is seen as the catalyst for the sudden explosion of leading conceptual artists such as Sarah Lucas, Tracey Emin, the Chapman brothers, Damien Hirst etc. and all who followed on a similar path.

What is an Institution?

1.	an organization, establishment, foundation, society, or the like, devoted to the promotion of a particular cause or program, esp. one of a public, educational, or charitable character: This college is the best institution of its kind.

2.	the building devoted to such work.

3.	a public or private place for the care or confinement of inmates, esp. mental patients or other disabled or handicapped persons.

4.	Sociology. a well-established and structured pattern of behavior or of relationships that is accepted as a fundamental part of a culture, as marriage: the institution of the family.

5.	any established law, custom, etc.

6.	any familiar, long-established person, thing, or practice; fixture.

7.	the act of instituting or setting up; establishment: the institution of laws.

8.	Ecclesiastical. a. the origination of the Eucharist, and enactment of its observance, by Christ. b. the investment of a member of the clergy with a spiritual charge. *Taken from Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Saatchi

He certainly wouldn't be the first business man to not only get in involved in the art scene, but to change it forever. Patronage like his opens up the door for a world of art which might only be able to survive given the attention and funding he brings to it. Saatchi has become not only a medium under which conceptual art thrives, he can also be viewed as high emperor of the art world - dictating like the moon does the tides of the sea. It would appear he has the Midas touch, even though he's found many enemies along the way.
His recent attention on Chinese art has led the entire world to look east, and who knows what might come of it?
His website has opened up possibilities for many young artists to gain recognition, even though artists have been exhibiting their works online since the internet became readily available, the tendency is to look no further than what's under the Saatchi name. It's truly awe-inspiring to see the sheer numbers of artists buzzing around under him and all he stands for, hoping to be noticed by him or someone like him and flung head first into the limelight.

Saatchi Online Magazine Latest News

January 2008: The Saatchi Online Gallery will be representing two of Julie Bennett’s paintings ‘Karie’ (left) and ‘Jo-Lan’ (right) at FORM, a London Art Fair. The Saatchi Online Gallery will be hosting an exhibition of 20 London-based artists who have been chosen from Saatchi Online magazine's Critic's Choice. FORM - 28 February - 2 March 2008 at Olympia National Hall, Hammersmith Rd, London W14 8UX.

Saatchi and Clare mix social networking and shopping

Lord Saatchi has joined forces with the former chief executive of Dixons John Clare and the web business expert Michael de Kare- Silver to set up MyFaveShop. com, a site that claims to unite the two main internet trends of the moment: shopping and social networking.

The site, to be launched in the summer, will allow shoppers to design their own store, choose the products that fill it, and then invite friends and family to shop there, while also posting reviews, comments and tips.

Brands and retailers, meanwhile, will pay a monthly rent for each shop whose virtual shelves they appear on, as well as commissions on subsequent sales.

Mr Clare said he hopes the site will revolutionise a "very functional" existing online shopping market. "For the first time, online shoppers will be able to create their own favourite shop with all their favourite shops in it. In the real world you can't do that. That's why it will be the ultimate shop - the future of online shopping."

The project's backers are targeting 500,000 unique visitors per month in the first year, rising to 5 million by the third. Lord Saatchi explained why he believes they are on to a winning formula. "What brands want most is repeat business from loyal customers. In the internet world, that means being added to someone's favourites. MyFaveShop will give advertisers the opportunity to be considered when someone is building their favourite shop."

According to a survey carried out by Foviance Research, 69 per cent of people spend more than 30 minutes a day on their favourite sites, where they are 65 per cent more likely to spend more money than anywhere else. On top of that, net shopping in the UK is booming, with sales rising 54 per cent in 2007 to 46.6bn.

As brand expert Jonathan Gabay pointed out yesterday: "Amazon has launched WebStore, which charges brands $60 [30] a month and 7 per cent commission for selling on its site. For Saatchi and co to move clear of the pack, they'll have to give people the chance to order products custom-made to their own tastes."

From The Independent (London), February 15, 2008 by Daniel Igra

YBA's and Saatchi

One of the visitors to Freeze was Charles Saatchi, a major contemporary art collector and co-founder of Saatchi and Saatchi, the London advertising agency. Saatchi then visited Gambler in a green Rolls Royce and, according to Freedman, stood open-mouthed with astonishment in front of (and then bought) Hirst's first major "animal" installation, A Thousand Years, consisting of a large glass case containing maggots and flies feeding off a rotting cow's head. (The installation was later a notable feature of the Sensation exhibition.)

Saatchi became not only Hirst's main collector, but also the main sponsor for other YBAs–a fact openly acknowledged by Gavin Turk. The contemporary art market in London had dramatically collapsed in mid-1990 due to a major economic recession, and many commercial contemporary galleries had gone out of business. Saatchi had until this time collected mostly American and German contemporary art, some by young artists, but most by already established ones.

His collection was publicly exhibited in a series of shows in a large converted factory building in St John's Wood, north London. Previous Saatchi Gallery shows had included such major figures as Warhol, Guston, Alex Katz, Serra, Kiefer, Polke, Richter and many more. Now Saatchi turned his attention to the new breed of Young British Artists. There was much concern when Saatchi divested himself of some of his earlier collection, since it had a significant downward effect on the value of some of the artists whose works he sold.

Saatchi invented the name "Young British Artists" for a series of shows called by it, starting in 1992, when a noted exhibit was Damien Hirst's "shark" (The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living). In addition to (and as a direct result of) Saatchi's patronage, the Young British Artists benefited from intense media coverage. This was augmented by controversy surrounding the annual Turner Prize, (one of Britain's few major awards for contemporary artists), which had several of the artists as nominees or winners. Channel 4 had become a sponsor of the competition, leading to television profiles of the artists in prime-time slots.

The Young British Artists re-vitalised (and in some cases spawned) a whole new generation of contemporary commercial galleries such as Karsten Schubert, Sadie Coles, Victoria Miro, Maureen Paley's Interim Art, Jay Jopling's White Cube, and Antony Wilkinson Gallery. The spread of interest improved the market for contemporary British art magazines through increased advertising and circulation. Frieze launched in 1991 embraced the YBAs from the start while established publications such as Art Monthly, Art Review, Modern Painters and Contemporary Art were all re-launched with more focus on emerging British Artists. The British art establishment was solidly validating the pre-eminence of the YBAs. Hirst had become an internationally recognised major artist, with shows in Europe and the USA.