Art of picking up

How to Pick Up Girls Like a Pro

The Art of Charm is all about teaching you how to pick up girls like a pro. Creating attraction with the woman of your dreams is no accident; It’s a series of simple processes that any man can learn how to perform. Picking up girls like a pro isn’t about using tricks and gambits. It’s about paying a little bit of attention to some very small things that can make a very big difference.

Enter the Room Walking Tall

Attraction doesn’t start when you first notice a girl. On the contrary, it starts when she first notices you. And when is that? When you first walk into the room. This is why if you want to pick up girls like a pro, you need to practice walking tall, straight and confidently. When you walk in the room tall as a tree, she’s going to notice that you’re a confident man. Add to that some high fives and glass clinks (it doesn’t matter if you actually know the person, it just matters that you look like you do) and you’re going to be the type of high value, confident man that has not trouble meeting women.

Lighten the Mood

One of the biggest mistakes that men make when they first start talking to girls is that they come on far too serious. Even seemingly innocuous questions like “Are you having fun?” or “What do you do for a living?” can put her on edge when you start out by asking them. Instead, opt for playful, light, content-free conversation. Starting out by teasing her, joking around and being playful lightens the mood. There’s no better way to pick up a girl than to make her feel at ease in an inherently stressful situation like a bar or a club.

Create a Connection

Creating a connection with a girl is one of the most powerful things that you can do when trying to pick up girls. She already knows that you think she’s hot. She wants to know that you’re interested in who she is as a person. Creating a connection with a girl is a great way to say that. Start by telling her that you’re into her in a very simple and straightforward way like “I dig you” or “You seem pretty cool. ” Then start talking about things like where she grew up or what she does for a living. Remember to use open-ended questions like “What do you like about what you do for work” instead of more closed ones like “What do you do for a living?”

Take a Lap

True story: Hanging on the same girl all night can make you look a little thirsty. What’s more, it puts pressure on her. Better to take some time for yourself. Walk the bar, hit the bathroom, grab a drink, dance, flirt with other girls. She’s not going anywhere and trust us, the fact that you care about talking to her and getting to know her probably makes you a lot better fit for her than most of the other guys at the bar. Come back over after a little while and check in, start the conversation over again and keep things going. But don’t be afraid to walk away and catch your breath — and let her catch hers. Remember: Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Get Her Number

Don’t leave without getting her number. Tell her that you need her number so tha the two of you can get together sometime. Don’t phrase it like a question. Phrase it like a simple statement. Then hand her your phone, ready to take her number. While she’s entering it in, rattle off some killer date ideas that you think she’s be into. When all is said and done, send her a quick, playful text message that reminds her of who you are and gives her your number. Don’t be afraid to text the next morning to remind her of who you are.

50 years of pickup artists: why is the toxic skill still so in demand? | Men

In an upmarket bar near Oxford Circus in London, I am watching two men hit on women with all the desperation of a doomed cavalry charge. But without the heroism.

Mike and Raj (not their real names) circle the bar, scanning for women, drinks held at an awkward right angle to their chests. When they identify a target, they approach. The women stiffen, their smiles tightening. They swirl drinks with straws and chit-chat politely before mentioning boyfriends – real or imagined. The men retreat, regroup, identify fresh women. Advance, engage, retreat. On and on it goes.

I’m standing with the man coordinating this operation, the British pickup artist Johnny Cassell, as he watches as Mike and Raj – his students – run drills. Tonight is the culmination of Cassell’s intensive, day-long “Impactful Connection” workshop. For £700, Cassell promises to help men “master the art of attracting the women you truly want”. But watching as Mike and Raj hit on women indiscriminately, it looks as if any women will do.

It has been a long and disturbing day. Arriving at the venue, a four-star Mayfair hotel that morning, I had found Cassell, 31, in a black mood: a client had just dropped out. Tall and handsome, with a wolfish air, Cassell switches between being charming and cold. He does not like being contradicted or mocked. At one point during the session, I joke about spreadsheets and GDPR violations. Cassell is visibly displeased.

The message that the men are doing a good thing, and that women enjoy being hit on, is continually reinforced by Cassell.

Photograph: Assembly/Getty Images (posed by model)

For the uninitiated, pickup artists (PUAs) are typically men – female artists are much rarer – who attempt to coax women into having sex with them through a mixture of flattery, psychological manipulation and coercion. The movement has a surprisingly long pedigree, dating back to Eric Weber’s now almost 50-year-old manual How to Pick Up Girls. Today, this seems relatively sedate stuff. Weber writes, “the most important tenet of a pick up is that it’s mutual … Women are entitled to say ‘no’, plain and simple.” But the community really exploded into the public consciousness with the publication of Neil Strauss’s 2005 international bestseller The Game, which sold 2.5m copies. It introduced a generation of men to the murky, underhand world of pickup artists and their nefarious tactics, such as negging – insulting a woman to undermine her confidence, and make her feel as if she has to seek your approval – or peacocking, where you dress flamboyantly as a talking point to hit on women. I went to university two years after The Game was published, and watched its influence spread like a virus through the men in my year: I don’t think I went on a night out in 2007 without some drunk rugby player trying to “neg” me.

What was once an underground community has grown into a seduction industry valued at $100m (£75m). “The basic premise of all seduction teaching and practice is that interactions between men and women are subject to certain underlying principles that, once understood, can be readily manipulated,” explains Dr Rachel O’Neill of Warwick University, the author of Seduction: Men, Masculinity and Mediated Intimacy. “This is an impoverished view of sex and relationships, in which intimacy is less something to be experienced for its own sake and more something to be achieved for other ends.”

With the advent of the internet, elements of the pickup artist community’s ideology hardened into something darker. “[It] paved the way for other masculinised self-help formations to emerge, such as Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life,” says O’Neill. Peterson, a Canadian academic, published his bestselling self-help tome in 2018 and is a critic of feminism. “It also connects with masculinist factions such as the incel movement [“involuntary celibates” – characterised by an extreme hatred of women], and men’s rights activists.” This globalised network of pickup artists, men’s rights activists and incels all emerged out of the same primordial sludge.

‘I want you to take that shot’ … Johnny Cassells takes his pickup workshop in London last week. Photograph: Andy Hall/The Guardian

Attending today’s workshop are Mike, a 31-year-old tech worker, and Raj, 26, who lives in Dubai and works in finance. We sit around a circular table in a panelled conference room. Oil paintings of horses stare down at us. “I’ve been doing this for 14 years,” Cassell says. “It started off as a need for myself. Now I teach other people.”

Raj uses PUA terminology abundantly. “I have an issue with approach anxiety,” he says, meaning that he gets nervous hitting on women for the first time. He also refers to “sarging”, the process of picking up women. Both Raj and Mike are (perhaps unsurprisingly) edgy around me. I shunt my chair into a corner and arrange my features into a neutral expression.

The workshop begins with Cassell urging Raj and Mike to pick their dream women. Raj favours Kylie Jenner; Mike opts for Amber Gill, from Love Island. With the right mindset, Cassell says, they can bring their dream women into existence. He says reassuring if somewhat oblique things such as: “You are not a mass-market product,” and, “If you are getting rejected, you haven’t worked out what you want,” and, “The magic word here is, choose.” (Cassell writes “choose” on the whiteboard.)

Pop psychology session over, Cassell teaches them a conversation model. When approaching a woman, they should begin by making an assumption, before using a hook to draw her into conversation. Next they should challenge her, then introduce a time constraint and close the interaction by asking for a phone number. Raj and Mike hunch over their notebooks like dutiful schoolboys.

In recent years, Cassell has been describing himself as a dating coach as well as a pickup artist, and avoids the worst excesses of the PUA community, such as sexually coercive tactics. Notorious pickup artist Daryush Valizadeh – known as Roosh V – was accused of advocating legalising rape, on private property, in comments he later said were satirical. The American pickup artist Julien Blanc was banned from entering the UK in 2014, after 157,000 people signed a petition protesting against his visit. Earlier this month, pickup artist Adnan Ahmed – who called himself “Addy A-Game” – was jailed for two years after being convicted of threatening and abusive behaviour. Ahmed would harass women on the streets of Glasgow, causing them distress, and offered tips on his YouTube channel on how to overcome “last-minute resistance to sex”.

While his patter is assured, Cassell’s teaching feels to me very similar to the message of Neil Strauss’s seminal pickup bible. At one point, Cassell suggests challenging a woman who is into Crossfit by telling her that Crossfit is for people who aren’t really good at any sport. This appears to be textbook negging.

Conversational model learned, it’s now time for what Cassell refers to as fieldwork, but would more accurately be termed street harassment. Thus follow two of the most dispiriting hours of my career, as I walk around central London in the rain, watching as Raj and Mike pester women. They pretend to ask for directions, and after the woman has pointed out the route, say: “Actually I just wanted to talk to you,” or, “You look cute.”

At one point, Mike stops two women on Oxford Street and pretends to ask for directions. After they walk on, Cassell sends Mike chasing after them – he is convinced one was being flirtatious, because she crossed her legs while speaking to Mike. (She tells him she has a boyfriend.) Outside Fortnum & Mason on Piccadilly, there is a surreal chat about whether the men should approach a young woman shopping with her mother. Cassell decides in favour of it, but by then, thankfully, the women have moved on.

As a young woman who has experienced street harassment throughout my life, it is an extraordinarily uncomfortable thing to observe. I know that, on a fundamental level, women do not want to be approached in this way by strangers on the street. Not when they are running errands, or chatting on the phone, or on their way home from work. We want men to leave us alone.

But I am here to observe. So I say nothing and we squelch on through the rain. I am struck by the fact that all the women being approached are uniformly young, slim, white – and uniformly polite. They smile and refer to boyfriends, but with the exception of one woman Mike interrupts having a cigarette outside Pret – who looks furious – they do not seem put out. Why don’t any of these women tell Mike and Raj to get lost?

“Women are socialised not to challenge men,” explains Dr Bianca Fileborn of the University of Melbourne, an expert in gendered street harassment. “But this response may also be about managing the situation safely.” When you confront a stranger you risk escalating the situation. “You don’t know what’s going to happen next. These are men who’ve already crossed your boundaries … deflecting them, by telling them you have a boyfriend – in effect, saying, ‘I’m the property of another man, please leave me alone’ – can be a strategy for managing the situation.”

As we walk, Mike is having an internal tussle. “You do wonder, am I bothering people?” he admits. “Especially with things like #MeToo. But then I think, you’re being nice. You’ve gone up to someone and said they’re attractive.” This message – that the men are doing a good thing, and that women enjoy being hit on in the street – is continually reinforced by Cassell. He urges them on, an officer rallying his troops. “I want you to take that shot. You’re just making someone feel better about themselves.”

After Raj is rejected outside Topshop (who knew so many women in central London had boyfriends?), Cassell reassures him he has done nothing wrong. “She’s going to call her friend and say: ‘Oh my God, this guy just hit on me!’ You made her day.” Outside Piccadilly Circus tube station, the cold rain whipping my face, Cassell repeats: “You’re just making someone feel better about themselves. It would be selfish not to.”

That’s not true. I think I am witnessing street harassment – something Fileborn makes emphatically clear. “This behaviour has a profoundly negative impact on women. It’s often excused as flirting, or seen as good-natured. And on the individual incident level, I can understand why you might think that: someone came and spoke to you in the street, what’s the big deal? But for many women, these aren’t one-off experiences, but are repeated constantly, often from childhood. They add up.” She sighs. “I don’t think men live with this experience of being intruded upon and having people feel entitled to your time.”

Cassell tells me about a girlfriend who would prefer to pay a handyman rather than ask him for help. He didn’t like that, he says. It made him feel redundant.

On we walk. I think about the smartly dressed man who said something crude as I was having lunch at a former job. I told him not to talk to me like that. His fury was sudden and total. “Fuck you,” he snarled, as I recoiled in terror. I always remember how quickly the rage came, like it had been there all along. Eventually, we head back to the hotel. As the men write down their aspirations for the future, Cassell, surreally, puts on the score to Inception.

We decamp to the hotel restaurant and eat while making stilted conversation. It is not an easy meal for anyone. The men feel that I am judging them. Mike says he thinks men should be physically stronger, so they can protect women, and waits for a response. I chew my food. Cassell tells me about a girlfriend who would prefer to pay a handyman rather than ask him for help. He didn’t like that, he says. It made him feel redundant. “What do you think about that?” Cassell says, fixing me with a cold look. I make a feeble joke.

And so, to the bar where the staff know Cassell and don’t seem to mind that he is bringing men into the venue expressly to pester women. For the next three hours, Cassell identifies groups of women. The men trot over obediently. “Try that blonde at the bar,” he tells Raj. “You’d only be adding to her night. She looks bored.” Cassell suggests going up to a woman, saying “Trick or Treat?”, and then holding her wrist. At one point, Cassell sends Mike to sit with two women who are having a quiet drink. “What should I say?” Mike pleads. He is vibrating with nerves.

In that moment, I feel sorry for Mike. It is easy to judge these men, but they are painfully introverted and shy – even childlike in the way they look to Cassell for answers. I don’t think they are bad people. But they are denying women the chance to exist in public spaces without being treated as objects of desire. Just to be free, without an imaginary boyfriend or a place you need to be.

The night wears on. “I’m not sleazy,” Cassell says, apropos of nothing. My feet hurt and my chest feels tight with emotion. I say goodnight. Raj and Mike look relieved I’m leaving. On and on they circle, men on the prowl.

Beginner Collector's Guide: How to Collect Art

Contemporary Art

As Garage curator Andrey Misiano points out, contemporary art today has many definitions, but if you look at classic textbooks, it originates with the Impressionists. “This is a separate project within the development of art history, which is based on constant experimentation and revision of established conventions,” he says. – Contemporary art is more focused on working with meaning than with form, and explores concepts and ideas. One of the key tasks of such art is to critically reflect on and capture the present.” nine0003

The contemporary art market can offer great opportunities for the beginning collector. Candidate of Art History and Senior Research Fellow of the Pushkin Museum im. A.S. Pushkin Alexey Petukhov recalls the history of the beginning of the 20th century. The situation on the art scene then was similar to the modern one: high expectations of the new and a variety of currents. In 1904, a community of Parisian intellectuals led by André Lével decided, as an experiment, to buy works of art for a specified amount every year for ten years. At the end of the term, like-minded people planned to sell the entire collection. They called their project "Bear Skin". At 1914, the whole collection, numbering more than a hundred works, went under the hammer. The market was on the rise, and the work sold well. For example, Picasso's painting "The Family of Comedians" has risen in price by more than 15 times.

The family of comedians, Pablo Picasso / Wikimedia

Another example from modern times. In 2018, the painting by the famous artist, who has been working since the 1990s under the pseudonym Banksy, “Girl with a balloon” was exhibited at Sotheby’s. With the final blow of the hammer, the shredder hidden in the frame began to cut the masterpiece into narrow strips. It seemed that a work of art worth $1.4 million was being destroyed right before the eyes of the astonished public. But the mechanism suddenly stopped. Only part of the painting was damaged, which was immediately renamed “Love in a Wastebasket” at the request of the author. Last October, the painting was sold for $25.4 million to an unknown buyer. In just three years and thanks to an unusual performance, it has risen in price by 18 times. nine0003

Balloon Girl, Banksy / sothebys.com

Paintings by one of the most prominent representatives of contemporary art, Adrian Genya, have risen in price by more than 150 times in 10 years. The works of the artist, who was born in 1977 in Transylvania, balance on the verge of figurative and abstract art. Back in 2009, Francois Pinault, the owner of Christie's auction house, bought Genya's Nickelodeon painting for €60,000. In 2016, it went under the hammer for $9 million. what she has” was sold at Sotheby's for $3 million. This is almost three times more than her previous record, set in June of the same year at Phillips New York. nine0003

But it is hardly worth considering collecting works of contemporary artists as a way to get rich: demand may fall, the artist may oversaturate the market or end his career altogether. According to TV presenter and well-known collector Andrei Malakhov, it is difficult to consider art as an object for investment in Russia. “There is still some overclocking on the foreign market, they called me several times with an offer to sell some works. But I never bought with the thought “I will buy, hold and sell,” he told Vedomosti. Town". nine0003

Nickelodeon, Andrian Genie / Christie's

It is impossible to invest in what you don't like, what you don't accept on an emotional level, art historian Alexei Petukhov is sure: "From the very first steps, collecting was connected with mutual understanding between the artist and his representative, the gallery owner." Even if the investment did not materialize and the work fell in price, and the choice was made out of love, you can always rejoice at your favorite painting and realize that you have supported a particular artist and like-minded person. nine0003

According to Statista.com, in the pandemic year 2020, the art market, that is, the market of buyers and sellers selling services, objects and works of art, amounted to $50 billion. This is $14 billion less than in 2019. In 2021, the art market has recovered from the impact of the pandemic. Last year, experts at the auction house Christie's recorded the highest rates in the last five years.

“I will have what she has”, Flora Yukhnovich / sothebys.com nine0003

A study by Bank of America Art Services back in the fall foreshadowed a new growth in the global art market in 2022. Now, due to the events in Ukraine, according to the Financial Times, European buyers have paused. Among the main drivers of the market are the activation of demand, digitalization and the emergence of new collectors. Experts note an increase in interest in the art market from millennials and collectors from Asia.

During the lockdown period, online auctions began to take place. For example, Christie’s online sales in 2020 grew by 262% compared to the previous year, and in 2021 by another 43% (to $445 million). “As soon as the world slowed down and museums closed, people decided to create museums in their homes,” says the candidate of art history and an expert in the evaluation department at NINE im. PM Tretyakova "Ulyana Dobrova. nine0003

The art market depends on consumer demand, inflation and financial crises. Collector Inna Bazhenova started collecting art in 2007. “There was a real boom, including in its Russian segment, art was very expensive. Now the market has sunk, it is sensitive to economic and political crises. We are in line with the global process, and the movement is undulating - after the recession, there will someday be an upsurge, ”she says.

NFT fever

An important role in the recovery of the market after the pandemic was played by the boom around NFT art and the interest of large auction houses in it. Connoisseurs seem to have discovered a brave new world, previously concentrated in the sandbox of special closed areas and communities. nine0003

NFT is a digital asset certification system based on blockchain technology, which can also be used for art. Last year there was a sensation: Christie's sold for $ 69.3 million digital collage artist Beeple (Mike Winkelmann) "Every day: the first 5000 days" (Everydays: The First 5000 Days). The item was the first ever digital work sold by a reputable auction house exclusively in the form of non-fungible tokens.

Painting from the series "Every Day: The First 5000 Days", Mike Winkelmann / Wikimedia nine0003

In December 2021, nearly 29,000 digital art lovers bought Pak’s “The Merge” from Nifty Gateway for a total of $91.8 million. to the buyer, and was not sold to different people. In just a year, the sale of NFT works brought Christie's $ 150 million. But so far this is a drop in the ocean compared to the figures of more traditional segments of the art market.

The art of collecting art "Super-collector" Charles Saatchi talks about his discoveries: Culture: Lenta.ru

Once one of the most successful advertisers, and now a gallery owner, an influential collector and specialist in the search for young and potentially trendy artists, Charles Saatchi is a non-public person. However, in September 2009, Phaidon publishers will release the book "My Name Is Charles Saatchi And I Am An Artoholic" ("My name is Charles Saatchi, and I am an artaholic"), from which you can learn a lot of interesting things about the world of contemporary art and collecting. Selected remarks by Saatchi from the book were published by The Observer weekly. Lenta.ru offers an abbreviated translation of the material. nine0003

- You are spoken of as both a "super collector" and "the most successful art dealer of our time". How would you yourself describe your activities, looking back at the last twenty years?

- What difference does it make what they say about me. Collectors are rather insignificant people in the general world order. Art matters, and it continues to exist. I buy art that I like. I buy it and show it at exhibitions. If I want, I sell one and buy another. Since I've been doing this for thirty years, other people in the art world have caught on. Just because I'm selling something doesn't mean I'm out of love with it. I just can't keep everything all the time. nine0003

- Your buying habits of emerging artists have been surprisingly contagious, and are said to be having the biggest impact on the market today, with veterans and newcomers following your example and buying young, almost unknown artists. Will you take responsibility for this, in general, the speculative state of the market?

- I hope so. Artists need a lot of collectors, all kinds of collectors who will buy their things. nine0003

- Have you ruined anyone's life by criticizing all his works?

- I don't buy art to make artists happy, nor do I sell art to make them sad. Are you too melodramatic?

Diamond skull by Damien Hirst "For this is the love of God." Photo by AFP

Lenta.ru

- Does love for art, especially Renaissance or related to the Bible, bring you closer to God?

- It seems to me that the Lord must be very dissatisfied with his work. Mankind has turned out to be decisively unable to evolve over all these years, we are all the same idiots and barbarians as we were many centuries ago, and poor God, probably, shakes his head all day, observing our vileness and general worthlessness. However, maybe we can make him laugh. But, of course, I hope that the Lord likes our art enough to forgive us our sins. Especially mine. nine0003

- Which artist was your most pleasant discovery?

- I've been so lucky to have seen many early stage artists over the years, and I could say it was a "pleasure" to discover them. But I also "discovered" a lot of artists who nobody but me cared about, and their careers evolved very slowly, if at all. So I certainly don't have an infallible gift for discovering the winners. But it would be fair to say that I bought the work of Cindy Sherman at the first exhibition with her ... I bought most of the work from the first exhibition of Jeff Koons ... But all this is bragging, and in fact, I missed as many good artists as I found. nine0003

- Is it true that it is better to invest in paintings than in sharks in formaldehyde? Hirst's shark somehow blew now, but Peter Doig's canvas is as good as it was ten years ago, and it will be easier to restore it.

- There are no rules in investing. Sharks are good, and artists' excrement too. Canvas, oil are also successful. There will always be a team of restorers to look after what the artist considers art.

- What will be the value of British art of the beginning of the 21st century in a hundred years? Who will stand the test of time? nine0008

- Introductory art books of 2105 will be as ruthless towards the end of the 20th century as they have been towards all previous centuries. All but Jackson Pollock, Andy Warhol, Donald Judd and Damien Hirst will only get footnotes.

- If you would order a portrait of yourself, in what technique?

- I would rather chew a canvas than let myself be written on it.

- Do you encourage your children to explore your collection and visit museums and galleries? nine0008

- My kids don't think it's cool to have anything in common with my gallery. But they like the gallery shop.

- Should the country spend money to save the old masters for the people, or should the new generation be bought?

- At the risk of being lynched by a mob of people from art, I will still say that there is no great need to save pictures at the expense of new art. What difference does it make where Titian hangs - in the National Gallery, in the Louvre or in the Uffizi? It is no longer the 18th century, people travel, and there is no need to be a nationalist about the treasures of world art. It is more important to support living artists. nine0003
- What is your favorite museum?

- Madrid Prado. I love Goya very much. And this museum is so unpretentious, it so obviously loves to display its many masterpieces in the most modest way, that every visit there only strengthens my faith in the enduring value of art.

- Do [Damien Hirst's] mug paintings look like wallpaper?

- You can also say that Rothko's paintings look like pretty rugs. There is nothing wrong with decorative art. nine0003
About the Artists

When you study a great work of art, you will probably find that the artist was a kind of genius. And geniuses are different from you and me. So let's stop talking about temperamental, self-absorbed and absurd babies.
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