Given words : Building an Oral History Archive of the Art Market in France

“Given Words/ Paroles données” is a project that aims at creating an oral archive of art dealers. Oral interviews, recorded, transcribed and indexed, will be compiled and deposited at the Institut national d’histoire de l’art. These interviews will capture living memories and provide a new, valuable resource for researchers interested in the recent history of the art market. The information collected will cover market mechanisms, the evolution of taste and trends, careers within the art market, as well as the impact of significant events and social phenomena on the trajectories of artworks.

The purpose of creating this archive is to document expertise and experience of dealers in order to develop a detailed understanding of the mechanisms involved in the creation of value for artworks and, more generally, the role of the market in the development of art history as a discipline. It also addresses the need to build bridges between market stakeholders and the world of research at a time when research on provenance and the art market is becoming increasingly important.

The first part of this project focuses on African art dealers.