Christo and Jeanne-Claude's Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price

Okay, the most consequential piece yet written about The Gates has to be Greg Allen's evaluation of the $20 million cost. Shame on the rest of us, and especially the paid pros, for not giving a second thought to the price tag. By Greg's calculations, it's tough to account for as much as $10–15 million.

Holy shit, right? As Greg notes, Christo and Jeanne-Claude's work has an emphatic social component to it. Whether or not it's still true, C&J-C sell their drawings to buyers with the understanding that, though the individual pieces aren't really expected to appreciate in value (they make so many of them), the buyer contributes to the execution of a largescale work. (Their visibility and mass production also means that, quite independent of their vision, some buyers see their schematic drawings as affordable art by prominent artists.) Both artists often describe the preparations of their pieces as crucial to the art; if they blew $10 million or flubbed their timesheets, it doesn't sound like they prepared very well. Greg wonders how long a period C&J-C might be billing for; as Blake Gopnik notes for the WaPo, the piece's working title is The Gates: Central Park, New York, 1979–2005—sounds like we have an answer.

But look—we're basically talking about commie frogs here, aren't we? Should we be so surprised that the market didn't deliver? Artists don't have accounting departments, right? Oddly, you'd think that this is something that the cultural gendarmes over at National Review would be serving with a Coke and a smile, but reports from The Gates have come back as so family-friendly that you could very well imagine them playing defense here.