Sunday 13th March 2016

 

Last year in a blog on 16th July 2015, Beth Greet (former Manager of the Fletcher Gate Art Gallery) remarked about the seemingly unstoppable rise of the global art market and commented on how the market reaches peak after peak apparently immune to any economic downturns.

 

Sunday 13th March 2016

HAS THE BUBBLE BURST, IS IT READY TO PEAK?

 

As the world’s leading auction houses report a slump in sales and profits, the British Art Historian Dr Bendor Grosvenor believes “It looks like at the top end of the Modern and Contemporary Art Market buyers are beginning to look very wary.

A decade of growth appears to be ending but the leading auction houses themselves are to blame for the slump.  Christie’s said its decline was caused by a strategy to push special auctions focused on masterpieces. Sotheby’s gambled on the largest ‘GUARANTEE IN AUCTION HISTORY’ to acquire the collection of its former disgraced Chairman ALFRED TAUBMAN, forgoing any commission on sold works until it reached $515 million and promised to cover any shortfall – THEY LOST $12 MILLION WHEN THE SALE CLOSED.

Just two years ago the celebrated oil painting by Pablo Picasso ‘HEAD OF A WOMAN’ (1913) sold at Sotheby’s for an astonishing £24 m.  Last month when it came up for sale a second time it only managed £18.9 m, selling for 30% less.

 

Pablo Picasso’s ‘TETE DE FEMME’ oil painting sold for £18.9million at Sotheby’s in January 2015

 

Henri Matisse’s ‘THE PIANO LESSON’ (1923), the domestic scene of life in the Artist’s studio sold for £10.8 m last month well below its £12 m to £18 m estimate, at Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Sale.

 

Alberto Giacometti’s ‘BUST OF A MAN (1956), a sculpture bought just before the credit crunch for £1.6 m, was estimated at £1.8 m to £2.5 m at Christie’s last month but failed to sell.

Alberto Giacometti’s ‘BUST OF A MAN'(1956)

 

And Max Ernst’s ‘THE STOLEN MIRROR’ (1941) sold for £10.3 m in 2011, a record for the surrealist artist.  But the European collector who bought it suffered a loss when the work was sold for just £8 m at Christie’s in February this year.

 

 

There has been a race between the high end auction houses over who can sell the most art for the greatest money. 

In Dr Grosvenor’s opinion, “We haven’t had enough major sales this year to gauge the market in New York.  You have to take a long term view. The people who fetch the highest amount in the contemporary market today can be worth hardly anything in 50 years’ time.”

AND THE EXODUS HAS BEGUN; Henry Wyndham Chairman of Sotheby’s, a key figure, is leaving; “I have decided the time has come for a change and have now decided this is the moment”.  Melanie Clore Chairman of Sotheby’s Europe has resigned, Clore’s counterpart at Sotheby’s America in New York, David Norman tendered his resignation, as did Alex Rotter, Senior Director in Contemporary Art in New York.

Wyndham presided over the sale of many a masterpiece from Raphael, Rembrandt and Canaletto to Degas, Giacometti and Picasso, including recent record-breaking works by Turner and Gentileschi.

Does this all point to a ‘PEAK’ in the High End Art Market?  It appears now to be on the descent -only time will tell.

Sunday 13th March 2016

 

Claire Moore BA (Hons)

GALLERY MANAGER

 

WELCOME TO THE FLETCHER GATE FINE ART GALLERY