Inside the Craze for KAWS KAWS’S Total Auction Sales (US$)

Spring 2019 Intelligence Report

A Buyer’s Guide to the Venice Biennale

How Does Art Inside Perform in a the Craze Recession? Which Artists Will Go Blue- for KAWS Chip in 2019? Table of Contents

At a time when the US President is under investigation, the prospect of Brexit looms over the UK, and China is in 4 The Art Market by 46 What to Expect the midst of a bruising economic slowdown, the art mar- the Numbers in the Art Market ket may not be the most important matter on your mind. • Total auction sales around the globe When You’re But here’s the thing about the art market: It is a reflection • Why you’re paying more for art Expecting a of the larger economy—and the world around us. Every • Expert predictions for 2019 geopolitical event, cultural shift, and election has a Recession By Tim Schneider ripple effect that jostles our little sector.

Three lessons we learned from

Editors’ Letter The second artnet Intelligence Report drills down into the 2008 market crash—and the fact that art is never divorced from commerce, poli- 6 The Best-Seller what it tells us about the future tics, or economics, much as we might like to think other- Lists wise. In this issue, we explore the effects of China’s economic quake on the art market and uncover the powerful The top 10 lots of 2018 in every forces behind the craze for street artist-turned-global major category phenomenon KAWS. We also offer advice about how to 52 Ahh … a most wisely handle your art collection during a recession and present a handy guide to the rising stars participat- Refreshing ing in this year’s Venice Biennale. Data Dive 20 Does the Future of By Julia Halperin Above all, this report explores how data—compiled here the Art Market in close and creative partnership with the indispensable We pull together exclusive artnet Price Database team—can offer valuable insight Look Like ... KAWS? data about the market’s 2018 By Eileen Kinsella to help us better understand the past, prepare for the performance, gathered from the future, and maybe even have some fun along the way. artnet Price Database, and speak How a New Jersey-born graffiti to experts about what it all means artist subverted almost every art- Andrew Goldstein and Julia Halperin market norm to become a global phenomenon 61 Who Are Today’s Most Bankable 28 A Buyer’s Guide Artists? to the Venice See the 10 best-selling artists in Biennale each genre last year By Melanie Gerlis Andrew Goldstein Julia Halperin Editor-in-Chief Executive Editor What you need to know when artnet News artnet News shopping for the show’s most @AndrwGoldstein @juliahalperin desirable artists

2 3 Intelligence Report BY THE NUMBERS

The sum spent The growth rate of the value THE NUMBER on fine art, design, of fine art worldwide in 2018. Is OF WOMEN and decorative art that good news? Not really, says ON THE LIST OF 100 TOP- at auction in 2018— $5.95 Benjamin Mandel, a global strategist SELLING ARTISTS IN 2018 less than one percent at JP Morgan Asset Management. 5

BILLION more than in 2017. It’s still less than the growth rate of BILLION the global GDP. “The sales growth 1. $19.3 The total amount of in the art market underperformed money spent overall economic activity,” he says.

on postwar and 4.1% “It was a soft year.” contemporary art YAYOI KUSAMA at auction worldwide, The total amount a 15 percent increase of money spent at from 2017. (Just 2. auction on fine art remember, it’s all “Although the value and design alone in relative: carmaker 2018, up 4.1 percent Tesla generated $7.23 of the sales has held

BILLION from 2017. billion in revenue in relatively constant, the $14.7 the final quarter of JOAN MITCHELL 2018 alone.) number of lots sold has decreased dramatically. 3. That’s showing you “Because auctions are driven by supply, when there’s a contraction in major estates come up, the market.” GEORGIA O’KEEFFE it makes for more robust Jeff Rabin, Cofounder, Artvest 4. 7.5% years. Estates were a major player last year.”

Suzanne Gyorgy, Citi Private Bank’s CECILY BROWN global head of art advisory and finance 5. $$$ $59KThe average price of a work of fine art sold at auction in 2018—up from $43,000 in 2013, a rate LOUISE BOURGEOIS of growth that far outpaced inflation. “ So many women artists who are considered masters and essential to the story of contemporary art The share of all fine-art PEGGY & DAVID The consecutive years ROCKEFELLER don’t show up in the evening sales. auction revenue last that the total number I think, and hope, that will change.” year generated by just BARNEY of works of art sold at two estate sales. EBSWORTH auction has dropped. Wendy Cromwell, art advisor

4 The Best- 1 Ultra-Contemporary 2 Contemporary 3 Impressionist & Modern 4 Postwar $eller 5 European Old Masters 6 Photographs Lists6 Ultra-Contemporary

Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Mimetic Gestures (2010)

Because Crosby makes only about six to eight works each year, competition for her dazzling collages is fierce. As a result, the vast majority of collectors “can’t access Crosby, period—it’s not a matter of at what price,” says the art advisor Todd Levin. “If a collector wants to pur- chase a Crosby and not donate it to a museum, the only option is the secondary market.”

ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE

Adrian b. 1977 Boogeyman 2010 $ 6,358,144 1 Ghenie

Njideka b. 1983 Bush Babies 2017 $ 3,375,000 2 Akunyili Crosby

Ren b. 1976 Nine Dragons and Sea 2018 $ 2,760,145 3 Zhong

Jonas b. 1977 Maritime Hotel Pot with Aloe 2014 $ 2,292,500 4 Wood

Jonas b. 1977 Rosy's Masks 2008 $ 2,061,219 5 Wood

Jonas b. 1977 Black Still Life with Yellow 2013 $ 2,055,000 6 Wood Orchid

Njideka b. 1983 Mimetic Gestures 2010 $ 1,932,500 7 Akunyili Crosby Hao Liang, The Hunter and the Transformations Hao b. 1983 Shell 2010 –11 $ 1,854,856 of Hell (2011) 8 Liang The young artist, whose modest aim is no less Njideka b. 1983 Untitled 2010 $ 1,392,500 than the total reinvention of traditional Chi- 9 Akunyili Crosby nese ink-wash painting, broke the $1 million mark at auction twice in 2018. Last summer, Hao b. 1983 The Hunter and the 2011 $ 1,362,457 his debut exhibition at Gagosian in New York 10 Liang Transformations of Hell sold out before it even opened.

8 9 The Best-Seller Lists Christopher Wool, Contemporary Untitled (1990) It’s worth noting that two other big-ticket paintings by Wool—both abstract compositions—failed to find buyers the same evening this one sold. All told, the artist had an uneven year, with five of 22 paintings going unsold at auction. Word paintings like this one remain the most sought-after part of his oeuvre.

ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE

Jean-Michel 1960–88 Flexible 1984 $ 45,315,000 1 Basquiat Works by Basquiat from 1982 and 1983 are by far Jean-Michel 1960–88 Flesh and Spirit 1982–83 $ 30,711,000 the most desirable—and 2 Basquiat sure enough, all of these top performers date to Jean-Michel 1960–88 Untitled (Pollo Frito) 1982 $ 25,701,500 those years. 3 Basquiat

Jeff b. 1955 Play-Doh 1994–2014 $ 22,812,500 4 Koons

Kerry James b. 1955 Past Times 1997 $ 21,114,500 5 Marshall

Jean-Michel 1960–88 Discography Two 1983 $ 20,900,000 6 Basquiat

Peter b. 1959 The Architect’s Home 1991 $ 19,967,222 Jean-Michel Basquiat, 7 Doig in the Ravine Flexible (1984) Jean-Michel 1960–88 Untitled 1982 $ 19,433,453 When a high-quality and fresh-to-market Bas- 8 Basquiat quiat hits the auction block, you can all but guarantee a bidding war. This work was the Jean-Michel 1960–88 Multiflavors 1982 $ 16,726,257 largest—and most expensive—painting ever 9 Basquiat sold by the artist’s estate. No wonder it nearly doubled its estimate. Christopher b. 1955 Untitled 1990 $ 15,218,750 10 Wool

10 11 The Best-Seller Lists Impressionist & Modern

Edward Hopper, Chop Suey (1929) Auctions aren’t always what they seem. Each of these works was This was the most expensive paint- guaranteed to sell—essentially, ing from the lucrative estate of trav- they were presold ahead of the el magnate Barney Ebsworth. But auction. The top two, worth more the sale made waves for more than than $272 million combined, were just its price tag: Ebsworth had sold on a single bid each to their promised the painting to the Seattle guarantors. Art Museum in 2007 but ended up leaving it to his family, who sold it.

ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE

Amedeo 1884–1920 Nu couché (sur le côté 1917 $ 157,159,000 1 Modigliani gauche)

Pablo 1881–1973 Fillette à la corbeille fleurie 1905 $ 115,000,000 2 Picasso

Edward 1882–1967 Chop Suey 1929 $ 91,875,000 3 Hopper

Kazimir 1879–1935 Suprematist Composition 1916 $ 85,812,500 4 Malevich Henri Matisse, Odalisque couchée aux Claude 1840–1926 Nymphéas en fleur 1914–17 $ 84,687,500 magnolias (1923) 5 Monet This painting, from the celebrated Henri 1869–1954 Odalisque couchée aux 1923 $ 80,750,000 Rockefeller estate, set a new record 6 Matisse magnolias for the artist. And it isn’t even from his most coveted period. Works from Constantin 1876–1957 La jeune fille sophistiquée 1928 $ 71,187,500 the early 1910s, when the artist made 7 Brancusi (Portrait de Nancy Cunard) La Danse, and paintings and cutouts from the 1940s are more desirable Willem de 1904–97 Woman as Landscape 1954–55 $ 68,937,500 than the decorative works from the 8 Kooning ’20s. “There are Matisses out there worth hundreds of millions, but Pablo 1881–1973 Femme au béret et à la robe 1937 $ 68,707,943 they’ll never come to market,” one 9 Picasso quadrillée (Marie-Thérèse dealer says. Walter) Pablo 1881–1973 La Dormeuse 1932 $ 57,864,252 10 Picasso

12 13 The Best-Seller Lists Zao Wou-Ki, Postwar Juin-Octobre 1985 (1985) Taiwanese executive Chang Qiu Dun, whose company produces treadmills and power tools, made a pretty penny on this monumental work. He bought it for $2.3 million in 2005 and sold it this past September for 28 times that price, setting a new record for an Asian oil painting at auction.

ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE

David b. 1937 Portrait of an Artist (Pool with 1972 $90,312,500 1 Hockney Two Figures) 2 Zao Wou-Ki 1920–2013 Juin-Octobre 1985 1985 $65,197,302

Jackson 1912–56 Composition with Red 1950 $55,437,500 3 Pollock Strokes

Andy 1928–87 Double Elvis [Ferus Type] 1963 $37,000,000 4 Warhol

Jackson 1912–56 Number 32 1949 $34,098,000 5 Pollock

Gerhard b. 1932 Abstraktes Bild 1987 $32,000,000 6 Richter

Andy 1928–87 Six Self Portraits 1986 $31,409,678 David Hockney, 7 Warhol Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) (1972) Lucian 1922–2011 Portrait on a White Cover 2002 $29,750,099 8 Freud British currency trader Joe Lewis million and offered the lot without was so confident in the demand for a minimum price reserve. His wa- David b. 1937 Pacific Coast Highway and 1990 $28,453,000 his Hockney, which starred in the ger paid off, and the sale vaulted 9 Hockney Santa Monica artist’s recent traveling retrospec- Hockney over Jeff Koons to become tive, that he reportedly rejected a the most expensive living artist at Andy 1928–87 Most Wanted Men No. 11, 1964 $28,437,500 financial guarantee of around $80 auction. 10 Warhol John Joseph H., Jr.

14 15 The Best-Seller Lists European Old Masters ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE Frans 1582–1666 Portrait of a gentleman, aged 1637 $ 12,803,437 1 Hals 37; and Portrait of a lady, aged 36

Rembrandt 1606–69 Study of the Head and $ 12,085,150 2 van Rijn Clasped Hands of a Young Jean-Baptiste- Man as Christ in Prayer Camille Corot, Venise, vue du Quai Eugène 1798–1863 Tigre jouant avec une tortue 1862 $ 9,875,000 des Esclavons (1845) 3 Delacroix When David Rockefeller bought this Venetian scene Jean-Baptiste- 1796–1875 Venise, vue du Quai des 1845 $ 9,009,844 Camille Corot in 1957, he had a hunch its 4 Esclavons proportions would be per- fect for the space above the Ferdinando 1619–86 A Bronze Group of Hercules 1640–50 $ 8,936,599 Tacca fireplace in the library of 5 Overcoming Achelous his New York estate, Hud- son Pines. He was right, Pieter 1565–1636 The Netherlandish Proverbs $ 8,060,240 6 Brueghel the and the painting remained Younger there for the rest of his life. Lucas 1472–1553 Portrait of John Frederick I, 1530s $ 7,737,50 0 7 Cranach the Elector of Saxony (1503-1554), Elder half-length

Anthony van 1599–1641 Portrait of Princess Mary 1641 $ 7,485,307 8 Dyck (1631–1660), daughter of King Charles I of England, full-length, in a pink dress decorated with silver embroidery and ribbons

Peter Paul 1577–1640 Portrait of a Venetian 1620s $ 7,161,708 9 Rubens Nobleman

Lucas Cranach the Elder, Ludovico 1555–1619 Portrait of Carlo Alberto Rati $ 6,705,342 Portrait of John Frederick I, 10 Carracci Opizzoni in armour, three- Elector of Saxony (1530s) quarter-length, wearing the Order of the Knights of Malta, This arresting portrait was the city of Bologna beyond presumed lost or destroyed for more than 75 years before it was returned to—and promptly sold by—the heirs of the Jewish More and more 19th- banker Fritz Gutmann, whose century works are collection was plundered by the turning up in Old Master Nazis in 1940. sales. Why? “It’s getting harder and harder to find great earlier paintings,” notes one dealer.

16 17 The Best-Seller Lists Photographs

Andreas Gursky, James Bond Island I, II & III (2007)

This wasn’t a particularly strong year for Gursky’s market (this work ranks 38th on his list of top auction prices) or for the photography market in general. But art advisor Todd Levin says Gursky isn’t going anywhere. “If one is a wise collector, that softening signals a potential buy opportunity should the right work come to market,” he says.

ARTIST LIFE TITLE DATE SALE PRICE

Richard b. 1949 Untitled (Cowboy) 2013 $ 1,695,000 1 Prince

Richard b. 1949 Untitled (Cowboy) 1999 $ 1,429,167 2 Prince

Richard b. 1949 Untitled (Cowboy) 1997 $ 1,428,384 3 Prince Cindy Sherman, Untitled Film Still #21A, Cindy b. 1954 Untitled Film Still #21A, City 1978 $ 1,252,814 City Girl Close-Up (1978) 4 Sherman Girl Close-Up This work is widely con- Helmut 1920–2004 Panoramic Nude with Gun, 1989 $ 982,347 sidered the greatest exam- 5 Newton Villa d'Este, Como ple from Sherman’s most significant series, “Unti- Andreas b. 1955 James Bond Island I, II & III 2007 $ 887,300 tled Film Stills.” At a time 6 Gursky when work by relatively untested young artists Andreas b. 1955 Kuwait Stock Exchange 2007 $ 795,000 is selling for three times 7 Gursky this price, “the collector who purchased that work Diane 1923–71 A box of ten photographs $ 792,500 got one of the best value 8 Arbus buys of the entire year for contemporary art,” says Andreas b. 1955 Avenue of the Americas 2001 $ 759,000 art advisor Levin. 9 Gursky

Diane 1923–71 Identical Twins, Roselle, N.J., 1966 $ 732,500 10 Arbus 1966

18 19 The Best-Seller Lists icture this: a line of dozens kyo. Perrotin’s inaugural exhibition with KAWS of people snaking down the in 2008—the same year the artist designed the aisle of a convention center, cover for Kanye West’s album 808s & Heart- all writing their names on break—marked “the only time someone stole a a legalP pad. No, they aren’t signing up for the work from my gallery,” he recalls. chance to win a free trip to the Bahamas or an Oculus Rift headset. They are entering a Last year, a switch seemed to flip. The steady lottery for the chance to pay $65,000 for an burn that had characterized KAWS’s market edition of a new print by the artist KAWS. for the past decade transformed into a full- blown inferno. In 2018, his work generated a Inside This unlikely scene played out during the first total of $33.8 million at auction—a 260 per- hour of the VIP preview at Art Basel Miami cent increase from the previous year, accord- Beach in December. And it is emblematic of ing to the artnet Price Database. His average the extraordinary ascent of an artist who has sale price also nearly doubled, to $82,063 from become a phenomenon without following the $42,272 in 2017. art market’s rules. What’s more, all 20 of KAWS’s highest auction Most artists work with galleries prices were set in 2018, including five that to find a niche and develop a surpassed $1 million. On November 15, the the moneyed collector base, then artist’s auction record was broken three times wait for those collectors to donate in a single night. their art to museums, where it finds a broader audience. KAWS worked backward: He developed GRAFFITI BEGINNINGS a massive global following on The 44-year-old Brooklyn-based artist, whose social media for his toys and real name is Brian Donnelly, got his start as a collectibles, and eventually, interest teenager, when, by his own account, he would trickled up to some of the most shell out $1 to take the PATH train from New powerful players in the art world. Jersey to New York City to leave his KAWS Craze tag—the somewhat random letters he chose “I had a feeling that he was going to because he liked how they looked together—on shake up our old art-world habits,” says downtown walls and buildings. He later began dealer Emmanuel Perrotin, who started tagging street advertisements with playful, showing KAWS just over a decade ago in Mi- cartoon-like figures. ami and has since organized eight solo shows for the artist in Paris, New York, Seoul, and To- In 1999, after graduating from New York’s School of Visual Arts with a degree in illustration and working briefly as a background for painter for animated TV shows like Doug and Daria, KAWS took a life-changing trip to Japan. There, he created his first editioned toys, a series of Mickey Mouse-like Companions in three colors. These characters also made their way into paintings, which have become extremely sought-after.

Before long, his work was popping up all over KAWS the world. The artist’s 2016 retrospective drew By Eileen Kinsella record attendance to the Modern Art Museum

20 CROSSOVER ARTIST of Fort Worth, in Texas, before traveling to the private collection of work by Andy There may be no better example of the KAWS effect—the artist’s 1980s, when he began buying work Yuz Museum, in Shanghai. In January, KAWS Warhol. uncanny ability to attract collectors of other kinds of collectibles and by Basquiat and Haring. erected an 11-story-tall inflatable “Companion” convert them into art buyers—than the trajectory of Utah-based Ron- in Taipei, his largest work to date. Mugrabi says he started paying nie Pirovino. A former advertising executive now working as a full-time MASS APPEAL attention to KAWS around 2011, collector and appraiser, he first encountered KAWS’s toys in the early “He’s omnivorous,” says Christie’s associate when he came across the work through 2000s—when the figurines, produced in collaboration with Japanese KAWS has not taken the typical path specialist Noah Davis. “No cartoon is safe Los Angeles dealer Honor Fraser. Fraser manufacturer Medicom, were only available in Japan. to art-market dominance. “Everyone from being consumed and turned into and her husband, collector Stavros in my generation knows KAWS, KAWS.” In November, Phillips sold Untitled Merjos, were major early champions of “I may not have ever come across his work if it wasn’t for my interest in and not because we saw a show at (Fatal Group) (2004), a painting that riffed the artist. (Fraser was not available for Japanese Pop culture,” Pirovino says. Skarstedt,” says Leon Benrimon, on characters from the 1970s Fat Albert comment.) Heritage Auctions’ director of cartoon series, for $2.7 million, about triple After more than 15 years amassing limited-edition figures, Provino put modern and contemporary art. its $900,000 high estimate. “This was like some sort of street art a complete set of every example KAWS ever made on the block at that I hadn’t seen before that came Heritage Auctions in November. All 111 works sold, a so-called “white- Mugrabi made a similar observation: But KAWS’s mass appeal has also been greet- out of Keith Haring and all the glove” sale that generated a total of $603,144, almost triple the presale “Collectors would come to my office ed with skepticism in many corners of the art graffiti artists,” Mugrabi recalls. high estimate. to look at Warhol or Basquiat and tell world. “You can call me an elitist,” says art “It looked familiar but completely me, ‘My son or daughter wants me advisor and publisher Josh Baer. “I’m sure he’s unfamiliar. I understood that this The auction was “a benchmark,” says Leon Benrimon, Heritage’s to look at KAWS.’ That was insane— a super nice guy and a great businessman. But guy had a completely different type director of modern and contemporary art. Typically, “if I told people it showed me the generation to come I don’t think that the history of art will go: of language.” Mugrabi and his family we have a toy auction coming up, they would laugh in my face. People was leading the way. An eight-year- Matisse, Pollock, Johns, Basquiat, KAWS. If have been devoted buyers ever since. saw Ronnie’s sale and started to get it.” old? A 24-year old?” you think that Paris Hilton and the Kardashi- ans are important cultural figures, then you’re KAWS’s market profile took another Benrimon says the toys bring out a demographic that wouldn’t neces- By press time, almost 900,000 likely to think KAWS is an important artist.” significant leap early last year when high- sarily think it has access to fine art. But there is increasing crossover. photos had been posted on profile dealer Per Skarstedt—who works Pirovino, for example, has begun to acquire work by artists Rashid Instagram with the hashtag As for the current thriving market, Baer has with such heavyweight artists as George Johnson, Jonas Wood, Avery Singer, and Katherine Bernhardt. “kaws”—more than the number for a prediction: “If you want to tell me that his Condo, Georg Baselitz, and the late Martin Jeff Koons, Damien Hirst, Jean- market is great, just prepare to take one or two Kippenberger—began representing him. KAWS, however, remains near and dear to his heart. “KAWS shaped my Michel Basquiat, or Andy Warhol. zeros off in 20 years when you prepare to sell. Mugrabi says Skarstedt was initially collection by making me really think about why I was drawn to his work,” It’s that kind of art.” skeptical about the idea but, after Pirovino says, “ultimately getting to know myself better in the process.” about a year of lobbying and cajoling, reconsidered and took KAWS on. (“We FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES always like to do our homework before we sign Despite his detractors, KAWS has been on a new artist,” Skarstedt says in response.) promoted by some of the most powerful figures in the art world—among them, Alberto The artist’s first solo show with the gallery Mugrabi, whose family owns the world’s largest in November, “GONE,” featured four new THE TOP 5 large-scale bronze sculptures and a series of MOST new paintings—all of which, not surprisingly, 1 NEW YORK sold. “We monitor the primary-market sales LUCRATIVE very carefully and are focusing on placing CITIES FOR his works in serious private collections and 2 HONG KONG institutions,” Skarstedt says. KAWS AUCTION Other famous collectors have boosted SALES: KAWS’s profile outside the art-market 3 LONDON bubble. Reality star Kylie Jenner and her boyfriend Travis Scott, as well as musicians and producers Swizz Beatz and Pharrell, are known buyers of his work. KAWS collector 4 TOKYO and Chinese contemporary art expert Larry Warsh says he has not seen anything like the energy of KAWS and his art since the $$$ 5 PARIS 22 23 Inside the Craze for KAWS KAWS’s Total Auction Sales (US$)

$35M “I’ve seen him $30M $25M

go from an $20M underground artist $15M that a few people $10M $5M knew to being on $0 the main stage.” 2 008 2 009 2 010 2 011 2 012 2 013 2 014 2 015 2 016 2 017 2 018

Swizz Beatz, who has been collecting KAWS Lots Sold and Bought-In Lots Sold Bought-Ins KAWS’s work since 2008. 500 450 400

350 In 2018, KAWS was the 24th-most-searched artist in the 300 artnet Price Database (one slot below French-Chinese 250 200 market force Zao Wou-Ki, but one above Banksy). 150 KAWS, Pay the Debt to Nature, 2010 100

Part of KAWS’s appeal may come from the fact that, 50 unlike the work of some artists, his richly saturated, with KAWS. “Social media is telling the marketplace 0 flat, Pop-inspired compositions reproduce faithfully what is important culturally.” 2 008 2 009 2 010 2 011 2 012 2 013 2 014 2 015 2 016 2 017 2 018 online. Suzanne Gyorgy, the head of Citi Private Bank’s The artnet Price Database art advisory, says she has “talked to people who are KAWS’s institutional projects have similar reach. Andrea KAWS’s Adjusted Average Avg. Sale Price building a business just by selling KAWS works on lists 1,293 KAWS lots having Karnes, a senior curator at the Modern Art Museum of Sale Price & Mean Estimate (US$) Mean Estimate paper online, via hashtags.” Fort Worth, was surprised to see visitors flocking to a gone to auction. Of these, $90k small show of the artist’s work at the museum in 2011. $80k

“I think we’re seeing the 86 percent, or 1,085, $70k effects of how the art “I didn’t have an understanding at that time of KAWS’s found buyers. $60k market has gone global,” audience,” she says. “Every time I went over to the $50k says Jacob Lewis, director galleries, it was a different crowd and just an entirely $40k of Pace Prints, which has new demographic. It was younger people who were very $30k released about 10 print engaged with what they were seeing.” $20k editions $10k Whether the breadth of his appeal will translate into $0

long-term sustainability remains to be seen—though 2 008 2 009 2 010 2 011 2 012 2 013 2 014 2 015 2 016 2 017 2 018 some are betting on it. “Collectors who are in their 20s or 30s might not have the means to buy a painting right KAWS Lots Sold for More than High Estimate > High Estimate < Mean Estimate now, but when they do have more disposable income, & Lots Sold for Less than Mean Estimate it will be the same sensation that started happening 15 100% years ago with Warhol,” Benrimon says.

80% The next chapter of the KAWS story may offer a window into where contemporary art is headed. As longtime 60% Modern Art Museum chief curator Michael Auping 40% wrote in a catalogue essay: “KAWS is [art critic Clement]

Greenberg’s worst nightmare and a philosophical 20% challenge to those of us who, perhaps secretly, want to believe in fine art ‘purity’ and the separation between 0%

high and low.” 2 008 2 009 2 010 2 011 2 012 2 013 2 014 2 015 2 016 2 017 2 018

24 25 Inside the Craze for KAWS THE KAWS COLLECTIBLE UNIVERSE PRINTS HIGH FASHION Few contemporary artists produce work in as many different media and as many price ranges as KAWS, who has designed a pair of Air Jordans, Marc Jacobs flats, and even a balloon for THE LATEST: KAWS recently the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Here’s a handy overview of his most prominent forms. collaborated with Christian Dior’s menswear artistic director Kim Jones on the TOYS SCULPTURES designer’s inaugural summer 2019 collection. THE PRODUCT: The domestic-size works (larger than the PRICES: A cotton Dior T-shirt toys, smaller than the outdoor with KAWS bees for $890, sculptures) are produced in THE PRODUCT: Edition sizes jeans for $1,700, a cotton bee editions of 10, 25, and 100. range from 20 to 250. The jacket for $2,050, and bee Monumental sculptures, quality of KAWS’s prints and socks for $250. meanwhile, come in editions the overwhelming demand for of two to three. his name keep interest high: “Multiples are a huge part of FAST FASHION ORIGINS: KAWS created what KAWS’s art is about,” says the first large Companion Lindsay Griffith, international THE LATEST: The artist coll- THE PRODUCT: KAWS has sculpture exclusively for his head of contemporary editions aborated with the mass- produced well over 100 edi- now-defunct Tokyo boutique, at Christie’s. market retailer Uniqlo twice tions of now-recognizable OriginalFake, which opened and sources say they sell last year. characters such as “Com- in 2006. for about $1 million on the PRICES: Complete sets of 10 panion” (a Mickey Mouse- primary market. screenprints—Ups & Downs THE PRODUCT: The first inspired cartoon with Xs for PRICES: This past September, (2013), Blame Game (2014), collaboration was a capsule eyes), “Chum” (a version of Philips sold a four-foot-tall MOST WANTED: In Novem- No Reply (2015), to name a collection of T-shirts that Companion that looks like the gray Companion from 2007 ber, Phillips sold the nearly few—were initially priced at included a new Companion Michelin Man), and “Accom- for $150,000, far above the 25-foot-tall Clean Slate (2014), $25,000 and now regularly inspired by the blue puppet plice” (Companion, but with $25,000 to $35,000 estimate. a large gray Companion, for fetch around $100,000 at Grover along with other bunny ears) in vinyl, wood, Monumental sculptures have just under $2 million. auction. Sesame Street characters. and other media. fetched millions at auction, The second included hoodies, BUYER BEWARE: Auction sweatshirts, tees, and a range ORIGINS: In 2002, after coll- houses try to prevent sets of “plushie” toys. aborating with several PAINTINGS from coming to auction manufacturers in Japan in too soon after their initial PRICES: From $9.90 for a the late ‘90s, KAWS decided PRICES: On the primary primary market release. T-shirt to $39.90 for plushies. to cut out the middleman and market, paintings now release his figurines through consistently sell for six figures, his own website. up to about $300,000, sources DESIGN say. Prices have soared PRICES: When first released, far higher at auction, as THE LATEST: KAWS teamed an edition of eight, sold out soon the figures cost between $100 evidenced by the November up with the Brazilian design after they debuted, at the gallery and $500. (At press time, all sales of CHUM (KCB7) (2012), duo Humberto and Fernando Friedman Benda’s Design of the Companions on KAWS’s which more than quadrupled Campana to produce a line of Miami booth in December. website, priced at $480 each, its $500,000 high estimate to KAWS x Campana chairs and were sold out.) They routinely fetch $2.4 million. sofas covered with plush stuffed BIG FANS: The collaboration fetch ten times as much on the animals. went viral when Kylie Jenner resale market. MOST WANTED: The earliest Instagrammed her daughter ORIGINS: KAWS’s painting paintings featuring altered PRICES: The chairs were Stormi gleefully reclining on MOST WANTED: Wooden production picked up in the images of cartoon characters, produced in an edition of 25 and one of the pieces, a gift from Companions are the most early to mid-2000s, as did the including the Simpsons, reportedly retail in the range of Kylie’s boyfriend Travis Scott. coveted. works’ prices. SpongeBob, and the Smurfs. $25,000; the sofas, produced in

26 27 Inside the Craze for KAWS s the 58th Venice Biennale Some collectors, meanwhile, prefer to hunt at approaches this spring, you the biennale for historic showpieces to add to are likely to begin hearing their holdings, however ambitious—or ungain- A the familiar refrain that ly—they might be. Just ask Belgian collector A Buyer’s Guide to this most prestigious event on the global con- Alain Servais, who once phrased the appeal of temporary art calendar—also known as “the buying from Venice this way: “Do you want the Olympics of the art world”—is all about the art, derivative works—do you want the T-shirt ver- not the market. By now, however, most have sions that you can buy at Frieze and Basel—or come to acknowledge that this is nonsense. do you want the original one? The big boys, the Venice Biennale they prefer the originals.” Biennials provide artists with needed valida- By Melanie Gerlis tion and distinction in a crowded field. Out of the dozens held around the globe each year, the one in Venice—through both its central exhibition and individual national pavilions—offers the most influential stamp of approval. Its top award, the Golden Lion, is the closest equivalent to an Oscar (or even Nobel Prize) that the field has to offer.

Sure, the biennale, which runs this year from May 11 to November 24, is not so crude as to put prices on the walls or red dots on works sold, and commercial conversations are rather hushed on-site. But gallerists—who have often contributed to the funding of the ambitious works on view—will be very much on the ground, hosting parties and wooing collectors.

Works in Venice aren’t always the most commercially attractive, since they are often sprawling, conceptual installations. But you’ll undoubtedly notice plenty more-wall- friendly work by these same artists at the Art Basel fair in Switzerland, which welcomes VIPs a few short weeks after the biennale’s grand opening.

“If galleries aren’t bringing works by their With all that in mind, we selected eight national Venice artists [to Art Basel], then there is pavilion artists who are likely to be among the something wrong with their sales strategy,” stars of this year’s Venice Biennale and delved says Louise Hayward, director at London’s into their markets to provide a buyer’s guide to Lisson Gallery, which represents Laure Prou- their most sought-after works. $ vost, the official artist of France’s national pavilion this year. Although the event was still being finalized at press time, several themes are clear this year. “There’s a familiar More women, more artists of color, and a generally older and more politically aware group refrain that this can be expected to be on view in the Giardini’s event is all about the pavilions. This chimes with the current delib- erate market mood and suggests that the bur- art, not the market. geoning appetite for more sober, revisionist, and This is nonsense.” thoughtful art will continue to take root in 2019.

28 29 The Venice Biennale Renate Bertlmann (b. 1943)

Representing: Austria Up next: Bertlmann’s first-ever solo museum exhibition will debut at the new Landesgalerie Niederösterreich in Krems, Austria, on May 25 (running through September 29).

Gallery affiliation: Galerie Steinek (Vienna), Also worth knowing: Richard Saltoun (London) Bertlmann is the first solo female artist to represent Austria at the Venice Biennale. Most wanted: Bertlmann’s latex pieces—dildos, Renate Bertlmann, Zärtliche Berührungen (Tender Touches), 1969 teats, condoms—once shocked the public (her work has routinely been banned from exhibition) Price points: Best but are now prized. Dallas collector Marguerite Hoffman Bertlmann “didn’t have much known for: owns Bertlmann’s full 120-piece of a market originally,” says installation Washing Day (1976–77), Niamh Coghlan, sales director chosen by curator Jessica Morgan at Richard Saltoun gallery. But Confrontational, for the 2014 Gwangju Biennale. prices have shot up in recent years edgy, second- The work comprises skinlike as both private collectors and items—including nipples, phallic institutions engaged more deeply wave feminist, pacifiers, and vaginal forms— with postwar feminism. All three installation works hung across five clothes lines. editions of the Verwandlungen Meanwhile, Bertlmann’s 53 staged photographs, for instance, have that fuse objects photographs, Verwandlungen sold, as well as the artist’s proof. associated with (Transformations), taken in 1969, Coghlan now values these sets at proved popular in a special section around £45,000 each. Individual masculine and of Frieze London in 2017 dedicated latex works are available for feminine sexuality to feminist artists who made between £7,000 and £10,000, explicit work in the 1970s and ’80s. moving up to six figures for complete sets. Renate Bertlmann, Viagra, 1998

30 31 The Venice Biennale Enrico David (b. 1966)

Best Gallery affiliation: Michael Werner known for: (London, New York) Representing the human body with Up next: a queer narrative Interest in the Italian-born, London- across several based artist is growing across the Atlantic. David’s first major media, including retrospective in the United States, sculpture and “Gradations of Slow Release,” is on view at Chicago’s Museum of tapestry Contemporary Art (through March 10), traveling from there to the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, DC (April 18– Most wanted: September 2). David’s drawings sell well, and nearly all of Installation view of “Enrico David: Gradations his pieces begin with a preparatory work on of Slow Release” at MCA Chicago, 2018. paper. Having appeared at auction just 23 times since 2002, according to the artnet Price Database, his work is fairly rare-to-market, with the best-sellers being his attractive thread- Also worth knowing: and-wool compositions on canvas. His auction David’s work is often described as record—achieved at Phillips in London in 2009, “tough”—Gordon VeneKlasen, at the same year he was nominated for the Turner Michael Werner, says. “He deals Prize—is just under $45,000. Longstanding with the body on earth, which isn’t collectors of his more ambitious works always a pretty picture.” include Vancouver’s Rennie Collection and the Maramotti family, founders of Italy’s luxury fashion business Max Mara.

Representing: Italy Price points: At Art Basel Miami Beach in December, Michael Werner gallery sold David drawings priced at $15,000, paintings at between $50,000 and $70,000, and sculptures for up with Liliana Moro (b. 1971) to $150,000. Enrico David, Untitled (Ombre Rosse), 2007 and Chiara Fumai (1978–2017)

32 33 The Venice Biennale Inci Eviner (b. 1956) Best Price points: Inci Eviner Total Sales, 2008–18 Eviner’s prices have only gently $50K increased over the past 30 years. known for: Her large canvases are now priced at around €25,000 to €30,000, $40K Sociopolitically while videos range from €30,000 engaged videos, to €50,000. On the secondary $30K market, 14 of her works have sold at Turkish auction houses performances, $20K and architectural for between $2,477 and $26,048, the latter fetched by a black- structures that and-white acrylic from 2011 that $10K was purchased after her Venice often challenge representation was announced. 0

how women have 2011 2017 2014 2012 2015 2013 2018 2016 2010 2008 2009 traditionally been portrayed

Gallery affiliation: Galeri Nev (Istanbul) since 1989, Up next: with overseas support from Eviner’s Venice project will Pearl Lam (multiple locations incorporate videos, drawings, and in Asia) and Mario Mauroner sound into an architectural setting Contemporary Art (Salzburg) of her own design, reflecting her “wide imagination,” says Haldun Dostoğlu, cofounder of Galeri Nev.

Most wanted: Collectors favor Eviner’s videos, Representing: Turkey black-and-white drawings, and Also worth knowing: canvas works. Her market to date has mostly been local, though Last year, Eviner’s video work was early buyers included Deutsche included in both the Liverpool and Bank’s corporate collection. Gwangju biennials. Inci Eviner, Harem, 2009

34 35 The Venice Biennale Voluspa Jarpa (b. 1971)

Gallery affiliation: Best Galería Patricia Ready (Santiago), known for: Mor Charpentier (Paris) Expansive, quietly activist projects based Price points: on revelations the Jarpa’s small installations and artist has gleaned drawings sell for between $4,000 and $7,000, while the major works from declassified fetch up to $45,000. archives of the CIA and other intelligence agencies Up next: Venice marks a new phase in Jarpa’s practice, as she closes the chapter on intelligence- archive investigations and focuses Most wanted: on today’s so-called crisis of masculinity. The biennale also Jarpa has been making archive- marks a return to painting, her based works since 2009, and original format and one that is buyers include “all the major Latin likely to prove more market- American art collectors,” says Voluspa Jarpa, Desclasificados, 2003 friendly. Philippe Charpentier, cofounder of Mor Charpentier. Although contemporary-art buyers in her home country of Chile remain scarce, her work has been acquired by collectors in Brazil, Mexico, Representing: Chile Colombia, and Argentina. It is also Also worth knowing: represented in the collection of San Jarpa came to the art world’s Francisco’s Kadist and the Blanton attention at the Istanbul Biennial in Museum of Art, in Austin. Jarpa is 2011 with Biblioteca de No Historia less well known in Europe, though (Library of No History), 2010, a that can be expected to change compilation of documents relating with the biennale. to the Chilean dictatorship. Voluspa Jarpa, Monumenta, 2018

36 37 The Venice Biennale Charlotte Prodger (b. 1974)

Most wanted: Price points: Prodger’s works—described as Prodger’s works sell for between “video sculptures”—have to date £7,000 and £50,000. mostly been placed in public institutions that are au fait with the moving image. Museums in Glasgow, where Prodger Gallery affiliation: lives, have been “particularly supportive,” says Emma Astner, Koppe Astner (Glasgow), cofounder of Koppe Astner. Astner Hollybush Gardens (London) describes Prodger’s market as “healthy” and notes that while video tends to be a tougher sell, there is a growing interest in the moving image. In fact, the four Representing: Scotland nominees for the 2018 Turner Prize Charlotte Prodger, Mini the Bull Terrier, 2016 were all filmmakers.

Also worth knowing: Prodger burst onto the international art scene in 2012 when her film Colon Hyphen Asterix, from that year, was shown at the Centre for Best Contemporary Arts during the Glasgow International. Tate known for: recently bought this work through Hollybush Gardens for £35,000, Winning last and fragments from it reappear in Bridgit. year’s Turner Prize with Bridgit (2016), a filmic Up next: meditation on Prodger’s work will be included landscape made in the group show “Palimpsest” at Lismore Castle Arts, in Ireland, entirely on the alongside contributions by Lynette artist’s iPhone Yiadom-Boakye, Martine Syms, and Nicole Eisenman (March 31– October 13). Charlotte Prodger, Northern Dancer, 2014

38 39 The Venice Biennale Laure Prouvost (b. 1978) Best known for: Up next: It’s looking like a busy year for Surreal, Prouvost, whose largest solo show playful films, to date is on view now through May 19 at the M HKA Museum performances, of Contemporary Art in Antwerp, and immersive the city where she now lives. For Venice, the pavilion’s organizers installations Laure Prouvost, Wantee, 2013 have promised a fictional film that investigate that questions the biennale’s Gallery affiliation: concept of national representation language and blur and which takes the form of “an Galerie Nathalie Obadia (Paris), invitation to melt into a liquid and fiction and reality Lisson Gallery (London), tentacular universe.” Carlier | Gebauer (Berlin)

Most wanted: Price points: Works range from €10,000 for Prouvost’s quirky, distinctive works small paintings and ceramics have attracted a loyal if niche to about €200,000 for the major following. Private buyers love her installations. The “Metal People” “Metal People” sculptures—stick works were priced at about figures with eerily appropriate €25,000 and sold out, according flat-screen heads. A number of to Lisson. her larger, film-based installations have found homes in Italy; Wantee, which unexpectedly won her the Turner Prize in 2013, is now in the Fondazione Sandretto Re Also worth knowing: Rebaudengo, in Turin. Further Last year, Prouvost invited an afield, work by Prouvost is also in Representing: France opera singer to roam the aisles of Beijing’s Red Brick Art Museum, Frieze London, turning overheard which hosted her first show in snippets of conversation into song. China in 2016. Vocalized phrases ranged from “What is she singing?” to “Have you watched [the Great British] Bake-Off?” Laure Prouvost, Metal Woman - Welcome, 2018

40 41 The Venice Biennale Martin Puryear (b. 1941)

Representing: United States Price points: Primary-market prices remain a closely held secret, although one source estimates that domestic- scale sculptures range from $475,000 to $650,000. At auction, Puryear’s prices have grown steadily—the artist’s sculptures Gallery affiliation: were commanding six-figure sums as far back as 1996. His top Matthew Marks Gallery (New York) auction sales are dominated by the wall-mounted “Ring” pieces, made Martin Puryear, Big Bling, 2016 in the 1970s and ’80s, including his bass wood Fraught (1983), which Martin Puryear Total Sales Value, 1988–2018 sold for $907,500 at Christie’s in 2016. Most wanted: 1988 1989 Puryear, now 78 and working in 1990 upstate New York, has always 1991 1992 had a very limited output, so 1993 whatever he makes is sought-after. 1994 Puryear’s work is generally already 1995 Best 1996 , 1998-2018 well appreciated (his landmark 1997 Up next: US retrospective toured through 1998 known for: 1999 “He gets hundreds of requests [for MoMA in 2007), but the African 2000 shows], but is totally focused on American history he references 2001 Doing wonderful 2002 Venice,” says Stephanie Dorsey, is likely to be newly appealing to 2003 senior director at Matthew Marks. things with collectors as the market continues 2004 2005 to reassess the importance of 2006 wood and fusing black artists. Puryear’s collector 2007 base is mostly in the US, where 2008 Modernism 2009 his works helped inaugurate the 2010 with craft in his expanded Glenstone museum, in 2011 2012 elegant, elegiac Maryland. He has had dedicated 2013 European buyers too, including 2014 Also worth knowing: 2015 sculptures The museum-like US Embassy Italy’s Giuseppe and Giovanna 2016 Panza, whose collection includes 2017 in Beijing just unveiled a 31-foot- 2018 the painted pine “Ring” sculpture high, stainless-steel arch made by Cerulean (1982). Puryear in 2008. $0.5M $1.0M $1.5M $2.0M $2.5M $3.0M

42 43 The Venice Biennale Eva Rothschild (b. 1971)

Most wanted: Representing: Ireland Rothschild’s larger works have Price points: gone to institutions, while her Rothschild’s smaller works now smaller geometric pieces get start at £45,000, while an edition snapped up by private buyers. of five bronze boulder sculptures, Empire, the arrangement of The Hot Knife (2018), quickly spider-like red, green, and black sold out at London’s Modern archways that graced New York’s Art stand at Art Basel priced at Doris C. Freedman Plaza in 2011, £85,000 each. Larger works “go has since been donated to the into the hundreds of thousands,” Walker Art Center, in Minneapolis, Gallery affiliation: according to Stuart Shave, the by the Minnesota agriculture Modern Art (London), gallery’s cofounder. Only 15 of heiress Martha MacMillan. The Modern Institute (Glasgow), Rothschild’s works have sold at 303 Gallery (New York), auction, topped by the nine-foot- Kaufmann Repetto (Milan), high Meta (2004), which fetched Galerie Eva Presenhuber (Zurich) £43,400 in 2015. Best known for: Also worth knowing: Immersive, angular Rothschild has a strong collector sculptures that base in Australia, helped by her participation in the 19th Sydney can defy gravity, Biennale in 2014. including the black zigzagging metal construction that sliced through Up next: For Venice, the London-based Tate Britain’s artist says, “I want to create an Duveen Galleries experience that is sculpturally excessive, critically aware, and in 2009 welcoming to the viewer.”

Eva Rothschild, Cosmos, 2018

44 45 The Venice Biennale By Tim Schneider othing gold can stay, and set out to examine past market contractions for every art-industry veteran lessons that could prepare us for the next one. understands that the good Because no matter how unappetizing it may be N times don’t last forever. to sell art in a downturn, someone is going to have to do it. Beneath the big-money rumblings of last November’s New York auctions—a bellwether To this end, we combed through fine-art auction slate of sales unfolding just a few weeks after data from 2005 through 2018, with a special the 10-year anniversary of the Great Recession focus on the crisis in 2008–9 and the more recent dredged up memories of titanic losses—it wasn’t art-market hiccup in 2016. (These were the only hard to hear a consistent, if sotto voce, stream downturns for which our analysts felt sector- of concern about a looming market downturn. wide data could be considered complete and The chatter only grew louder after several of the reliable.) After contextualizing the results with week’s marquee lots were greeted by lackluster firsthand experience from market experts who demand or failed to find buyers entirely, were in the trenches during these tumultuous dimming sentiment on the decent yet somewhat chapters, we teased out three pieces of advice for uninspiring overall results—and perhaps on the potential sellers in the next recession. market’s prospects as a whole in 2019.

A few months later, against the backdrop of Brexit, the Mueller investigation in the United Don’t be afraid to States, and other political uncertainties, many sell a masterpiece, in the trade remain wary about the near future. because great works Another decline is inevitable. When it will 1 begin, and how harmful it will be, remain open can still fetch great questions. Rather than speculate about those prices in downturns. impossible-to-predict answers, however, we’ve

Total Fine Art Sales at Auction $17B What to $16B $15B $14B

Expect in the $13B $12B

$11B $10B Art Market ... ? $9B $8B $7B $6B When You’re $5B $4B $3B Expecting a $2B $1B 0 2011 2017 2014 2012 2015 2013 2018 2016 2010 2007 2005 2008 2009 Recession 2006 46 47 Expecting a Recession Number of High-End $1 million–10 million low est. $10 million+ low est. mega-collector Robert Scull and was Was the “morose market,” as de Pury dropped almost 60 percent, to just Auction Consignments back on the market for the first time puts it, merely the result of few sell- 443; and the number of works con- in 23 years. “For [200 One Dollar ers offering works of rare quality? signed with a low estimate of $10 1500 Bills] to sell for over $40 million in “What dries up in down markets is million or higher dropped nearly 75 1400 the middle of the most morose mar- discretionary consignments,” the percent, to just 12. (Broadly similar ket ever signaled that the market was auctioneer notes. Data bears this but less severe declines occurred in 1300 still pretty much there,” says legend- out for blue-chip works. In 2009, the the 2016 downturn.) 1200 ary auctioneer Simon de Pury, who number of fine art pieces consigned 1100 credits the exuberant sale with help- worldwide with a low estimate be- So it’s possible that more sellers ing to pull the trade out of its funk. tween $1 million and $10 million could have snagged healthy returns 1000 sooner if they’d applied Warren Buf- 900 fett’s classic adage about investing: Change in Average 2009 800 Be fearful when others are greedy, Sales Price by Price Band 2016 Lots and greedy when others are fearful. 700 600 1% 500 0 Your best bet 400 is to sell a 300 -1% work estimated 200 2 -2% between 100 $100,000 and 0 -3% $1 million. 2011 2017 2014 2012 2015 2013 2018 2016 2010 2007 2005 2008 2009 2006 -4% Since the financial crisis didn’t make our sample other than 2005, when most valuable private collection sold On average, works valued at be- landfall until September 2008, glob- the market was smaller but on an to that time. -5% tween $100,000 to just under $1 al fine art sales at auction dropped upward trajectory. million showed the smallest over- only about 13 percent that year, to Together, Christie’s and Sotheby’s -6% all percentage drop in sale price in roughly $10 billion. It was 2009 that Despite the drop, the market pro- sold a total of about $4.5 billion in 2009 and 2016, two years in which bore the brunt of the downturn, with duced some extraordinary results fine and decorative art at auction in -7% fine art auction totals declined more total sales plummeting to just $6.4 during this year-long hurricane. The 2009. This means the Saint Laurent than 20 percent from the previous -8% billion—the lowest annual total in art dealer Daniella Luxembourg, collection accounted for roughly year. The average sales price within who formerly served as 11 percent of the Big Two’s sales this band dipped only about 1.6 per- president and co-owner that turbulent year—a staggering Change Percentage -9% cent in 2009, then actually gained of the Phillips, De Pury proportion that speaks to the 0.3 percent in 2016, outshining the & Luxembourg auction enduring value of masterworks. As -10% year-over-year performance of all house, highlights the Luxembourg explains, when the other price bands in our sample. historic Christie’s sale market is at an extreme low (or high), -11% of works belonging to “it doesn’t always affect all the works De Pury reminds us of the sound Yves Saint Laurent and of art. It just affects the fashionable, -12% economic logic beneath this Pierre Bergé in Febru- of-that-moment works of art.” phenomenon. He describes the art ary 2009. The collection -13% market’s socioeconomic structure ranged from Old Master This maxim proved true again in as a pyramid, with only a handful of paintings and Constan- November 2009, when Andy War- -14% collectors able to pay $100 million or tin Brancusi sculptures hol’s 200 One Dollar Bills vaulted to more for an artwork even in a heady to Qing dynasty bronzes three and a half times its $12 mil- -15% year. The population of willing and and 18th-century Italian lion high estimate to sell for $43.8 able buyers multiplies when you dining chairs. It racked million at Sotheby’s New York. One -16% descend to the $10 million price up $476 million in sales of only 10 Warhol canvases featur- range but remains thin. By contrast, and set six artist records ing more than two greenbacks, the -17% de Pury points out, “at $1 million, a Andy Warhol, 200 One Dollar Bills, 1962 en route to becoming the work was previously owned by early $0–10K $10K–100K $100K–1M $1M–10M $10M+ pretty large group can buy.” Estimate Band 48 49 Expecting a Recession Incidentally, Suzanne Gyorgy, that year plummeted by more than China’s outsize ascent didn’t last. Nanne Dekking, Citi Private Bank’s global head of art half in the United States and nearly By 2015—notably, a year in which founder and CEO of Artory and advisory and finance, notes that her Think outside two-thirds in the UK—but more than the country’s fine art sales crashed chairman of TEFAF, New York clients’ general “sweet spot” has been doubled in China, from about $711 (along with its stock market) while edging ever higher over the past two your home million to over $1.44 billion. (All re- US sales surged—“you’re already years, settling between $500,000 country. It’s a gional figures for China combine the seeing a stabilization of metrics for The market for fine art, decorative art, and design grew by less and $3 million. She attributes the 3 mainland and Hong Kong.) what China’s long-run size might global economy than 1 percent in 2018, and the number of lots sold at auction recent uptick primarily to the qual- — sell in what- look like,” says Mandel. “But back declined for the fourth consecutive year. What’s your reaction? ity of works available at auction in What accounts for the gargantuan in 2008, you were still very much in a relatively healthy 2017 and 2018, ever region has discrepancy? Benjamin Mandel, an extraordinary growth period for It’s not a healthy market. Whatever happened to the lawyer, the thanks largely to extraordinary es- the strongest global strategist for multi-asset so- art-related sales. When you add that dentist, the professional with fairly high income? Are they still buying? tate sales like Rockefeller’s. (Estates market. lutions at JP Morgan, highlights as an additional layer to the underly- For me, the biggest surprise in the art market is that we still mainly stand as arguably the best—and China’s robust long-term economic ing macroeconomic story, you have communicate to the constituency we already have. I see so many sometimes the only—way for auc- growth (thanks to its status as an a pretty good explanation for why opportunities to reach out to new people. tion houses to secure great works Comparing the past decade of auc- emerging market) and a two-year, the Chinese art market continued in troubled times. Death and estate tion sales in the United States, the $585 billion stimulus package an- apace” in 2008, even as the finan- The only two price bands that showed overall growth in the taxes don’t care about bad timing.) UK, and China, the art market’s nounced by the state in November cial crisis temporarily dragged the past five years were the two highest: $1 million to just under $10 three dominant regions, one feature 2008. The latter ushered in softer American and British art markets million, and $10 million and up. Considering the financial guar- Given what we know about the scar- stands out: A strong (or weak) year monetary and fiscal policies, largely under the waves. antees often needed to win consignments of trophy works, how city of great works consigned during for one is not necessarily a strong (or to accelerate provincial and local sustainable is that trend? contractions, sellers would be pru- weak) year for all. infrastructure projects. The effect dent to hew to the more conservative likely bolstered sentiment in the I don’t think it is sustainable. Christie’s can basically spend as much $100,000–1 million price band dur- The divergence was most extreme in country’s art market as well. as it wants to secure the most important lots. Sotheby’s has to ask ing the next downturn. 2009. Auction sales totals for fine art “A weak permission from shareholders to give up margins at that level. So it depends on how deep the pockets of [Christie’s owner] Mr. Pinault are Total Auction Sales of Fine Art by Country China UK US year for one in the end.

$7.5B region is not Recently, auction houses have made an effort to promote lesser- known Old Masters, particularly female artists. Given TEFAF’s $7.0B necessarily broad historical mandate, I assume you find this encouraging. $6.5B a weak year It is encouraging. I never believed Old Masters were completely out of $6.0B for all.” fashion. There are hardly any collectors anymore who solely buy one $5.5B category, and people queue for Old Master museum exhibitions.

$5.0B In the Impressionist field, it’s also becoming harder and harder to find When selling in a downturn, then, $4.5B the right kind of material. The big collectors are now looking at other choosing the right sales venue in the opportunities, and they see completely different price levels for very $4.0B newly global art market looks just good Old Master paintings. It’s an interesting shift. as important as offering works of $3.5B extraordinary quality or appealing There was a lot of talk of a “brain drain” at major auction houses $3.0B value. Strategizing wisely, let alone last year. How big a challenge do you think personnel turnover at having the courage to pull the trig- Christie’s and Sotheby’s will be for the market? $2.5B ger, may not be easy. But the good $2.0B news is that, no matter how bleak It’s not going to affect business at all. Yes, I had the most amazing things appear overall, opportuni- relationships with some clients [at Sotheby’s, where Dekking worked $1.5B ties still exist. Daniella Luxembourg until 2017], and they would only buy from me. But do you really think $1.0B says it best: “Art was always expen- that when Nanne Dekking leaves Sotheby’s, these people are not sive, and [yet], somehow, there is buying anymore? In the end, it’s about the artworks. Make sure you $0.5B always money for art.” have credible information about these works, and make sure there is a 0 somewhat presentable person to communicate it to the people buying art, and it’s fine. 2011 2017 2014 2012 2015 2013 2018 2016 2010 2007 2005 2008 2009 2006

50 51 Expecting a Recession Global Fine Art Sales Totals vs Lots Sold, 2013–18

Total Sales Value Lots Sold $20B 400K

$15B 300K

$10B 200K Lots Sold Lots

$5B 100K

Ahh… Global Fine Art Sales Totals 0 0 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 A Top-Heavy Market Do auction catalogues seem to be getting thin- That puts the art market in a precarious posi- a Refreshing ner? It’s not an optical illusion. Over the past tion, according to Benjamin Mandel, a global four years, the number of artworks sold at auc- strategist at JP Morgan Asset Management. “I tion has declined consistently. And because would expect continued growth over time in fewer lots are heading to the auction block, the a small market [like art], not shrinkage,” he sale price of the average work needs to keep ris- says. “It’s putting a lot of pressure on prices Data Dive ing for total auction sales to remain steady. to perform.”

Fine Art Sales by Country, 2013–18 USA UK China All Remaining Countries $8B

$6B

$4B

$2B

0 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 America Out Front We slice and dice international America cemented its status as the world’s larg- growth in 2018 than at any time in the past 28 data on sales by medium, genre, est art market last year with $6.17 billion worth years. The ripple effects were felt in the coun- and country to give you a sense of fine art sold at auction, a 20.6 percent bump try’s art market, which saw a 16.2 percent drop of where the market is headed. from 2017. “The United States plays an impor- in total auction sales. tant role in propping up growth,” says Mandel. This was particularly true in 2018, when the US Meanwhile, the UK defied Brexit jitters with economy as a whole expanded around 3 per- an 11.6 percent bump in total auction sales and cent, its fastest pace in more than a decade, India posted an extraordinary 219.6 percent while other major economies quailed. gain. Why? One house, AstaGuru, saw a 152.3 percent rise in total sales. And in 2017, Chris- The most dramatic downturn took place in tie’s stopped holding sales in Mumbai; last China, which experienced slower economic year, Sotheby’s began. By Julia Halperin 52 53 Data Dive Good for the World, Bad for the Market Fine and Decorative Art Sales by Price Band, 2013–18 Wondering how the market will evolve over the next The bad news is that, while humanity may benefit from a decade? We have good news—and bad news. The good more level economic playing field, inequality is the rocket $10 million+ $1 million–10 million $100,000–1 million $10,000–100,000 $0–10,000 news: Economists predict that the growth of inequality fuel that has been powering the art market. And since in- will lessen over the next five to 10 years as the rate of equality is likely to increase at a slower pace moving for- $25B globalization and technological change slows, capping ward, the art market is unlikely to see the same dizzying a period of massive expansion. “The amount of global growth spurts it has enjoyed over the past few decades. wealth creation in the past 20 years has been extraordinary,” says Artvest’s Michael Plummer. “We haven’t seen similar growth in the past year or two.” $20B

Top 100 Best-Selling Artists at Auction by Nationality in 2018

$15B

American/French Spanish 1% 3% French/Russian 2% French $10B 15% Russian/Ukrainian 1% Japanese 4% Chinese/French $5B 3% German 4%

Italian 0 3% 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

A Trophy Market compete fiercely to secure high-pro- perts disagree about what’s causing After the $115 million sale of Pablo file property, often offering sweet- the dip. Some say that works in this American Picasso’s Fillette à la corbeille fleu- heart deals that cut into their profits. price range are being sold through 25% rie (1905) failed to impress auction Last year, for example, Sotheby’s lost various online outlets that do not watchers last year, veteran dealer money on two multimillion-dollar always post their results—meaning Chinese Larry Gagosian told the Wall Street paintings with financial guarantees the transactions are still happening 20% Journal: “Maybe $100 million is the (believed to be Modigliani’s Nu cou- but may not be reflected in our data. new $10 million.” ché [sur le côté gauche] and Picasso’s British Buste de femme de profil. Femme Others contend that this portion of 6% He might be onto something. Since écrivant) that performed below ex- the market is simply disappearing. 2013, the top two segments of the pectations. The lesson: Demand for “The upper middle class is leaving market—composed of works priced trophies isn’t necessarily as deep as the market,” says Jeff Rabin, from $1 million to just under $10 the sky-high numbers suggest. cofounder of Artvest. “That’s why million, and $10 million and up— midlevel galleries have been closing Where Are the Top Artists From? have grown, while lower-priced seg- What Happened to All and you are seeing people struggling Americans dominate our list of top- Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy War- hind with a 20 percent share, while ments have shrunk. the Less Expensive Art? at art fairs.” The reality is probably a selling artists at auction in 2018, hol, Jackson Pollock, and Edward French artists take third place with The lower end of the market—for mix of both. representing a full quarter of the Hopper, all of whom appear in the 15 percent. But the very top of the market is not art valued at up to $100,000—has group. (In particular, you can thank top 20.) Chinese artists are close be- always what it seems. Auction houses shrunk over the past six years. Ex-

54 55 Data Dive Total Sales by Genre, 2013–18 Looking Back to Move Forward Postwar and Contemporary Art What’s the Market’s Sweet Spot? Both the Impressionist and Modern Every segment of the postwar and Postwar & Contemporary Old Masters Impressionist & Modern category and the postwar and con- Sales by Price Bracket, 2013–18 contemporary market grew last $10B temporary category posted signifi- $10 million+ $1 million– $100,000– $10,000– $0–10,000 year—but some ballooned faster than cant gains last year compared with 10 million 1 million 100,000 others. While the bottom of the mar- 2017. But neither reached the dizzy- $8B ket posted incremental gains, the $1 ing heights of 2014. million-to-$10 million bracket grew $7.5B 23.7 percent, more than any other. Overall, the Impressionist and Mod- $6B One dealer describes this segment as ern category outperformed postwar the “sweet spot” for auction houses, and contemporary by $1.3 billion. which receive hefty commissions on $5B At the same time, both segments of $4B the deals. Meanwhile, ultra-high-net- the market have experienced a pre- worth individuals are increasingly cipitous decline in the number of lots willing to buy art in the $500,000 $2.5B sold each year, meaning the average $2B -to-$1.5 million range, according to work in both sectors has become Suzanne Gyorgy. “There is a larger more expensive. bracket that collects in that area re- 0 ally comfortably,” she says. 0 (A note of caution before you ex- 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 change all your Basquiats for Bran- cusis: Our categories don’t always follow auction-house distinctions. Average Price by Genre, 2013–18 Because they were born before 1910, Leslie Sun, for example, Willem de Kooning and collector and founder of creative agency Sunset, Taipei Postwar & Contemporary Old Masters Impressionist & Modern Francis Bacon are included in our Modern category.) $100K

Looking ahead, some market ana- What do you feel is the most exciting What artists are you paying close attention to lysts predict that collectors’ grow- development in the art market today? lately and why? $75K ing interest in reevaluating previously overlooked Modern, postwar, Various new art forms created by technology like VR, I’ve always been a sucker for poetic content, and Anri and contemporary artists will come AR, and digital painting and how they’re perceived Sala is one of the masters, moving from traditional art to benefit older categories, includ- by the art market. Can a 3-D print, for example, be forms such as painting, sculpture, and photography $50K ing Old Masters. Just keep in mind considered a sculpture? I’m also interested in the into video and mixed media. I also believe Lin Yi Hsuan that the spike in Old Master sales in relationship between these new media and the artists is one of Taiwan’s rising stars, and his work, also 2017 is due in large part to the re- who engage with them. Is the artist or the technology poetic, reminds me a bit of Cy Twombly. $25K cord $450.3 million sale of Leonardo the “tool”? da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi, which is What do you think the art business will look like in unlikely to be equaled anytime soon. What art scene are you paying close attention to 10 years? now and why? 0 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 “I’ve talked to contemporary collec- I think there will be a new category to describe art that tors who are starting to think about Taiwan, of course, as it is my hometown. Artists here goes beyond what we now think of as “contempo- mixing up their collections with Old have been significantly underexposed. [The debut edi- rary.” The usual suspects will still be on top, with a few Masters,” says Suzanne Gyorgy, Citi tion of art fair] Taipei Dangdai [in January] was a great newcomers, and new media will still be struggling to Average Price Private Bank’s global head of art platform to showcase local artists’ work to internation- find a price point. Emerging artists will find it increas- advisory and finance. “There is this al collectors. I took this opportunity to survey the best ingly hard to find a place for themselves as their of a Work at trend of looking back to great art- of Taiwanese contemporary art. numbers increase. There will be even more of a divide $70,410 Auction in 2018 ists that maybe didn’t get attention between institutional and commercial art. With the ris- at the time.” I am also looking at Latin America, which has been ing number of private museums and foundations, and $55,990 Impressionist & Modern uncharted territory for me. Thankfully, social media the growing cross-pollination between art and other allows regional developments to become increasingly creative disciplines like fashion, the value of academia Postwar & Contemporary transparent. and cultural institutions will rise significantly as the $0 $25K $50K $75K $100K market seeks new authoritative voices.

56 57 Data Dive North America, First Fine and Decorative Art Sales by Price Band in Europe, 2013–18 North America vastly outpaced ev- America were also considerably “North America $8B ery other continent in total sales, more likely to find buyers—with 71.9 outpaced all $10 million+ generating $7.2 billion in auction percent of lots on offer there selling, revenue for fine art and design in compared with 62 percent in Europe other continents $6B $1 million– 2018. Works up for sale in North and 66.1 percent in Asia. in total sales.” 10 million

$4B $100,000– 2018 Fine and Decorative Art Sales by Continent 1 million $2B $10,000– 100,000

0 $0–10,000 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

North America Fine and Decorative Art Sales by Price Band in Asia, 2013–18 $7,220,344,402 $8B $10 million+

$6B $1 million– 10 million

$4B $100,000– 1 million

$2B $10,000– Asia 100,000 $6,316,042,926 0 $0–10,000 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 Fine and Decorative Art Sales by Price Band in N.A., 2013–18 $8B $10 million+ Europe $5,677,545,787 $6B $1 million– 10 million

$4B $100,000– 1 million

$2B $10,000– 100,000 Oceania $82,238,577 0 $0–10,000 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 Africa Where Should You $27,650,971 Sell Your Collection? If you want to sell a $50 million most $1 billion more than in Europe a work priced between $10,000 and South America painting, your best bet is to put it up and Asia combined. Asia, mean- just under $100,000, then Europe $6,945,348 for auction in North America. Sales while, dominates the segment from may be your best choice. Works in in the $10 million-and-up price $100,000 to just under $1 million, that bracket generated $1.2 billion bracket generated a total of $2.7 which has been sloping downward on the Continent last year. billion in the region in 2018—al- in the United States. But if you have

58 59 Data Dive Total Fine Fine Art Sales by Auction House, 2013–18 WHO ARE THE MOST BANKABLE ARTISTS?

Christie’s Sotheby’s Phillips See the 10 best-selling artists in each genre last year. $6B Old Masters

More than for any other second-place finisher An- pressionist and Modern sector, the Old Master thony van Dyck). market, which is pumped market is driven by sup- up with guarantees, or ply. Rembrandt, a prolific With its lack of froth, the the contemporary market, $4B printmaker, leads the pack Old Masters market feels where demand is some- largely because of the vast secure to experts. “In an times so strong for untest- number of his works that ideal world, this is how ed artists that prices go out Rembrandt van Rijn, sold last year (475, com- you want to see market of sync with reality,” says Study of the Head of pared with just 14 for operate—unlike the Im- the art advisor Todd Levin. a Young Man, 1650

ARTIST LIFE LOTS LOTS SELL- TOTAL SOLD OFFERED THROUGH RATE SALES

Rembrandt 1606–69 475 547 86.8% $ 20,236,389 $2B 1 van Rijn

Anthony van 1599–1641 14 20 70.0% $ 19,683,888 2 Dyck

Lucas 1472–1553 14 17 82.4% $ 17,640,050 3 Cranach the Elder

Jean-Baptiste- 1796–1875 53 77 68.8% $ 16,642,848 Camille Corot 0 4 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 Peter Paul 1577–1640 6 9 66.7% $ 14,438,012 5 Rubens Which Auction House Won 2018? Christie’s has outperformed es left, including headline-grabbing former Christie’s CEO Ed Dolman Frans 1582–1666 2 2 100.0% $ 13,178,437 Sotheby’s every year since 2013— rainmaker Loic Gouzer and Euro- took the top job. 6 Hals and the gap between them has pean postwar head Francis Outred yawned ever wider over the past at Christie’s and COO Adam Chinn In 2013, Phillips’s fine-art sales Pieter Brueghel 1565–1636 6 8 75.0% $ 11,170,622 two years. Last year was a solid at Sotheby’s. The businesses’ ability made up 4.1 percent of the total rev- 7 the Younger one for both houses, with revenue to ward off brain drain and cultivate enue generated by all three houses. at each growing more than $500 new talent will do much to determine By 2018, that figure had grown to 7 Eugène 1798–1863 23 35 65.7% $ 11,134,002 million. But Christie’s still came out their success in the coming years. percent. During that period, Phillips 8 Delacroix far ahead in terms of total auction also managed to recruit and retain sales, outperforming Sotheby’s by a Finally, don’t count out perennial top business getters, including Chey- J.M.W. 1775–1851 13 14 92.9% $ 10,666,533 total of $1.1 billion. third-place finisher Phillips. While enne Westphal, Jean-Paul Engelen, 9 Turner its totals still pale in comparison and Robert Manley. The battle between the two is far to those of the Big Two, the house’s Jan Brueghel 1568–1625 6 10 60.0% $ 8,989,441 from over, however. Last year, a auction sales have more than dou- 10 the Elder number of key players at both hous- bled over the past five years, since

60 61 Data Dive Impressionist Postwar

& Modern Andy Warhol has been dethroned: of art advisory and finance. Now, ures, more people are waking up and Zao Wou-Ki displaced the Pop pio- he is steadily becoming a worldwide willing to part with their Hockneys,” neer as the top-selling postwar art- brand name as well. Gyorgy says. Picasso is in a league of his own, with $747.3 ist last year. With total auction sales million worth of art sold in 2018—more than that more than doubled from 2017, David Hockney was another artist Other artists, like Richard double the total generated by runner-up Claude the Chinese-French painter’s record who enjoyed a breakthrough year. Diebenkorn, are unlikely to appear Monet. He is also by far the most prolific and run was led by Juin—Octobre 1985 His top five auction results were all on this list again anytime soon. frequently traded artist out there. Of the 3,004 (1985), which sold at Sotheby’s Hong achieved in 2018, led by Portrait of Around half of the late California Picassos to hit the block last year, 2,525—or Kong in October for $65 million. an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) artist’s total sales in 2018 were 84 percent—found buyers, a higher proportion (1972), which sold for $90.3 million generated by an extraordinary than for any other name on this list. “The re- “For the collectors we know in Asia, at Christie’s—making Hockney the cache of 22 paintings sold by Donald quest we get more than any other is Picasso,” he’s the master,” says Suzanne Gory- most expensive living artist in the and Barbara Zucker. “That was the says one prominent dealer—although, he adds, Pablo Picasso, Femme au béret et à la robe gy, Citi Private Bank’s global head world. “Having seen these big fig- opportunity to get one,” Gyorgy says. Monet is a close second. quadrillée (Marie-Thérèse Walter), 1937

ARTIST LIFE LOTS LOTS SELL- TOTAL ARTIST LIFE LOTS LOTS SELL- TOTAL SOLD OFFERED THROUGH RATE SALES SOLD OFFERED THROUGH RATE SALES Pablo 1881–1973 2,525 3,004 84.1% $ 747,280,956 Zao Wou-Ki 1920–2013 464 519 89.4% $ 328,372,119 1 Picasso 1

Claude 1840–1926 37 46 80.4% $ 353,831,625 Andy 1928–87 1,078 1,377 78.3% $ 243,766,180 2 Monet 2 Warhol

Amedeo 1884–1920 18 23 78.3% $ 160,870,603 David b. 1937 404 456 88.6% $ 206,246,423 3 Modigliani 3 Hockney

Willem de 1904–97 87 119 73.1% $ 154,324,050 Gerhard b. 1932 269 334 80.5% $ 143,039,442 4 Kooning 4 Richter

Henri 1869–1954 294 389 75.6% $ 154,098,334 Yayoi b. 1929 642 706 90.9% $ 108,506,914 5 Matisse 5 Kusama

Joan 1893–1983 837 1,125 74.4% $ 128,592,671 Jackson 1912–56 16 20 80.0% $ 106,683,158 6 Miró 6 Pollock

Francis 1909–92 105 129 81.4% $ 126,566,132 Richard 1922–93 97 113 85.8% $ 96,081,701 7 Bacon 7 Diebenkorn

Edward 1882–1967 15 19 78.9% $ 120,124,356 Joan 1925–92 40 41 97.6% $ 83,882,649 8 Hopper 8 Mitchell

Alberto 1901–66 125 154 81.2% $ 117,412,812 Roy 1923–97 399 471 84.7% $ 68,800,640 9 Giacometti 9 Lichtenstein

Lucio 1899–1968 212 262 80.9% $ 103,452,945 Chu Teh-Chun 1920–2014 102 150 68.0% $ 58,777,108 10 Fontana 10

62 63 Data Dive Contemporary Ultra-Contemporary

“There’s a reason that Basquiat stays at the top the cutoff, with $32.6 million worth of art sold If you need more evidence that current tastes to museums—are first in line to buy from gal- of the market,” says one market source. “Every- at auction—up 125 percent from 2017. Her top have shifted away from bro-tastic abstract leries. Last fall, for example, Shane Campbell body knows there is a cartel of Basquiat buyers three auction prices were all set in 2018, led by painting toward subtler, figurative work, look Gallery sold a series of 24 of Wood’s tennis- who ensure that his market stays frothy.” Plus, the record-breaking Suddenly Last Summer no further than this list. The top eight artists court drawings as a single work to the Japa- since the artist is dead, there is a finite amount (1999), which sold for $6.7 million. are all figurative painters, each with a unique nese collectors Masahiro and Yoshimi Maki, Jonas Wood, of work to be traded. In all, 90 Basquiats sold style and subject matter. “Figurative art is now who pledged to donate them to the Los Angeles Untitled, 2014 at auction in 2018 for a total of $254.1 million— “Cecily’s market is beginning to rumble,” says definitely a trend,” says the art advisor Wendy County Museum of Art. more than double the total generated by the the art advisor Todd Levin. “Supply of her Cromwell. Cecily Brown, next-best-selling contemporary artist, Chris- paintings is constricted because collectors This dynamic constricts supply, driving up Suddenly Last topher Wool. aren’t willing to let go of them, and this has Access to work by many of these names—in- prices at auction. Of Wood, Cromwell says: “He Summer, 1999 increased demand, causing prices to rise.” cluding Jonas Wood, Njideka Akunyili Crosby, is a genuinely talented, genuinely well-support- If you are looking for any women on this list, and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye—is tightly con- ed artist, but there is an artificial quality to you’re out of luck. Cecily Brown just missed trolled on the primary market. Museums—and how the market is unfolding.” collectors who commit to donating the work

ARTIST LIFE LOTS LOTS SELL- TOTAL ARTIST LIFE LOTS LOTS SELL- TOTAL SOLD OFFERED THROUGH RATE SALES SOLD OFFERED THROUGH RATE SALES Jean-Michel 1960–88 90 101 89.1% $ 254,126,099 Jonas b. 1977 46 62 74.2% $ 13,180,060 1 Basquiat 1 Wood

Christopher b. 1955 58 77 75.3% $ 81,897,515 Adrian b. 1977 12 19 63.2% $ 9,147,082 2 Wool 2 Ghenie

Peter b. 1959 41 59 69.5% $ 77,501,394 Ren Zhong b. 1976 37 45 82.2% $ 7,729,989 3 Doig 3

George b. 1957 126 135 93.3% $ 63,483,405 Njideka b. 1983 5 5 100.0% $ 7,244,056 4 Condo 4 Akunyili Crosby

Mark b. 1961 13 13 100.0% $ 48,132,581 Hao Liang b. 1983 4 5 80.0% $ 3,359,487 5 Bradford 5

Rudolf b. 1956 23 27 85.2% $ 44,240,484 Ayako b. 1982 59 60 98.3% $ 2,199,593 6 Stingel 6 Rokkaku

Zhou Chunya b. 1955 74 93 79.6% $ 43,800,493 Avery b. 1987 5 7 71.4% $ 2,166,938 7 7 Singer

Kerry James b. 1955 24 27 88.9% $ 38,046,634 Lynette b. 1977 7 8 87.5% $ 2,146,201 8 Marshall 8 Yiadom-Boakye

Jeff b. 1955 138 216 63.9% $ 37,923,186 Danh b. 1975 14 14 100.0% $ 2,069,555 9 Koons 9 Vo

Yoshitomo b. 1959 326 356 91.6% $ 37,069,190 Dana b. 1976 8 11 72.7% $ 1,638,280 10 Nara 10 Schutz

64 65 Data Dive artnet News Editor-in-Chief Methodology Andrew Goldstein

This report reflects auction results All sales prices are adjusted to in- Executive Editor and from 539 auction houses worldwide clude the buyer’s premium. Price Editor of artnet Intelligence from January 1 to December 31, data from previous years has not Julia Halperin 2018. To consider how this year’s been adjusted for inflation. All re- results stacked up against previous sults are logged in the currency of Art Business Reporter years, we compared them with the the country where the auction took Tim Schneider same numbers from equivalent pe- place, then converted to US dollars riods from 2013 through 2017. based on the exchange rate on the Editorial Assistant day of the sale. Caroline Goldstein artnet’s Fine Art and Design Da- tabase includes art objects such as We defined artistic categories as fol- paintings, photographs, prints, and lows: European Old Masters covers IMAGE CREDITS - By The Numbers: Yayoi Kusama. Photo: Andrew Toth/Getty Images | Joan Mitchell. Photo: David Turnley/Corbis/VCG for Getty Images. | sculpture by creators ranging from European artists born between 1250 Georgia O’Keeffe. Photo: PhotoQuest/Getty Images. | Cecily Brown. Photo: Contributors Melanie Gerlis Michael Loccisano/Getty Images. | Louise Bourgeois. Photo: Jack Mitchell/ Old Masters to contemporary living and 1820; Old Masters covers artists Getty Images. Best Sellers: Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Bush Babies (2017). Eileen Kinsella Courtesy Sotheby’s. | Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Mimetic Gestures (2010). Courtesy artists. The Decorative Art Database born from 1250 to 1820 from any Christie’s Images Ltd. | Hao Liang, The Hunter and the Transformations of Hell (2011). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Christopher Wool, Untitled (1990). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Jean-Michel Basquiat, Flexible (1984). Courtesy contains antiques, antiquities, and country; Impressionist and Modern of Phillips. | Henri Matisse, Odalisque couchee aux magnolias (1923). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Edward Hopper, Chop Suey (1929). Courtesy Christie’s collectibles. Both databases include comprises artists born in any coun- Images Ltd. | Za Wou-Ki, Juin-Octobre 1985 (1985). Courtesy Sotheby’s. | David Hockney, Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures) (1972). Courtesy Christie’s only items with low estimates of try except China between 1821 and Images Ltd. | Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Venise, vue du Quai des Esclavons (1845). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Lucas Cranach the Elder, Portrait of John artnet Price Vice President, Operations Frederick I, Elector of Saxony (1530s). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Andreas $500 and above. 1910; Postwar includes artists born Gursky, James Bond Island I, II & III (2007). Courtesy Sotheby’s. | Cindy Sherman, Database Ning Lu Untitled Film Still #21A, City Girl Close-Up (1978). Courtesy Sotheby’s. KAWS: in any country except China be- KAWS, Four-foot dissected companion (2009). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | KAWS, CHUM (2012). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | KAWS, PAY THE DEBT Every lot in the artnet Price Data- tween 1911 and 1944; Contemporary TO NATURE (2010). Courtesy Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. | KAWS. Photo: © Christopher Sturman. | KAWS, Disney Pinocchio Jiminy Cricket (2010). Photo: Research Associate Heritage Auctions, HA.com. | KAWS, Clean Slate. Courtesy Phillips. | KAWS, New base is verified against auction cata- covers artists born in any country Again (2010). Courtesy Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. | KAWS and Humberto Robert Cacharani Campana. Courtesy Friedman Benda. | KAWS x Uniqlo T-shirt. Courtesy Uniqlo. | logues or directly with the auction from 1945 to 1974; and Ultra-Con- Dior Homme Runway. Photo: Victor Virgile/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images. | KAWS, Ups and Downs (2013). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. Venice Biennale: Gondola houses and then categorized by a temporary covers artists born after in Venice. Photo: Frank Bienewald/LightRocket for Getty Images. | Golden Lion. Photo: Awakening/Getty Images. | Renate Bertlemann, 1969,. © Renate Bertlmann. Junior Art Market Analyst This report Courtesy Richard Saltoun. | Renate Bertlmann, Viagra (1998). © Renate Bertlmann. team of multilingual art history spe- 1974. To avoid anomalies, all genre Courtesy Galerie Steinek. PHoto: Pixelstorm. | Renate Bertlmann, Zärtliche Michaela Ben Yehuda Berührungen (Tender Touches), (1976/2009). Courtesy Richard Saltoun. | Enrico reflects auction cialists to ensure the highest level of breakdowns in the “Data Dive” sec- David. Photo: J.R.P. | Installation view of “Enrico David: Gradations of Slow Release.” Photo: Nathan Keay © MCA Chicago. | Enrico David, Untitled (Ombre Rosse) (2007). accuracy and allow for detailed data tion exclude China. Courtesy Michael Werner Gallery. | Still from Inci Eviner, Harem (2009). Courtesy the artist and Galeri Nev Istanbul. | Voluspa Jarpa, Monumenta (2018). Courtesy Mor results from 539 Charpentier. | Voluspa Jarpa, Desclasificados (2003). Courtesy Mor Charpentier. | analysis. We only include Chinese Charlotte Prodger. Photo: Emile Holba. Courtesy Koppe Astner; Hollybush Gardens. | Charlotte Prodger, Mini the Bull Terrier (2016). © Katja Illner. Courtesy Koppe auction houses auction houses that have been vet- Notes on geographic terms: Ocea- Astner. | Charlotte Prodger, Northern Dancer (2014). Courtesy Koppe Astner. | Laure Production Designer Prouvost. Photo: Peter Muhly/AFP/Getty Images. | Laure Prouvost. Installation ted by the China Association of Auc- nia covers auction houses located in view, Wantee (2013). © Laure Prouvost. Courtesy MOTINTERNATIONAL. Photo: Tim Bowditch. | Laure Prouvost, Metal Woman - Welcome, Deep Travel Ink. NYC, Beatriz Lozano worldwide. 2018, © Laure Prouvost; Courtesy Lisson Gallery. | Martin Puryear. Photo: Shannon tioneers, a national association in Australia and New Zealand. North Finney/Getty Images. | Martin Puryear, Big Bling (2016). © Martin Puryear, photo: Jordan Tinker. Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery. | Eva Rothschild. Photo: Anne China that is seeking to standardize America covers auction houses in Purkiss/RA. | Eva Rothschild, Cosmos (2018). © Eva Rothschild. Courtesy Modern Photo Editor Art. Recession: Man bidding at Christie’s. Photo: Ramin Talaie/Getty Images. | the auction industry. This report re- the US, Canada, and Mexico. China Installation view of Andy Warhol, 200 One Dollar Bills at Sotheby’s. Photo: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images. Data Dive: David Hockney, Portrait of an Artist (Pool Winnie Lee with Two Figures) (1972). Courtesy Christie’s Images Ltd. | Rembrandt van Rijn, flects the numbers in artnet’s Price includes results from both the main- Study of the Head of a Young Man (ca. 1650). Courtesy Sotheby’s. | Pablo Picasso, Femme au béret et à la robe quadrillée (Marie-Thérèse Walter) (1937). Courtesy Database as of January 24, 2019. land and Hong Kong. Sotheby’s. | Cecily Brown, Suddenly Last Summer (1999). Courtesy Sotheby’s. Copy Editor | Jonas Wood, Untitled (2014). Courtesy David Kordansky. Methodology: Mark Bradford, Helter Skelter I (2007). Courtesy of Phillips. Elizabeth Ungar

66 67 Data Dive The artnet Price Database is the industry’s most trusted resource, with over 12 million auction records vetted by a team of dedicated analysts. Relied on by top auction houses, galleries, advisors, collectors, journalists, and government agencies, the Price Database is the gold standard for researching business-critical information. artnet.com/price-database