D&D 5E (2014) Question about art

[Lanliss]

The recent art thread got me thinking about something I find odd. When you make an art object (sculpture, painting, etc.) You must expend half of the market value to make it. What if a PC were to make the Mona Lisa, or some other equally priceless painting. Some work of art that was so amazing it prompted the kingdom to invent the Art Museum, just to have a place to put it. It would be worth millions of gold pieces, assuming you find the right buyer. Does this mean you have to spend half that price to make it? Will you have to use paint filled with tiny diamonds, and distilled tears of Angels? Canvas made of Dragon skin?

It seems a bit unrealistic, considering artists today can make a painting worth thousands of dollars with a few dollars of paint and a vision.

 

[GM Lent]

I suppose it's worth noting that many if not most prized works of art were considered worthless in their day. That should reduce the production costs some

 

[Gnarl45]

DM adjudication would probably be necessary here.

 

[rlor]

It might still take a year+ of trying with countless failures to create a masterpiece (or it might never happen). The failures may not be bad either, simply that they didn't catch the public's eye.

A person might have the same proficiency in playing a guitar and understanding of music as a rock star, but that doesn't mean the music they produce will make them the next big thing.

 

[Joddy37]

In order for your work of art to be a masterpiece, it needs to pull the attention of lots of people, maybe the majority of the public. So I guess you need many many successful skill checks to convince people that your work is truly unique.

 

[Lanliss]

Another question, perhaps the other side of the same coin, what would happen if a PC were to get a painting of something amazing, say, a summit of dragons? One of each color, each one the most powerful representative of his or her color. Something any other race would literally kill to see, and this PC got a painting of it. A canvas of maybe 20x30 inches, and about 20 gold pieces of paint. Let's say the summit lasted a long while (they're dragons, not like they are running out of time) and the artist managed a perfect rendition of the summit, in beautiful detail. That is something like 30-50 gold pieces I think, spent on this. Would you allow them to sell it for a million gold pieces? More? I know it would vary from one DM to another, but I am curious on the answer.

 

[BoldItalic]

The recent art thread got me thinking about something I find odd. When you make an art object (sculpture, painting, etc.) You must expend half of the market value to make it. What if a PC were to make the Mona Lisa, or some other equally priceless painting. Some work of art that was so amazing it prompted the kingdom to invent the Art Museum, just to have a place to put it. It would be worth millions of gold pieces, assuming you find the right buyer. Does this mean you have to spend half that price to make it? Will you have to use paint filled with tiny diamonds, and distilled tears of Angels? Canvas made of Dragon skin?

It seems a bit unrealistic, considering artists today can make a painting worth thousands of dollars with a few dollars of paint and a vision.

The trick is, to spend a day producing a cheap painting worth 5gp and, having paid the DM the 2½gp it costs to get it made, team up with a 3rd-level wizard who can cast Suggestion on a gullible collector. The collector suddenly believes it's an undiscovered masterpiece and buys it from you for thousands, which you split with the wizard. Rinse and repeat.

 

[MechaPilot]

@OP: The long and the short of it is that D&D rules fail to accurately reflect economies. It's not really their fault though, because they weren't meant to. They were really just meant to simplify things and give DMs a starting point for making these decisions.

One way to look at the cost is not that the final cost is that of the materials expressly required in the final piece, but of all the efforts and supplies that lead you there. For example, the PC artist may need to hire models to make life studies of, or hunt down monsters to do studies of, and she may need to travel to places to do studies of foreign architecture or landscapes. The artist may also need to attempt the work several times before finally settling on a result that she finds truly exceptional.

Ultimately though, the real fair market value of any item is what people are willing to pay in an arms-length transaction where the buyer is under no compulsion to buy and the seller is under no compulsion to sell.

 

[Jester David]

Another question, perhaps the other side of the same coin, what would happen if a PC were to get a painting of something amazing, say, a summit of dragons? One of each color, each one the most powerful representative of his or her color. Something any other race would literally kill to see, and this PC got a painting of it. A canvas of maybe 20x30 inches, and about 20 gold pieces of paint. Let's say the summit lasted a long while (they're dragons, not like they are running out of time) and the artist managed a perfect rendition of the summit, in beautiful detail. That is something like 30-50 gold pieces I think, spent on this. Would you allow them to sell it for a million gold pieces? More? I know it would vary from one DM to another, but I am curious on the answer.

Considering a castle is tens of thousands, a million gold pieces is unlikely.
Keep in mind, that even a few hundred gp is a fortune. You could comfortably live on 500gp for a year.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

The rules for crafting are simply tools for adjudication. The DM can, and should stray from them where it makes sense.

A more straightforward example: Engraving does not generally have a material cost, but would still increase the value of the engraved object. In some cases, like sculpture or woodcarving, the base material might be valueless.

In these, and many other examples, the DM should make a judgement call.