Art market

Art marketanalysis

Randomness rules New York's $42m American art sales

Small works won out at Sotheby's and Christie's as top lots went for their low estimates or were withdrawn

Cheap rents and larger spaces: Barcelona suburb tries to entice dealers out of the city

Some galleries are moving out to the industrial warehouse L’Hospitalet but others say it is too far out of the commercial centre

Marina Abramovic’s The Life to become first mixed reality work ever auctioned

Christie’s will sell the piece with a £600,000 price tag next October to coincide with artist’s Royal Academy retrospective

Art fairspreview

After years of debt and disaster, Puerto Rico’s Meca art fair offers economic boon

Opening this week in San Juan, the third edition of the event hopes to help the region on the road to recovery

Collector and patron Kamiar Maleki appointed director of Volta and Pulse art fairs

The two events have recently come under the same ownership although there are no plans to merge them—yet

Auctionsanalysis

New York's autumn sales were subdued but not necessarily septic

Overall sales were down by around 30% but beyond the disappointing headline figures, women and minority artists shone

Art fairsreview

Still very much a local (af)fair: Art Düsseldorf's Asian promise is yet to come to fruition

Strong German collector base attracts European and US galleries but the the influx of international dealers and visitors is only a trickle

Banksynews

Banksy’s The Drinker withdrawn from Sotheby’s sale after rival artist claims ownership

Sculpture—estimated at £1m—was removed from the street by Andy Link in 2004 but later “liberated” from his East End garden

Banksynews

Artist who ‘kidnapped’ Banksy's The Drinker claims ownership ahead of Sotheby's sale

Andy Link says sculpture for which he demanded £5,000 in ransom was later stolen from him. Banksy’s former dealer says otherwise

Podcastspodcast

Anselm Kiefer interview. Plus, New York auction 'gigaweek'

We talk to German artist Anselm Kiefer about his new works inspired by String Theory and ask expert Scott Reyburn why the art market is treading water. Produced in association with Bonhams, auctioneers since 1793

Hammer Time: Sotheby's picks up the pace during a sluggish art week with $270.7m contemporary art sale

Record prices were set for Charles White, Brice Marden, and Wayne Thiebaud, while a Clyfford Still painting prompted a prolonged bidding war

Hosted and directed by Margaret Carrigan. Filmed and edited by Travis Wood. Produced by Helen Stoilas

Carved from a youth centre's walls, Keith Haring mural sells at Bonhams New York for $3.86m

The Grace House Mural becomes the first and only such site-specific work by the artist to be sold at auction

Helen Molesworth to collaborate with Jack Shainman on summer programming

The curator is organising “Feedback” for the gallery’s Upstate New York satellite space, marking her first major curatorial project since leaving LA’s Moca

Uncertainty hangs over Para Site’s fundraising auction as Hong Kong protests escalate

The non-profit art space derives half its annual income from the charity gala which last year raised a record HK$7.8m

UK buyer bags Artemisia Gentileschi painting for a record €4.8m in Paris

Work depicting Roman heroine Lucretia was in a private collection for 40 years

Two Dutch museums join forces to buy rare, $3m Van Gogh painting at Sotheby's New York

Work acquired by Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and the Drents Museum in Assen is one of few to survive from the artist's visit to Drenthe

Hammer Time: records set but reserves remain low at Christie's post-war and contemporary art sale

Ed Ruscha's visual pun Hurting the Word Radio #2 rose to $46m, a new world record for the artist, but most lots barely reached their estimate in a slow sales season

Hosted and directed by Margaret Carrigan. Filmed and edited by Travis Wood. Produced by Helen Stoilas

Fine Arts Paris to expand with new investment, but will it rival the city's Biennale?

New partnership with Connaissance des Arts magazine announced as third edition of the fair opens

Hammer Time: consistency and caution are key at Sotheby's Impressionist and Modern evening sale

The newly private auction house led the night's lots with its known money-maker Claude Monet, and set a world record for the Polish artist Tamara de Lempicka

Hosted and directed by Margaret Carrigan. Filmed and edited by Travis Wood. Produced by Helen Stoilas

'The complicated history of Boccioni sculpture is no barrier to record price at Christie's in New York'

Futurist bronze sculpture cast from another bronze in the 1970s sells for $16.2m—four times its estimate

Abuse of diplomatic privilege? How missing art has been linked to embassy officials

Recent cases involving stolen art have raised questions over the behaviour of diplomats

Hammer Time: Christie's Impressionist and Modern evening sale November 2019

In our new video series, deputy art market editor Margaret Carrigan recaps the highlights of New York's billion-dollar auction week

Hosted and directed by Margaret Carrigan. Filmed and edited by Travis Wood. Produced by Helen Stoilas

Also Known As Africa fair draws crowds but lacks big galleries—for now

Parisian fair dedicated to contemporary African art is gaining momentum in its fourth edition

Auctionsanalysis

Countdown to the auction block: one Rodin's journey from consignment to sale room

How a work of art comes to auction is far from a simple process and its place in the eventual sale order is crucial

Art marketpreview

Confidence may be low, but New York's auctions are aiming high

Can the quality of the smaller works coming up during "gigaweek" quell economic jitters?

'Hong Kong art market profits despite protestors’ pain'

If not immune to geopolitical unrest, then perhaps art is a refuge for money that is struggling to find its way into other assets