MEET THE EXPERTS: DANIEL WINN

How and when did you get your start in the art business? What is your position today? Can you give us a brief overview of how you got there? I am the CEO and President of Masterpiece Publishing, which has been in business for almost 20 years. My background is medical, reconstructive surgery. So when I gave up my medical profession, I created my own art and opened my own gallery. And I struggled tremendously, but became very successful, and then decided to have an agency to represent other artists. I’m sure you are well aware that even Da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo — they all had agents. Back then it was Lorenzo Medici. You talk about Van Gogh, Degas, Pissarro, even those artists had agents, such as Ambroise Vollard. And going forward even to our current time, Auguste Rodin had B. Gerald Cantor. And so that’s why I felt that I wanted to do something for artists that could move to the next level. We are now branching out with a subdivision called Winn Slavin Fine Art, which is going to be a higher division of the art agency. Winn, my last name, and Slavin is my partner and CFO here at Masterpiece. Our artist criteria for the new subdivision is much more strict in that our artists have to be able to do a lot more, almost like modern Renaissance artists. Of the ten artists we represent at Masterpiece, three of them are moving forward to Winn Slavin Fine Art. The first is Renzo, the second is Ira Reines, and the third is Andre Desjardins. These three artists paint and sculpt, have engineering and architecture backgrounds, and also write on various subjects including philosophy. This is what we require to go to this next tier, because now we are showcasing these artists’ works in museums and worldwide exhibitions.

Why is art essential for our lives? Why is it important to you personally? Art is something that is so instinctively healing and powerful that there is no other form that communicates to us as human beings more. That’s why I became an artist, and that’s why I gave up that profession to become an agent for future artists. I sacrificed my dream to go to another dream. It’s pretty amazing, this journey, so far. When my family heard that I was going to give it all up to do something in the arts, it shocked them. But when I became successful, they saw that it was not a phase that I was going through, or something that I just did as a hobby; they saw it more as a passion that I made into something very financially rewarding. And they saw that I made a big difference. I think I’m healing people emotionally, now, rather than physically in the past as a surgeon. When I go to shows and meet collectors that have divorced, have had a death in the family, or a terminal illness, and they see the works of the artists we represent—they talk, they cry, they come to terms with their existence. I look at that and it is so rewarding. This is even beyond healing people physically because, you know what? All of us are going to leave this world. Now, I’m healing people emotionally. So even though they have a terminal illness, when they leave this world, they are happy. They are content. To me, that is by far so much more rewarding and satisfying. Healing someone like that is eternal, rather than just a temporary “fix,” so to speak.

What is the most important thing that an art gallery needs to have a prosperous venue for its artists? What is important in how a gallery does business is that, number one, it maintains a relationship with an agent with a business mindset. Dealing with an artist is something that we do as an agency, and it is not easy because artists are not businesspeople. They are pretty much right-brained, whereas businesspeople are mostly left-brained. Fortunately for me, I feel I can understand both sides. Basically, we do all the marketing, the write-ups, the museum shows, the charity events, and the competitions. We do a lot so the gallery has resources on the background and history of an artist to give to its clients. I also recommend that galleries maintain the artists they represent on a long- term basis rather than trying to carry the works of a hundred artists over a few years. But you have to get good artists. They need to be the top-of-the-top to be able to do that.

What advice do you have for professionals in the art industry who want to achieve a bountiful career such as your own? It is very hard. And as in any business, it takes years to be successful. If you go into this profession expecting to have financial

32 OFF THE EASEL MAGAZINE – WINTER 2014