A pair of plates priced at £150. Two cushions at £65 each. A limited-edition rug at £1,900. Limited-edition prints ranging from £625 to £7,650. And one original painting, from 2016, with an undisclosed “price on application”, understood to be in the six figures. This mix of original art and newly produced homewares comes from Gagosian’s partnership with the estate of Howard Hodgkin, the late British abstract painter (1932-2017). Could it also signal the shape of the art market to come?
The Howard Hodgkin Home line debuted in what a Gagosian statement termed “a takeover”, from 3 to 28 September, of the mega-dealer’s boutique shop dedicated to artist-related retail goods in London’s Burlington Arcade. After the gallery began selling wares online in the early 2000s, it opened the first Gagosian Shop on New York’s Madison Avenue in 2009, then the London store in 2022. Prestigious luxury brands such as Manolo Blahnik, Chanel and La Perla have mini outlets nearby the latter.
“The lines between selling luxury and art have become increasingly blurred,” says Ian Taplin, a professor of sociology at Wake Forest University in North Carolina and the author of the 2019 book The Evolution of Luxury.
“The big luxury brands know that art is something that resonates with their customers. They have made a killing using art, but the artists have not done that well with luxury goods,” Taplin adds. Compare Louis Vuitton’s lucrative 12-years-and-counting collaboration with Yayoi Kusama to the contrasting fate of Other Criteria, Damien Hirst’s retail chain, whosestandalone outlets in London, Devon and New York each closed during the 2010s.
Merging lanes
But with sales of big-ticket contemporary works in a dip, has the time come for the art market to radically reimagine its relationship with luxury? Certainly, some of the trade’s leading players think so.
The lines between selling luxury and art have become increasingly blurred
In the three years since the mega-gallery David Zwirner launched Platform, an ongoing digital sales channel, in 2021, it has transitioned from exclusively offering original works of art in partnership with emerging and middle-market dealers to adding more affordable, limited-edition items designed by artists, such as a silver pendant by Josh Smith for $375 and a Dana Schutz jigsaw puzzle for $200.
Rival mega-gallery Hauser & Wirth opened its five-star Fife Arms luxury hotel in Scotland in 2019 and acquired London’s legendary Groucho Club in 2022. Mirroring the retail initiatives of Gagosian, Zwirner and others, Hauser & Wirth’s online shop offers “an exclusive collection of artist-inspired gifts”, including a Philip Guston plate for £240.
The international auction houses have for decades found that sales of luxury collectibles such as handbags, watches and jewellery are an effective gateway to attract new clients. But here too the relationship between luxury and the core business is evolving, most notably at Sotheby’s.
Luxury goods contributed 30% of Sotheby’s $7.9bn revenue in auction and private sales in 2023, compared to 20% of the $5bn in auction sales made by Christie’s (which did not disclose private sales figures). Sotheby’s now sells high-end classic cars and luxury real estate, having become a part-owner of RM Auctions and Concierge Auctions in 2015 and 2021 respectively. (As we went to press, Christie’s announced it had agreed to acquire the US-based rare car auction house Gooding & Co.) Sotheby’s also operates physical showrooms; in July, it opened its latest, called Maison, a 24,000 sq. ft space in Hong Kong with seven thematic “salons” that, according to Sotheby’s, “re-imagines the art and luxury philosophy”.
“The total addressable markets are enormous,” says Josh Pullan, Sotheby’s global head of luxury, referring to the world’s ever-increasing population of wealthy and ultra-wealthy individuals. This year’s UBS Global Wealth Report estimates there were 58 million millionaires and 2,664 billionaires in 2023.
Asymmetrical spend
Sotheby’s and other art businesses must address the yawning discrepancy between what consumers spend on luxury versus art. According to the management consulting firm Bain, global sales of personal luxury goods grew from $301bn in 2019 to $387bn in 2023, an increase of almost 29%. The 2024 Art Basel and UBS Art Market Report estimates that art sales decreased 4% over the same five-year period, from $67.7bn to $65bn.
Given the huge “addressable market” of more than 58 million individuals with more than $1m in liquid assets, why do so few of them spend it on art?
“Art is expensive, there’s an awful lot of it, and apart from the major stars, whose prices are prohibitive, there isn’t the brand recognition,” according to Taplin. He says that, for the most part, the art world is “intimidating”, and that art “has less cultural relevance for new wealth groups than it did in the past”. He adds: “They’re purchasing different things to have luxury experiences rather than an Andy Warhol to impress their friends.”
“When generations shift, tastes and markets also shift,” Pullan says. “It’s what speaks to the collecting audience. It needs to be relevant. It needs to be welcoming.”
The seemingly growing disconnect between wealth and art is clear to see in the multimillion-dollar properties offered by Sotheby’s residential real-estate business Concierge Auctions. There are plenty of opulent bedrooms, bathrooms and reception rooms, but hardly any art of consequence.
So rather than illustrate works of art in catalogues on blank walls with a model staring into space, why not show them hanging in luxury homes to make the art more relatable? If just 1% or 2% of the world’s 58 million high-net-worth individuals bought a couple of five- or six-figure paintings a year, would that not help move the art trade’s dial? Should buying art be more like a retail shopping experience, with more affordable artist-designed “gateway” products to spark initial interest?
Within an hour following the public opening of the Gagosian Shop’s new homeware and art initiative, a pair of Hodgkin Home range cushions had sold for £130 before this writer’s eyes. As the Tesco supermarket chain says in its advertisements, “Every little helps.”