I’ll never understand art. What in the world makes that painting worth $200,000? It’s ugly, it’s a rotten representation of its subject matter, it’s blurry and the colors are smudged. Some FReeper who knows art fill me in, here.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
There is no accounting for taste.
The worth of a thing is what some fool will give you for it...............
The bear is pretty representative of a lot of family totem carvings - they have not all been finely done by great craftsmen. It’s not her best, but typical of her style; and I can see collectors paying that for it as part of her body of work.
Look at some of her others; there are aspects that remind a little of Georgia O’Keefe, and even Thomas Hart Benton:
https://www.aci-iac.ca/art-books/emily-carr/significance-and-critical-issues/
Well, I don't know; but I been told some of them high-hats prizes the use of distortion and vibrant colour. /s (I guess)