Rash Bacon Buy

Only yesterday I wrote "I doubt the top end of the art market will feel the pinch" (of recession). I didn't expect my words to be confirmed so quickly, but Sotheby's Evening Sale of Contemporary Art in London took a record £95m ($39m) for a contemporary art auction in Europe. Caught up in the frenzy of bidding, some tasteless twerp lashed out nearly £20m on this mentally disturbed image by Francis Bacon: Study of Nude With Figure In A Mirror (1969)! Why do fat cats buy paintings that are symptomatic of mental illness? Simply to make a huge profit in a few years time? Or to help their shrinks make a diagnosis? I find it difficult to believe that anyone shrewd enough to amass a fortune could be persuaded that this sick tripe is a masterpiece worth buying.