Investing Aura: Making Value at an Emirati Art Center

Abstract

The article examines the politics and processes of establishing value for artworks, highlighting the continued belief in Walter Benjamin's idea of aura and describing the value aura generates as “auratic value.” Focusing on an artist residency program in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) during the country's arts boom, I analyze contestations between artists and the gallery director. In response to the gallery director's contracts, which accorded value by size and in which artists signed over copyright to their work, artists refused to invest their auratic value in their artworks, ultimately devaluing their own works but minimizing the value extracted from them. These instances show the continued relevance of aura and how value is negotiated between various actors in the art industry.