Art sales face acid test amid credit crunch
By Deborah Brewster in New York
Published: November 3 2008 02:47 | Last updated: November 3 2008 02:47
The art market, which has enjoyed a robust six-year boom in prices, faces a big test over the next two weeks as it finally shows signs of faltering amid the global financial crisis.
Christie’s and Sotheby’s, the two main auction houses, expect to sell up to $1.7bn in artworks in New York’s two-week sale season which begins on Monday and which has traditionally been a key barometer of fine art prices, setting the tone for the coming months.
The sales come two weeks after markedly weaker contemporary art auctions in London, as buyers finally resisted paying the top prices that contemporary works have come to command.
The Mei Moses All Art Index, which measures the value of works sold at auction, has fallen by 5 per cent in the 10 months to the end of October.
It had risen by 5 per cent is the first six months of the year. The Postwar and Contemporary art index has fallen by 10 per cent in the year to date.
Dick Fuld, the former chief executive of Lehman Brothers, and his wife Kathy are among the sellers at the upcoming sales, although their consignment to Christie’s was made before Lehman Brothers hit trouble and filed for bankruptcy this year. The couple are offering 15 abstract expressionist drawings for an estimated $20m.
Henry Kravis, the co-founder of the private equity group Kohlberg Kravis, is selling a work by Edgar Degas, “Danseuse au Repos”, for an expected $40m or more, which would set a record for a work by Degas. Mr Kravis bought it in 1999 for $28m, which was then a Degas record. The work will be offered at Sotheby’s on Monday night.
Other highlights of the same Sotheby’s sale include a 1916 work by Ukrainian expessionist artist Kazimir Malevich, “Suprematist Composition”, which is estimated to sell for $60m. Sotheby’s said it has received an “unrevocable bid” for the work, which is being sold by Malevich’s heirs after the work was reconstituted to them this year.
A Cubist work by Picasso, “Arlequin”, was going to be sold by Sotheby’s for more than $30m, but it was withdrawn from sale last week “for private reasons”, according to the auction house.
Christie’s will sell another Picasso, “Deux Personnages”, a 1934 portrait of his mistress, Marie-Thérèse Walter and her sister, for up to $25m on Thursday.