171113 How shares in Emeralda differ 

The image is my painting, Voyage of the Emeralda, Emeralda being the name of a mythical ship to which I am applying the name of a platform for investing in the Northwest Print Center Incubators.

In the past five years some companies have started up to sell shares in art collections. People enter with small amounts--$13 in one instance—to be part owners of artworks. Another, starting up with over a million dollars in seed capital, calls itself a platform for art investing where people with $10,000 or more can be part owners of entire collections, or blocks, of artworks.
These artworks are purchased with the pool of money thus committed and kept in storage. The premise is that the art will grow in price, so investors can hope for up to 10% growth of their investment. Not only is the profit an incentive, but it’s fun because of the collectible and cultural value of the art objects.
Over the course of several days I read a number of stories and propositions, and the assumption is always the same—big sums of money and the promise of positive ROI and the assurance of the artistic, cultural value of the objects grounded in expert opinion and big data.
My platform for investing in arts and culture takes a different point of view. Profit remains a motive, but a holistic view of art-making and community makes my platform different. To begin with, there is one unique, one-artist collection to invest in: Mine. Thus far, with my wife and daughter’s help we have a database of about 1,500 pieces of artworks spanning a variety of media in different sizes, shapes and descriptions.
My position in the community has made this possible, as I have retained my life’s work instead of selling these objects over my fifty years. However, it’s true I sold some of my art, and I have another database of over 400 people, corporations and institutions who bought it and, for all I know (and hope) still have it.
My mother taught me not to brag. In her memoir she derided people who “amaze themselves” with their own inventions. That may be one reason I still own what I made—a hoarder of amazing things, one might say. I am shy about this as I remember and honor my dear mother’s words.
Still, there is something to be said for things I achieved and the ways in which I have touched peoples’ lives. For example, because I was not compelled to sell off my work to make a living during my most creative years (I had a secure teaching job) I still have much of my art. There is something valuable in this which now, thanks to modern technology, can be mined to start the Northwest Print Center Incubators. It's mine to mine!
In my drive to think outside the box during those halcyon years at the 'Dub, I was involved with projects which, at first, were not considered art nor anything like art. Now, in the instance of video art tapes, they are. They may not be what consumers consider art as yet, but to historians they are something to consider in the context of art history. Thus, I have the largest privately-held video collection of locally-made videos.
This has brought me to a privileged position of having a diverse art collection which I estimate to have a valuation of half a million dollars or more. In today's industry, a half-million is not enough to bring about my great ambition—the Northwest Print Center Incubators—but it’s a start. It gives me hope, every day, that it will be seed capital to get to the bottom rung of the ladder toward construction.
Shares in other, similar investment pitches (Arthena comes to mind) give investors a piece of an art collection which is assumed will grow, and these investment schemes offer perks, besides, such as privileged interviews and exclusive online, insider viewpoints. These are good indicators to show me how to structure a plan for investing in the NPCI.
My plan is not to appeal to consumers—for it is a consumer model upon which Arthena is based: on monetary profits only, but as an investment in the Seattle community or, expanding on this, the creative economy via the experience economy. Art is experience, in my opinion, not only the owning or looking at an artwork. The “work” of art means the action of art, the experience of art and that which can be communicated in today’s global communication and interrelated cultural exchange. Most importantly, it can be part of educational experiences.
My art collection, which consists of thousands of bits and pieces of Northwest printmaking art history stored in our family art gallery and storage area of our condo, reflects the kind of global thinking I was privileged to indulge in during my 19 years as a mollycoddled art professor at the UW. It was my work. I did it for pay.
Now, notwithstanding my family’s rights to this legacy as an income stream, too, I want to give back to my neighborhood, the Uptown Arts and Culture Coalition, a physical building for artists, crafts people and designers’ housing which is sustained in part by cash streams I exploited within my domain-of-expertise—printmaking and other media arts, education and entertainment.