What Makes a Portrait Worth $500K? 

Some time ago I was told a story by another photographer whose client had attempted to hire a then very successful high profile photographer to cover a corporate event. The quote they received was for £15,000 and for that they would receive ONE photograph, which the photographer would select. Naturally the client declined and hired my friend at a fraction of the cost. But the point was, the client repeated the story, my friend repeated the story and so on of the great man who could 'apparently' command £15,000 for one photo of a bunch of suits at a party. In effect they were doing his marketing for him free of cost. This was pre-social media. Today if you look at corporations hiring Magnum photographers for shoots and look at their social media, it's all about how they're working with Magnum etc and hoping some of the magic dust will rub off on them. The actual photography is secondary in this case.

Back when I was corporate girl, I offered a visiting business guru a cup of coffee. Being a good human, he came with me to get it. My then boss chuckled afterwards that was the most expensive cup of coffee ever: the cost for those few minutes was more than I made in a week. Time and value at the top end of society hits kind of differently. As they say about Rolex, a guy that spends five thousand dollars on a watch isn't just trying to tell the time.

We live in a second gilded age whereby money is awash in certain rarified worlds. And also the taste level is questionable to the point where reductive cookie cutter aesthetics could be misperceived as true artistic creativity.

The beauty, or the value in the is case, is always in the eye of the beholder- the client in this case. We as ‘sellers’ must build and communicate this value. The better we get in that skill, more return we can command. This is a universal rule of trading in everything. I would applaud Abosch not as photographer, but as a marketer.

It's not the quality of those portraits that makes them valuable, it's the fact they are taken by a very appreciated conceptual artist.

A common factor in selling art at high values is how well connected the photographer is socially - look at the rock stars that are now photographers. They will know higher worth individuals and if they ask a high figure then they are more likely to get it because the buyer can say "oh this was taken by X". The law of supply and demand only applies to the mainstream market. After that it's about exclusivity, novelty and excess. Does a James Bond edition Leica Q3 take any different photos than a standard one ? - No. Will the special edition find some customers? - yes.

His name is Kevin Abosch. He's an Irish photographer.

funny, I would not know who he is, until your video. Great marketing and who he knows. Is the prices for what he sells as a print? Does he charge the clients he photographs this amount?

Shit, I was shooting portraits like that for the past 15 years and I think the most I made on one portrait was $500. God Bless him, but it's silliness. Richard Avedon and Irving Penn are in an entirely different class of portraitist, they were genius.

Lighting looks pretty simple. He's no Avedon or Platon, but fair play to him. I'd take 500, let alone 500k , for bustin my ass in Northern Thailand in 43 degrees😂😂😂

I'd love to hear your thoughts, lets have a dialog here.

Dang, this is crazy. I went to Thailand and took portraits of the Karen tribe using a backdrop like that. Should have charged those hill tribe woman for my "unique" approach. Gotta hand it to the photographer though, he developed a niche and was able to crack the code.

For some reason, "P.T. Barnum" keeps coming to my mind.

It’s amazing what has happened to the art world in general. Besides money launderers, what fool would pay $40 million for squiggly red lines that any kindergarten kid could draw? The portraits of Mohammed Ali by Thomas Hoepke are an example of photographic brilliance. On the other hand the portraits you showed in this clip aren’t worth the photographic paper they are printed on, let alone $500,000.

I find it almost as silly how you're not able to make a video like this without having to spend half of it explaining what you don't mean, so the comments don't go crazy on you :) For me he's an after market Platon, with all the drama, story, and sole, taken out of the frame.

I think you should go easy with your excessive hand gestures that makes you look like an highly strung guy. Compose yourself.

I had never heard of him, so thank you for sharing! I think he's a p*** taker and he knows it. His conceptual art seems to have a deep vein of humour in it. So I'm not sure he's really taking the celebrity portraits that seriously. But for $500k a pop who knows! 😆

Learn to take photo's of the human ego.