Not quite ready for prime time: Some of Christie’s Impressionist/modern wares at yesterday’s press preview
So is the art market getting shakier, as we head into the next two weeks of big evening auctions in New York? Kelly Crow in today’s Wall Street Journal describes the jitters in tentative terms:
With a weak American economy and global fears over rising fuel and food
costs, New York’s chief auction houses are bracing for a potential
art-market slowdown.
One way to judge what the experts think is to see whether Sotheby’s and Christie’s have pulled back on guarantees—the amounts that they commit to pay for certain consignments, whether or not the bidding actually reaches the amount of the guarantee. In a down market, these guarantees carry bigger risks.
At yesterday’s press preview of the two big sales, Guy Bennett, Christie’s co-head of Impressionist and modern art, claimed that there had been no change in his house’s willingness to grant guarantees. He pointed to Vuillard‘s “Fillettes Se Promenant,” estimated to bring $7-10 million, as a work that Christie’s had guaranteed “because we believe in it.”
Sotheby’s, as a publicly traded company, provides more transparency on its degree of commitment to guarantees: Its April 2008 Investor Briefing (scroll to p. 11), revealed that “in light of current economic realities, Management has adopted a more cautious approach to its guarantee portfolio. The current maximum level of guarantees has been brought back down to $350 million from the previous $500 million in late 2007.”
Sotheby’s most recent annual report had indicated that its guarantees totaled $185.2 million as of Feb. 19, 2008. As I mentioned at the above link, its guarantees totaled $902 million in 2007; $450 million in 2006; only $131 million in 2005.
But let’s get down to basics: Have you cashed in your auction antitrust settlement coupons that are set to expire on May 15? Art-lings, what are you waiting for?