By Sophia Lennox
Elm Staff Writer
Fine art has a reputation for being incredibly expensive and inaccessible to the average person, according to NPR. Auction and private sales frequently make the news as works from famous artists sell for increasingly exorbitant prices.
In 2022, Vincent Van Gogh’s painting “Verger avec cyprès” sold for a record breaking $177,180,000, according to Christie’s Auction House. That same night, Paul Cézanne’s “La Montagne Sainte-Victoire” sold for $137,790,000, and Georges Seraut’s “Les Poseuses Ensemble (petite version)” sold for $149,240,000.
According to The Art Newspaper, these three works, and more, belonged to Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen. These pieces were a fraction of his private collection and amassed more than $1.6 billion dollars in two nights of auctions.
These auction house prices reflect the extreme end of art ownership, but even at a smaller level with local and community galleries, original paintings and sculptures can sell for hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Average households do not always have the budget to afford original artwork.
A common way for individuals to own art is to buy prints and posters, which are more affordable due to their mass-produced nature. Countless articles cite prints as one of the best ways to affordably decorate your walls. ARTNews suggests stores such as Gagosian Shop, Karma Bookstore, and White Columns Editions and Publications.
However, there is another way to own original art that supports both local and independent artists and fits comfortably into most individual budgets: art vending machines.
At one point, cigarette vending machines were scattered all over the United States. Although they declined in popularity, they were outright banned in 2010 due to the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, according to the National Institute of Health. Afterward, the decommissioned machines sat untouched.
To increase the general public’s consumption of art, reuse abandoned cigarette machines, and support local artists, artist Clark Whittington invented the Art-O-Mat. Whittington transformed the old machines with fresh, colorful paint and used empty cigarette boxes to package mini artworks.
Each slot in the Art-O-Mat machine is assigned to a different artist, who can fill empty cigarette-shaped boxes with one piece of handmade and one-of-a-kind art.
The work ranges from miniature watercolor paintings, earrings, small notebooks, mini stuffed animals, lino prints, batik cloths, and many more niche art forms. Each box is five dollars and is a complete mystery to the buyer aside from the general topic, according to their website.
Art-O-Mat has locations across the country in museums, grocery stores, churches, airports, hotels, colleges, farmers markets, and a variety of locations that the public interacts with in their daily life.
The five-dollar price point makes the art exceedingly more affordable than auction houses, and individuals could potentially purchase a few pieces and still be within their budget.
In addition to their goal of providing a space for the average person to engage with the art world, Art-O-Mat supports independent artists who can be paid to send in pre-filled boxes and have their work represented across the country, according to their website.
The organization also also sells “Art-O-Cartons,” which include five machine boxes for people who cannot access an Art-O-Mat near them.
There are over 200 machines nationwide, with the closest Art-O-Mat machines to Washington College are at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Aloft Philadelphia Downtown in Philadelphia, Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington D.C., and the Nerd Mall in Woodbury NJ.
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Photo Caption: Art vending machines can be found locally, including in and around Washington D.C.