Although international galleries have spent the past decade wooing collectors in far-flung countries, opening spaces in Asia in particular, the next set of moves will result in an even greater concentration of the market in its two traditional hubs: London and New York.
London’s White Cube is looking for office space in New York to “serve its international client base”, a spokeswoman for the gallery confirms. Peter Brandt, who was the co-director of its space in São Paulo until it closed in August, is now looking for a space in Manhattan.
Dealers looking in London include the Paris- and Salzburg-based Thaddaeus Ropac, who had originally considered opening in Istanbul, and Liza Essers, who runs Goodman Gallery in South Africa.
London-based Lisson Gallery is due to open a huge space in New York next year, while Hauser & Wirth plans to upgrade to a new five-storey building in the city in 2018.
The moves are happening at a time when the auction houses are increasingly doing the bulk of their big-ticket business in London and New York. In October, Sotheby’s said that its sales in London had made more than £400m in 2015 to date, around £100m more than the equivalent period last year.
New York’s auction season in November is set to be the highest-grossing ever, with seven evening auctions planned over ten days. One of these—Sotheby’s sale of works from the collection of its former owner Alfred Taubman—is part of a group of sales guaranteed at $500m. Christie’s headline works—Modigliani’s Nu Couché (1917) and Roy Lichtenstein’s Nurse (1964)—are estimated to make $100m apiece.
Increasingly, auction houses from overseas—such as Austria’s Dorotheum—are bringing their high-end lots to show off in London or New York before selling them locally.
Putting down roots in tried-and-tested cities is partly a reflection of the fragile economic and political environment elsewh ere. Trading is already a challenge in many developing countries, and recent economic turmoil has increased the risks for overseas businesses.
“Ten years ago, galleries looked for ways to be around the world. But people soon realised that the costs weren’t just financial,” the New York-based dealer Sundaram Tagore says. He is investing in a bigger space on his home turf, and is looking to open in London, too.
“Globalisation has made it easier to bring collectors to New York and London, the art world’s original stomping grounds, and most of the important collectors already own homes there,” he adds.
Heading to London and New York can mean heightened competition (and rents), but it has also become necessary to prevent artists from finding alternative representation. The Paris-based dealer Emmanuel Perrotin is frank about having opened in New York in 2013 partly to keep his artists on board—a move that has paid off, he says.
Others say that, below the art market’s stratospheric heights, there are advantages to being away from the madding crowd. “It doesn’t always make sense to be in a ‘superhub’, where there can be too much noise,” Alain Servais, an entrepreneur and art collector, says. “A mid-level or smaller gallery could get more attention in a smaller city, provided they are in good company.”
Servais’s home town of Brussels is experiencing an influx of galleries, particularly from Paris.