Quilt National is a biennial exhibition of contemporary art quilts. Most of the quilts are for sale. Because the quilts are so different in size and style, Kris and Deb, who have a quilt exhibited in Quilt National, asked me to analyze the QN ’13 prices. Here is what I learned:
Number of quilts in the exhibition: 88
Number of quilts for sale: 70
Number of quilts not for sale: 12
Number of quilts with purchase option (no price available): 6
Lowest price: $900
Highest price: $20,800
Average (Mean) price:$5111.36
Median price:$3,950
Average (Mean) price per square foot: $305.50
Median price per square foot: $245.83
The size information can be found in the Quilt National 2013 Best of Contemporary Quilts book, and the price information can be found on the Dairy Barn Arts Center Quilt National price list. Creating this spreadsheet taught me how to calculate averages( means and medians), but I also got to look at some really amazing art. You can see some of the quilts by going to the Dairy Barn Arts Center website: http://www.dairybarn.org/
16 responses to “Quilt National 2013: Analysis Of Prices”
Hi Kelsi! I am enjoying reading all your blog posts. Great job!!
Thank you!
Kelsi,
Being exposed to art AND learning more computer skills makes your internship the best “summer school” ever. You must be adding many new experiences to your resume.
Yes I am going to have a great resume now with all of the new things that I am learning.
Love this Kelsi! Do you have any thoughts on the fairly large discrepancy between mean and median?
When I took out the most expensive quilt, which was significantly more expensive than the second most expensive one, the difference between the mean and median got smaller. Eliminating that quilt brought the mean down to $4883.99 and the median to $3,900.00. Hope that answers your question.
Yes-thank you! I suspected there was an outlier and that affected the median.
This is interesting information but on the surface doesn’t really tell us much. My question is whether or not only one or two very high priced works have raised the average higher than it might have been. The highest price piece is 20,000, and that might be the only one that high, which would mean the average price is in fact much lower. How many pieces were priced in excess of, say, $500 or $600 a square foot? And if these are removed, what is the average price then?
It would be more interesting to figure the cost per square foot per piece and THEN take an average.
The average price per square foot is listed in the post.
You pose a good question, though. There were 11 quilts above $500 per square foot. An interesting fact is that the most expensive quilt was not the highest priced quilt per square foot. I hope that answers your questions.
@Jenny I’m commenting on your comment, but the width of the reply is too small to read! It’s the mean that is affected by the outliers (the prices way above and way below the rest. Looking at the median is an attempt to counter the effect of the outliers.
However, because I have performed no statistical analysis, I can’t really say that the highest priced quilt was truly an outlier (says she, whose numerous stat classes were way too long ago!)
Interesting numbers. Any chance you could share your spreadsheet? Or the price list? If not can you share the high and low for price per square foot? Or even a list of the price per square foot would be most interesting.
Thanks!
—lisa
PS What does it mean to have a purchase option but no price?
I am learning the spreadsheet program and how to set up all of that information in graph form. Hopefully I will have that up soon, and when I do I will let you know.
Having a purchase option means that someone has already bought the “right of first refusal.” If anyone else wants to buy that piece, the person who has the “right of first refusal” has two weeks to decide if they want to buy it. Otherwise, the piece can be sold.
Fabulous – thanks!
I thought that was what you meant by that – interesting they didn’t have the prices listed for those. Guess they didn’t really want to sell it a second time. I wonder if there was any way to find out the prices on the 6 that did sell. it would make for an interesting comparison to the ones that didn’t.
I’ll see what I can do about getting those 6 other prices.
This is all very interesting and useful information. thanks so much!
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