A woman poses for a photo of Andy Warhol’s ‘Shot Sage Blue Marilyn’ on April 29 during a press preview of Christie’s 20th and 21st Century Art in New York City.
Angela Weiss / AFP via Getty Images
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Angela Weiss / AFP via Getty Images
A woman poses for a photo of Andy Warhol’s ‘Shot Sage Blue Marilyn’ on April 29 during a press preview of Christie’s 20th and 21st Century Art in New York City.
Angela Weiss / AFP via Getty Images
The high-end art market appears to be booming, with a series of high-value auctions in New York bringing Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips’ combined sales to more than $2.5 billion for 2022.
Auctions this month alone include:
- 1964 Andy Warhol portrait of actress Marilyn Monroe,”Shot Sage Blue Marilyn“Sold at Christie’s for $195 million, currently the highest auction price for a 20th-century work.
- Jean-Michel Basquiat’s “16ft Untitled (Devil),” sold at Phillips for $85 million – up from $57.3 million at an auction in 2016.
- The painting “Femme nue couchée” 1932 by Pablo Picasso, Sold at Sotheby’s for $67.5 million
- Two works by Mark Rothko, sold at Christie’s for $116.4 million.
- Claude Monet’s trio of paintings sold at Christie’s for $168.7 million
Vendors at the Phillips auction were so confident in selling their wares that about half of last year took the auction house’s offer to secure a minimum price. Robert Manley, Vice President Phillips, told ARTnews that this confidence in the market is “astonishing” and shows the strength of the industry.
London art dealer Patrick Bourne notes that female artists in particular appear to be doing well this year, with recent sales of women’s works at Sotheby’s selling “sometimes 10 times the estimate” count.”
Bendor Grovesnor, a British art historian and former art trader, suggests that the high sales numbers indicate wealthy individuals view art as a “long-term hedge” in the future. uncertain economic times. Buyers need to trust that the market is rising before making expensive purchases, as auction houses make many cut deals.
“If you’re worried about inflation and stock market volatility, a painting or sculpture with the name of a blue-chip bank could be what investors see as a boon. safer bet,” he said, adding that healthy prices are particularly impressive given the amount of art on the market.
“Usually if you see things flying away, you would say it’s a reflection of limited supply, but that’s definitely not the case,” Grovesnor said.
Sales are soaring now after an earlier “small boom” in the high-end art market during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“There was definitely a time when the bored rich basically shifted the money they normally spend on services to other things,” says Grovesnor. During that period, the art market and leading auction houses were able to continue their online business quite seamlessly.
However, the latest increase appears to be something new, he said, and could also be related to a sharp drop in the value of some cryptocurrencies and their related digital art. , called Non-Fungible-Tokens, in recent weeks.
“There seems to be a risk that traditional art lovers might be overshadowed by crypto art and NFTs, but that doesn’t sound like it has worked out,” said Grosvenor. “So the primacy of painting on canvas remains with us.”
