> no longer participating in the value chain of their work I'm not sure what you mean by that. If you mean the value chain of the gallery/dealer/auction world

> no longer participating in the value chain of their work I'm not sure what you mean by that. If you mean the value chain of the gallery/dealer/auction world is where prices go up then yes, that's true, but the artist is very much participating by creating and selling new work. In the $750 -> $40K+ example the artist will definitely get a lot more than $750 per piece in the future. If you mean art only gains real value after the artist is no longer making any (i.e. is dead), then actually that's not true for contemporary art.