Art Auctions On Cruise Ships: Problems And Solutions

Emergence of the Cruise Industry and Art Auctions

Discuss about the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Index.

The emergence of the cruise industry can be traced back during the 1960s, the ships of which were later redeveloped to ease the passengers. Earlier, the liner services used to support transportation of the passengers who are supposed to cover long distances, particularly between the continents of Europe and North America (Bonilla-Priego, Font & del Rosario Pacheco-Olivares, 2014). This service emerged during the middle of the 19^th century. The need to include the passengers from different socio-cultural backgrounds for a minimum duration of two weeks, led the people of the industry to develop a special design of the ships that would be completely different from the previously used cargo ships (Sun, Feng & gauri, 2014). The newly developed and designed ships were more comfortable and these factors were taken care of at least for the elite classes. The art auctions held at the cruise ship does not actually throw light on the culture of the art and the paintings. Often, it was stated that the paintings or the art were not original and it is very rare for the industry to sell the paintings out where there are millions of customers to buy them. The report further discusses about the problems and the causes of the problems of organizing the art auctions in the cruise industry (Wiesehuegel at al., 2013).

Whenever the term of “art auction” come to minds of the people, the people either think of Christie’s or Sotheby’s in New York or London and not those auctions that are held in the cruise ships (Clancy, 2017). Over the past few decades, auctioning of the “fine arts” on the cruise ships, have attracted the first-time bidders and is being developed as the prime business in the cruises (Kowollik & Jonas, 2016). Park West Gallery has emerged as the biggest organizer of such auctions in the cruises with earning annual revenue of nearly more than 300 million dollar and selling nearly three lakhs artworks every year. The organizer is located at Southfield, Michigan and is capable of handling large amount sod sales at the sea and is “the world’s largest art dealer”.

The auctions are the biggest sources of revenue for the cruise industry. These are the perfect forms of entertaining the passengers similar to gambling or shopping or engaging the self in any shows (Bowen & Wilson, 2015). In spite of all these, many consumers or passengers complaint that they were not served that they were looking for. Even it has been reported that the organizers doo cheat the passengers who are eager to buy the paintings and are the first bidders. Even the organizers sell the same paintings at different places and at different prices. The cruise authority have  also misbehaved with the passengers while the passengers have raised a voice against them regarding the false selling of the art pieces at a very high rate.

Park West Gallery: Largest Organizer of Art Auctions on Cruise Ships

The most famous organizer of the art auction on the cruises, Park West, have turned over more than percent of its workforce and underwent a loss of more than 100 million dollar. More than a dozen of customers of the organizers have started to complain about them and the organizing company had faced several lawsuits. It has been recorded that the art auctions are arranged on the cruises in order to cover up the expenses that the cruise provides to the passengers (Wang, 2015). The luxurious dinners, fine wine, best linen for the elite class people, all the expenses incurred by the cruise ships are covered up by selling off the duplicate copy of the art pieces to these people at a very high rate. Even the food that is served during the auction session and in the lounge of the cruise ships are covered by the revenue collected from these art pieces.   

The place where the auction is organized is very crowded with the people, but these people are not eager to show their interests without the free food that is provided by the organizers. In addition to this, the art in the auctions move away very fast. The people who are interested in purchasing the items are required to describe the art by looking at it just for a glace and in case of wrong guesses; there is no second chances that are provided to them. The people are unable to guess them or understand the terms and the names of the artists without the free and fast Wi-Fi on the cruises (Suwondo, Yuliando & Saputro, 2016). In order to provide the passengers with these amenities, the organizers of the auctions as well as the authorities of the cruise ships have reported that they have to invest some extra revenue and cannot ask their fellow passengers to pay, thus exceeding the actual cost of the journey.

Most of the art auctions taking place in the cruise ships are charitable in nature, in which the wine is served to the participants of the auction which is completely free of cost. More serious motivations include supporting the organizations that the person respects or follows, building of network with the people of art community and discovering the emerging artists. It is not uncommon for the experts to warn against the charitable auctions (Ward, 2015). 

Setting of the price of the products kept for the purpose of auctioning is very difficult. This is because that there is no guarantee that there will be enough bidders present and would be participating equally in the auction. There might be many people travelling in a cruise, though they might be curious about the auction that is going on, they might not participate into it. Each and every auctions whether organized on the cruises or elsewhere rely on the completion regarding the setting of the prices of the items (Pujol-Gonzalez et al., 2013). The most risk arises when the participants are very reluctant to participate in the auctions. They do so unless they are very sure if the fact that they are going to win something from the organized event.

Auctioning as a Major Source of Revenue for Cruise Ships

Calculation of the bids is another major problem that the organizer of the auctions regularly has to face. The art auctions held in the cruises, does not have the modern day benefits of counting the bids such as the computer software that help in counting. The sealed bids are used in order to bid the items and these are the only things that can be counted in order to determine the winner of a particular art. Moreover, these auctions do not follow any kind of systematic rule of conducting the event and in the distribution of the art pieces. A person participating in the event can purchase most of the art pieces if the person has the capability to invest a large sum of money. In such a case others might not get the chance of bidding, causing a sense of inequality among the cruise members (Adibi & Shahrabi, 2014). 

Presently, the auctions have become a major source of fund raising. It has been studied that most of the auctions which involve a large sum of money are performed by the wealthy people of the society. They conduct the auctions to sell the product which they no longer needs in exchange for the cash. The collected cash is used for the purpose of donations to the welfare agencies of the society. It has also been seen that the item purchased is again used for the same purpose. The scenario is no different in the case of the art auctions held within the cruises.  The people who perceive of delivering this kind of services in their minds are very hard to recognize either by the authorities of the cruise industries or by the conductors or organizers of the art auctions.

In any kind of auction, there are very less space compared to the people participating in it. Many a times they participants have complained that they did not receive a place at least to sit and they had to remain standing throughout the event. Moreover the place where the event of the auctions is organized is very small and leads to suffocation which might hamper the health of the participants. The art auctions of the cruises are also not exempted from it.

The organizers of the auction should provide ample time to the guest so that they can guess the art that has been presented and then start their biddings. The ships or the part of the cruise where the event is being held should have the facility of fast and free Wi-Fi. This would be easy for the bidders to assess the meaning of the art and the artists.

Problems Associated with Art Auctions on Cruise Ships

The organizers as well as the cruise authorities should estimate beforehand the number of participants who would be the actual bidders.  The price can also be set prior to the event so as to avoid the confusion caused during the event. The organizer can maintain a register where the names of the guests can be enlisted. The cruise authorities can also ask the passengers of the cruise whether they are attending the auction or are interested to do so while confirming their presence and vacations through electronic media.

The auctions must follow a systematic rule where it is ensured that all the participants are able to participate equally. The guest should be given an identity number so that the organizers and others are not confused who is bidding and what amount has been bed by them. The organizers should also ensure that al, the guests are winning the auctions and all the stuffs which are put on display are not received only by a single bidder. The easiest way that the organizers can adopt in order to count the bids is to use an electronic device like the mobile or a smartphone app so as to eliminate the issues of interpreting the handwriting of the bidders.

Prior to the enlisting of the names of the guests, the cruise authority and the organizer of the event should ensure that all the details of the guests are collected. It should be ensured that neither the organizer nor the guests should involve themselves in any kind organizations. Where mostly of the auctions are done in order to spend the money as donations, both should ensure to stay away from it (Jin-Mei & Yong, 2016).   

The best rule to avoid the rushers and causing of suffocation is to leave a gap of about six to twelve inches between the items and the tables that are arranged for the guest and bidders to sit. When the organizers are running out of space they can either increase the space of the area or pack some of their stuffs and keep them aside so as to increase the space. They can display only few items once at a time in order to avoid the rushes of buying the items.

Conclusion

Organizing any event is a difficult as well as a time taking task, so is the case with the art auctions which are organized in the cruises. The cruise industry flourished mainly during the middle of the 19^th century. The cruises used to include passengers who used to travel from one continent to another, especially between Europe and North America. The ships were not well designed and included cargo ships, which were later on, were modified and redesigned to ensure comfort for the elite class people. The art auctions held in the modern day ships or cruises, provides entertainment to the guests who are travelling just like those of gambling, and other forms of entertainment, which normally lacks the culture. There are many problems that are being faced in the art cultures, which include both the guests attending the auction as well as the authorities of the auction and the cruises, though most of the problems have been reported to be faced by the guests themselves. The problems that are arising can also be effectively solved if both the authorities do cooperate with the guests and vice versa.

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