Rich People Pawning Art to Make Ends Meet

It's tiny violin time again: In order to keep up appearances, more and more elites are reduced to borrowing money against their precious art collections. Today the Times has an intriguing look inside New York's biggest fine art "pawn shop," the aptly-named "Art Capital Group," which expects to make $120 million in art-related loans in 2009, up from $80 million in 2008. The way it works is a desperate rich person agrees to sign over his or her most valuable possessions in exchange for a loan, and if they don't pay up, Art Capital takes away their Rembrandts and Warhols. What's funny is how Art Capital co-owner Ian Peck brags to the Times about how "very discreet" his company is, and then the Times finds all sorts of details on clients like Julian Schnabel (pictured) and Annie Leibovitz, who has apparently fallen on such hard times that she's pawned off the rights to all of her photographs, past and future, in exchange for $15 million. Meanwhile, on Monday, less disadvantaged swells dropped a collective $264 million on Yves Saint Laurent's art collection. For the rest of us, there's free pancakes at IHOP until 10 p.m. today, assuming there's any left after Schnabel's done.