After hearing about the Warhol that sold for over $40 million on the radio, I headed over to ArtForum to get more of the auction drama. The Sotheby’s folks must be thrilled after their banner night.
The U.S. art market appears to be on the mend. The major fall art auctions may not have sold everything on offer, but collectors showed a renewed willingness to bid up top examples of artists’ work. Dealers also said inflation fears and expectations of higher bonuses in the financial markets stoked strong bidding.
New York’s two chief auction houses, Sotheby’s and Christie’s International, brought in about $596 million combined from their semi annual sales of Impressionist, modern and contemporary art in the past two weeks. The total surpassed the houses’ $409 million spring sales in May, a gain that could signal a measure of returning confidence in high-end art values.
Despite the uptick, the market isn’t likely to recapture its boom-era exuberance anytime soon. The volume of art changing hands at these sales is still much smaller than it was last November, when the two houses brought in a combined $729 million, or two years ago at the market’s peak, when their fall sales totaled $1.6 billion.
FLYP just blogged about this, and linked to a story a while back– you may find it interesting:
http://www.flypmedia.com/content/after-party
I’ll check it out KP. Thanks for commenting and the tip.