contemporary preservation and the art market

[Jorge Otero-Pailos]

Richard Neutra's Kaufman House (Palm Springs, 1946) will be auctioned by Christie's in its contemporary art sale on May 13, 2008. The inclusion of a building in a contemporary art sale is drawing the attention of the press in the US and Abroad.
See the NY Times article: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/arts/design/31hous.html
See also the Le Monde article: http://www.lemonde.fr/culture/article/2008/04/30/une-icone-de-l-arc...

The introduction of Modern buildings in art auctions is being presented as a market driven form of preservation. What challenges and opportunities does the art market present to contemporary preservation?

[Laurence Lafforgue]

The opportunity certainly is to position architecture as art, therefore facilitating its preservation (as a work of art, as oppose to a functional space.) This said, by promoting architecture as art, its preservation will inexorably look to maintain a status quo, thus limiting the opportunity for innovation in preservation, or preservation as transformation.

[Patrick Ciccone]

So will a reconstructed building be discounted as a forgery, and thereby rendered worthless on the market?

Will thieves break in at night to steal an entire building and place it on the black art market?

Will auction houses only sell restored properties?

I find the auction somewhat ironic since many Neutra houses are still considered tear downs 100 miles west of Palm Springs, in Los Angeles.

How many properties can actually be sold this way? There are eighteen FLW properties on the market right now--some by Sotheby's Real Estate division. Would they sell more easily in a contemporary art auction?