Since the February announcement that UTA, one of the entertainment industry's three major agencies, would be opening a fine arts division, many people in the art market have been wondering what this new entity's game plan would be. Well, we finally started to get some answers this week via Melena Ryzik at the New York Times, and they mostly appear to lead to the multiplex––for better and worse, depending on how you want to frame the conversation. 

Though thousands of Americans would throw full colostomy bags at me for saying it, I tend to view the NFL more as a public health crisis than a professional sport. So it's safe to say that I'm not eager to compare Roger Goodell's gladiator combat association to fine art, the field I love. 

But earlier this week, a tweet from HBO Real Sports' correspondent Carl Quintanilla forced one particularly striking parallel to the surface.

In the ongoing debate over how creative projects in any medium can find financing outside the traditional system, crowdfunding tends to be a popular suggestion. Juke the gatekeepers and run straight to the outstretched arms of your target audience, the argument goes. But is it a viable strategy for fine art? 

While I eagerly await the U.S. release of Management of Art Galleries -- written by everyone's favorite professor/entrepreneur/protein-style-David-Foster-Wallace, Magnus Resch -- some advance intel on its contents has pushed me to think once again about the sales split between artists and gallerists. Because as severe as the industry's standard 50/50 division already is, apparently Resch thinks there are situations where gallerists deserve even more of your milkshake. 

A basketball player desperately heaving a shot at the opposing team's hoop just before the halftime buzzer sounds. An average (or worse) looking dude trying to chat up a face-meltingly hot woman alone at the bar. An artist frequently posting her work on Instagram in an attempt to generate direct sales, not just Likes. 

What do all of the above have in common? 

Aside from "I Can't Feel My Face," lately it feels like pop music's most inescapable chorus is that the economics of traditional bands no longer work. It's not a coincidence that the medium's leading edge now largely consists of singers, rappers, and producers/DJs -- many if not most of whom perform alone, at least until they have the backing of a label or promoter.

The problem is simple: From gear to rehearsal space to touring accommodations, the more tangible resources musicians need to produce their work, the quicker the costs escalate -- and with them, the probability that the whole enterprise disintegrates in mid-flight.

Yet around the world, the huge number of works in traditional media still landing in galleries and auction houses reinforces that young visual artists are not following young musicians' lead.

What does the average doctor have in common with the average gallerist? 

It sounds like the setup for an art world joke. And while I'm sure I could come up with a whole arsenal of punch lines at the expense of either party involved, I'm not asking because I want to fire some pithy shots. I'm asking because I want to make a point about the dangers of paternalism—especially concerning represented artists' access to their own sales and expense records. 

Every day, every artist striving to transform her work into a sustainable career asks the most fundamental, most difficult question in the creative cosmos.

Is what I'm doing unique enough to stand out? 

Ironically, though, most of the gallerists in a position to represent those rising artists simply aren't asking the same question about their own businesses. And I think their collective shoulder shrug is on the verge of becoming a major problem for every seller—and every artist—south of the gallery sector's apex. 

This is not going to be a typical Gray Market blog post. Today, I want to tell you a story.