Art absolutely increases in value. And it's steady, too, being unaffected by the market. Your stocks might crash but the art market won't and a new artist isn't going to change the value of a Van Gogh like the discovery of a gold deposit.
Furthermore, the art itself has no true value so the price can be manipulated through hype. I know someone personally (client at my old job) who proudly played this game with the paintings of a deceased friend. You just need one person to spend 100k on a painting (say, a friend...) And then suddenly every painting is worth 100k. Hype and repeat.
It's been years since I dug into it but here is a decent article (that I admittedly skimmed as I'm about to leave work) describing how art is used to evade taxes