My wife, Pat, and I have been customers of Park West since the early-mid 1980's when we began attending land based auctions in our home town of Dayton, Ohio. As newlyweds with minimal money to spend, but with a desire to begin collecting some nice pieces of art, we bought our first piece from Park West in 1983-84 for the small sum of $40.00. While not a named artist, we were enthusiastic about our purchase, and began attending their land auctions whenever they were in Dayton, and later in Florida, when we moved there in 1989. At that time, Park West was a much smaller organization, as many of the land auctions we attended in those early years were presided over by Morris Shapiro and William Smith. As our income grew, so did the quality and name value of the artists we sought to collect.

While not large dollar collectors, over the last 20-25 years, we have purchased about 25 pieces (which is actually a little low, based on a complete review of our purchases) from Park West, including

1 Fanch Ledan
4 Claude Cambour
3 Tarkay
2 Le Kinff
2 Agam
1 Mouly
1 Gockel
1 Peter Max
5 Dali Divine Comedy woodcuts
5 Misc artists

None of the 5 Dali pieces we have purchased are signed, but are marked with the blind stamp of Jean Estrade. These pieces were all purchased prior to 2003 or so, and none at a price of more than $550.00 each.

On a (Carnival Cruise Line) cruise that we took in May of 2006, we purchased one of the Rembrandt Millennium pieces for $2,100. Upon arrival at our home in Florida, we researched our purchase, and immediately decided that we did not want to follow through with the purchase. We contacted Park West, and after much negotiation, were able to get them to agree to not ship the Rembrandt. They would not issue a refund for the purchase price, but did provide a credit to be used at a future auction, which we used to purchase the small Peter Max we have, as well as a Gockel print on canvas at two land based auctions.

It is very upsetting to think that my wife and I have spent the last 25 years doing business with a company who appears to have blatantly defrauded thousands of people, based upon information we’ve uncovered on-line. While the total we have spent, which I estimate at around $10,000, is small in comparison to those individuals we read about on your site (i.e., Fine Art Registry), it is still a significant amount for us to have spent. It is also disturbing to think that we have recommended Park West to many of our friends as well. My hopes have been dashed that upon our deaths, we would be able to donate our art to either a local museum or other public forum where it could be enjoyed by others.

Brad:
We'd been buying fairly consistently for a large number of years from Park West and we were starting to reach a point where we felt they were obviously getting way too expensive and pushing what we felt was not really exceptional stuff to buy so we had pretty much stopped buying years ago.

Pat:
Also we ran out of wall space in our home.

Brad:
We've bought 30-31 pieces from Park West between 1983-2006 for a total of a little under $10,000.

We really did buy things that we liked. Our intentions were never to build a large estate of art or anything like that but to fill our home with pieces that we like. We are not wealthy people, so our hope was that at some point in time if we ever needed the proceeds as we got older that they (the art we purchased) were things that could actually have some value to do something with if we had to and at the end of our life be able to possibly bunch up the entire collection and give it to a museum or something like that.

We started purchasing the Divine Comedies that we have around 1993/1994. We paid around $275 for the first one and we paid around $500 for the most expensive one we have.

We went on a Carnival Cruise Line cruise in May of 2006 and in a fit of I don't know what, actually purchased one of the Rembrandts and paid I think $1875 plus buyer's premium for that. As soon as we got back home, I don't know if I had the first case of buyer's remorse or Pat did, but we did a little research on line and then we called Park West and said we didn't want the piece and not to deliver it. We had a couple of conversations with them on the phone and ultimately they agreed to give us a credit for the amount of the Rembrandt and we went to one of the land auctions that they were still having here in Florida and purchased the small Peter Max which is a Liberty Head II. Paid $1550 for that and used the balance of the credit to purchase a Gockel, which is a small one (lithograph on canvas).

The Max supposedly is a hand embellished Single Liberty Head in the middle, probably 8" x 8" in image size.

We originally started going to their auctions as newly weds in Ohio in 1983 or 1984. We bought our first pieces for less than $100 and developed what we thought was a relationship...Morris Shapiro was the auctioneer at the first couple of auctions we went to. Bill Smith was the auctioneer for several of the auctions we went to in Ohio and also here in Florida and we trusted their opinions when we asked them things.

Pat:
But they did stress at first that you should always buy what you liked in the hopes that something would go up in value but that it was more important to get what you liked than to necessarily go strictly for the investment value of it.

Brad:
The tone of their auctions has really changed. When we first started going, they talked about buying art that you liked. The value wasn't the most important thing. To buy things that fit in your home, that you enjoyed the image, and so forth and they didn't push the real expensive things. They talked about up-and-coming artists. I don't recall until we started going on some cruises in the last four or five years that we ever really got pushed to consider really expensive pieces of art. The early auctions were fun.

Pat:
The alcohol wasn't pushed to the same degree in the early days. It was much more relaxed.

Brad:
We were always really impressed with the knowledge that particularly the land auctioneers supposedly brought forth. We'd never caught them in a blatant lie about anything. We went on a Carnival Cruise Line cruise in February of this year with some friends and went to the auction on board the ship just for something to do and there was a young man or woman doing the auction really pushing Marcel Mouly and did not bother to mention that at that particular time he had been dead for a month or so. We didn't say anything. We didn't know if it was their ignorance or if they knew and didn't want to share. But if you're selling and talking about a particular artist and it's very common knowledge that he'd passed away in January I think, you'd want people to know.

Pat:
When we were speaking with them about how much they anticipated some pieces going for that we were mildly interested in, as soon as they got the feeling we were only mildly interested they didn't take the time to really speak with us. They kind of pushed us to one side.

Brad:
And they understood that we had been around for a while. It was almost as if they were more interested in people who didn't really have that much history nor had any kind of actual knowledge about art and artists. We were looking at a couple of Agams, and we have some Agams and we told them what we had and what we had paid for them back when we bought them, and it was like "Oh, oh," we knew what they were worth and spending $3,000 for a new one now is not worth the money.

We have not bought anything for about two years now and probably won't buy any more.

We've done business with this company for 25 years and we feel now that it's not the company that we first started doing business with.

On the cruise ships I think it's very much, "Let's see what we can get people to buy." That Mystery Artist thing, I think that's a ploy to get people to raise their hands.

Pat:
It looks more of the same. They said OK, this is a nice formula type painting to their other artists and we think we can sell more of it if you painted it as well with your name on it. There are more formulated paintings than there used to be.

Brad:
A lot of the Tarkays look the same. A lot of the Le Kinffs look the same.

Pat:
There are even artists that look like other artists. Like the Fanch Ledan. There are other artists producing similar type things incorporating other artists into their pictures as well. It's more formulated than it was.

Brad:
We always tried to find pieces that were just a little bit different. We like different artists.

I really like the Dalis but they reached a point where they wanted more money than we felt comfortable spending.

I feel really bad for some of the people that we've been reading about. My heart aches for these people that have spent all this money and obviously have something that's worthless.

I don't know what happened to that company because I don't believe that was their intention when I first met these folks. Obviously they got greedy and something happened.

Pat:
I wouldn't want to see other companies suffering because of what Park West is doing.

Brad:
From what I recall early on, there was not a lot of discussion about investment and that kind of thing. They would talk about their appraised value. They didn't talk a whole lot about investment value and so on until they started selling things like Dali, Picasso - they brought in that Collector's Portfolio. They started talking about the higher value, investment grade art. They probably weren't really pushing the investment side of things until the last five or six years.

We did notice over the last five years probably at the land auctions where the value of what they were bringing down (to Florida) really escalated.

Pat:
They also started doing a separate type of auction by invitation only and we weren't allowed in at all.

Brad:
For the last 10 or 15 years we've been using the PW Collector's Card.

We're not wealthy people. We're plain old working people. We're not wealthy. When we would buy art we had to figure out how we would pay for it.

The last two or three land auctions we went to it was apparent that they were looking for high roller type people. They were looking to make big scores on people. It kind of turned us off.

Pat:
It was insulting to us that just because we hadn't spent that kind of money we weren't going to be worthy of trying to spend that kind of money now.

Brad:
It's almost as if in some cases they look for people who really don't know better.

When we bought the Rembrandt, we were really looking at it as an investment - to have something we could pass down to a museum or a church to provide some value for. If we'd been thinking straighter we probably would not have bought that. I'm glad we were able to get out of it. They were very adamant about not giving a refund but at least we were able to get a credit.

I really do believe that something happened to that company and happened to the people at the top. The individuals who were leading the auctions did not appear to be as well educated (regarding art and the artists). We'd listen to them and they'd talk about these artists that we actually knew something about and we would think to ourselves, that's not right.

Very definitely over the last five or six years, their whole focus has changed from collecting art for the joy of collecting art to collecting art because you’re putting money in the bank which obviously I don’t think is true.

We bought things we liked.

Our days of buying from Park West are done. If we are going to collect any more art, we're going to go through a different avenue.

I guess the message here is a cautionary one. I really feel bad for these folks who have spent tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars on art.

We've watched on these cruise ships how people get drawn into it. Where it's a true auction, you can get wrapped up in that stuff and possibly make decisions that aren't the wisest.

I wanted to give you a personal update on what Pat and I observed on a cruise last weekend to the Bahamas on Royal Caribbean's Majesty of the Seas regarding Park West.

While not active participants, we visited the lounge where Park West was conducting their "auction" on Saturday afternoon, October 17, 2009 at around 4:00pm. We were very surprised to find that they were showing a "signed" Dali from the Divine Comedy as part of their stock for the sale. It was in a prominent location, just to the right of the podium. We only saw the one, and did not specifically ask as to pricing. We did not stick around for the auction itself, although I went back a little later to listen to the "auctioneer" spiel - he spent a lot of time going over the rules, etc that are contained on their bid numbers.

I did enquire as to the price on one small Agam – it was not an Agamogram, but what appeared to be a print on canvas (which I had never seen before). It was small, only about 10" square (image wise). The sales associates said the appraisal value was around $3,100, but I could buy it for the opening bid of only $800, which of course is a ridiculous price, as far as I'm concerned.

The other thing that surprised us was that they are still selling the Rembrandts. On Sunday evening, they had a special "Sale" at their office location on the 4th deck. They had special pricing where you could purchase two of the Rembrandts for $6,700, or one for around $3,600. Given the publicity they have received regarding the ownership issues with the plates, and the sheer numbers that appear to have been printed, it amazed both Pat and myself that they would continue to sell these items.