Cathy's Art Diary

Intriguing online talk from The Art Newspaper looking at whether the art market can be manipulated by gaming type behaviour. Anna Brady, Anny Shaw and Georgina Adam from the journal discussed whether manipulation of the art market could occur in the same way that buyers influenced the stock price of Gamestop recently. Adam carefully laid out how the art market was different and this probably wouldn’t happen but they went on to discuss ways people do try to manipulate the market. They discussed some interesting recent cases such as the Zombie Formalists which gave me lots to look up and learn more about. They then talked about Non Fundable Tokens (NFTs) in light of the recent sale of a digital only art work by Christie’s Beeple’s “Everydays: The first 5,000 days”, the first work of this type to be sold by an auction house. The discussed the possible benefits to the market of applying NFTs to physical works as well as digital only ones. They ended by looking at how art fairs had c...

Fascinating online interview from the Art Newspaper with Clare McAndrew of Arts Economics analysing how the art market has been affected by the Covid crisis. This was the last session in a series on the art market "New Models for New Times: Rethinking the Art Market in a Changing World" in which McAndrew was interviewed by Georgina Adam, editor-at-large of the Arts Newspaper. McAndrew took us through various charts and graphs of how the marker has reacted to the crisis. She felt the worse performers were the mid-range galleries selling at $250-500K with all galleries sales being down an average of 30%. Auction sales were down 50% in value compared to the previous year but partly because the number of lots were down. She compared the real and online markets, with online obviously increasing with online sales making up 37% of sales this year as opposed to 10% the year before. They then discussed how the galleries and auction houses had adapted to the issues and reflected ...

Enlightening online discussion from the Art Newspaper looking at how the Covid crisis has affected commercial galleries and asking if it has made them turn to their local markets more. This was the second session in a series on the art market "New Models for New Times: Rethinking the Art Market in a Changing World" chaired by Anny Shaw from the Art Newspaper including Rachel Lehmann, from Lehmann Maupin in New York; Sundaram Tagore, from Sundaram Tangore Gallery in Hong Kong, Singapore and New York; Rakeb Sile from Addis Fine Art in Ethiopia and Ayo Adeyinka, from Tafeta in London and Nigeria. All of them described things they had done locally during Covid from reconnecting with artists they represent to moving their galleries to more conducive spaces however they also stressed that they had continued to operate globally, albeit in different ways such as via online fairs. They all felt the art market would not return to the travelling frenzy it had been before the pandem...

Interesting online discussion from the Art Newspaper looking at how the art market reacted to the Covid crisis and the increased collaboration in the industry. This was the first session in a series on the art market "New Models for New Times: Rethinking the Art Market in a Changing World" well chaired by Anna Brady from the Art newspaper and included Pilar Corrias, Pilar Corria Gallery; Caroline Douglas, Contemporary Art Society; Sunny Rahbar, Third Line and Neil Weman, Hauser and Wirth. They highlighted some interesting initiatives from an initial Whats App Group for commercial galleries in London, though online art fairs and changes to the Contemporary Art Society’s purchase award at Frieze to benefit more artists rather than one large purchase. They all highlighted some changes which they think will be permanent as they have brought sustainability benefits and increased engagement. They did however also acknowledge than not all art is online friendly so we might see ...