Painting-to-painting comparison

Yesterday I talked about the art on the show The L Word. There is a scene from a recent episode that I'd like to talk about today.

In the scene, Bette, a high-level art figure, is talking to a character named "Michelangelo" about art. Michelangelo says that he saw a recent show at a local art center, which featured at least 10 paintings that were all better than the Eric Fischl painting Bette owns. Bette considers this for a moment, then concedes that it might be true.

This is what I am calling a "painting-to-painting comparison". It's where you choose a single painting by a famous artist and compare it to a single painting by a non-famous artist (for example, yourself), and determine that you are "better" than the famous/rich artist. I used to do this a lot a few years ago - I'd choose a single painting in a magazine, gallery, museum, etc., compare it with my best painting, and decide that I'm better than this guy, and wonder why I wasn't rich and famous.

These painting-to-painting comparisons are not valid. It's sort of "fun" to do them, to make yourself irritated about how unfair the whole art-world/ fame thing is. For a reality check, how about comparing your worst painting to the other artist's best one?