A hybrid documentary about the value of art

Some artworks reside in a dark vault. Others are burned. And art that everyone seems to be talking about, often does not exist in the physical world. Better Than Gold playfully examines how absent art can stil I be tangible and how destruction opens the door to a new world.

A lot of artworks by famous artists s are nowadays stored in high-security, climate-sensitive vaults. Once in storage, you can use art as a warranty, which makes investing in art even more interesting than investing in gold.

Better Than Gold investigates the consequences of this new reality on the valuation and the essence of art, by using the ultimate silent witness: a work of art.

Better than Gold is developed together with Christoph Rausch, associate professor at the Maastricht University Centre for Arts and Culture, Conservation and Heritage (MACCH). Rausch studies the global relations between art and finance in the 21st century.  In Better than Gold: Art in Storage and the Making of Financial Value Rausch currently finalizes the manuscript of a monograph describing the emergence and proliferation of novel types of art storage spaces, including so-called freeports. He asks how an increasing financialization of art in and through storage problematizes public and private relations of ownership and display, speculation and risk, as well as regulation and taxation.