The operative words for the art market this season are “correction” and “contraction.” So Sotheby’s can be forgiven for seeking comfort in nostalgia, via this Monday tweet, recalling a past triumph:
#OnThisDay in 2012, Sotheby’s sold Edvard Munch’s 1895 ‘The Scream’ for a record $120 million #SothebysImpMod pic.twitter.com/VO0i1XxsPc
— Sotheby’s (@Sothebys) May 2, 2016
Those days (and that auctioneer, Tobias Meyer) are gone. There’s nothing in this spring’s evening sales at Sotheby’s expected to reach the giddy heights of “The Scream.” Nor does Christie’s have anything to offer at the level of last November’s $170.4-million Modigliani or last May’s $179.34 Picasso. Judging by their presale estimates, no lots are likely to be even close to crossing $100 million threshold in this season’s evening sales of Impressionist/Modern and Contemporary art at the Big-Two auction houses. Those bid fests are jammed together, for the first time, in one hectic week (starting this Sunday).
I felt the lack of the Munch Punch while attending Sotheby’s low-key press preview last week for its upcoming auctions. At the preview for the landmark “Scream” sale, four years ago, Simon Shaw, now co-head of Impressionist and modern art, and David Norman, now vice chairman of Sotheby’s Americas, had proudly unveiled their prize lot to a scrum of journalists, many of whom could barely glimpse the object of adulation:
Partly because almost the entire scribe tribe last week was at the press preview for SFMOMA’s imminent reopening, just a handful of journalists showed up for last week’s previews at Sotheby’s and Christie’s. Shaw and Norman were both in attendance at Sotheby’s, with the former seeming more subdued than at previous such events; the latter was hanging back, instead of assuming his usual duties as co-presenter.
Photo by Lee Rosenbaum
Norman, in fact, had one foot out the door: As reported previously, this respected Sotheby’s veteran, with his deep knowledge of art and extensive market contacts, will exit the auction firm after the May sales to strike out on his own—part of a large turnover of talent that has occurred under the auspices of the new CEO, Tad Smith.
Amy Cappellazzo, former co-head of Post-War & Contemporary Art at Christie’s, will be a major player under the new Sotheby’s regime, as chairman of its Fine Art Division:
Photo by Lee Rosenbaum
The mood later that morning at Christie’s seemed a little lighter. But both houses had less to crow about, in terms of quantity and quality of top lots, than in previous outings. A bit of uplift came from Christie’s deputy chairman of Post-War and Contemporary Art, Loïc Gouzer, thanks to the cleverness and audacity of his Bound to Fail theme for a Mothers Day auction—a strange quirk of Sunday scheduling, which might help make the sale’s title a self-fulfilling prophecy, in terms of prices.
Gouzer’s mischievous charm is disarming. And he has a knack for “curating” (as Christie’s insists on calling it) outside-the-box auctions that are provocative and highly successful. During his “Bound to Fail” press walk-through, he assured me that if I were the winning bidder (a project also bound to fail) for Koons’ 1985 “One Ball Total Equilibrium Tank,” he would helpfully get the artist’s studio to re-suspend the basketball in the vitrine’s liquid, a few months from now when it is expected to sink.
Photo by Lee Rosenbaum
Wait…what? It’s the dirty little secret of this iconic object—news to me, although it has been previously written about (as quoted in Christie’s catalogue)—that its “equilibrium” is a temporary phenomenon. Its presale estimate—“in the region of $12 million”—seems a lot to pay for an object with its own “deflategate.” As Gouzer told us, “After six months, pretty much, the whole thing fails. The ball goes down.”
Loïc helpfully explains all of this to us in my two-minute CultureGrrl Video:
But now, back to Sotheby’s: I’m going to miss David Norman’s deeply informed insights about the offerings he assembled and his candor about the state of the Impressionist/Modern market. Although he didn’t speak at the press preview, I took the opportunity to chat with him afterwards, one last time before he leaves his current post:
ROSENBAUM: How would you describe the state of the market?
NORMAN: This season the supply was contracted, but we were able to populate the sale with good quality pieces at a little bit of a lower price point than previous seasons [emphasis added]. Our feeling—and so far the reaction is—that it’s going to perform well. That will bring some little jolt of confidence back in the market.
ROSENBAUM: Was Sotheby’s affected by all the news and all the turmoil here, in terms of consignor confidence?
NORMAN: There were some concerns, but in the end I think the sales are of equivalent value [emphasis added] and we’ve got a few more pieces at a higher price point and we won several competitive situations. I think the market really needs both houses here.
The Impressionist team is completely intact. I stayed because I wanted to work with the team. I’m not running away from anything. I’m running to something that had been an aspiration for a long time.
As for the sales at the two houses being of “equivalent value,” that may be true in Norman’s field, where Sotheby’s has excelled (thanks, in good measure, to his efforts), but not in contemporary, where Christie’s has been dominant.
Here’s how the total presale estimate for next week’s evening sales stack up:
Sotheby’s Impressionist/Modern: $164.8-235.8 million
Christie’s Impressionist/Modern: $138.3-203.4 millionSotheby’s Post-War/Contemporary: $201.35-257.45 million
Christie’s Post-War/Contemporary: $285.6-398.2 million
Christie’s “Bound to Fail”: $59.39-81.03 million
Christie’s total Post-War/Contemporary: $344.99-479.23 million
In my “Bubble Alert” post of almost a year ago, I suggested why an art-market correction might be imminent, blaming this, in part, on the auction houses themselves: They had been relying too heavily on the inflationary effect of third-party guarantees and irrevocable bids. These are typically undertaken by megacollectors and dealers with a sizable self-interest in keeping the ball afloat.
This season, both houses have reportedly scaled back their reliance on those artificial supports. What the market needs now is a sense of “equilibrium”—not a Koons-ian trumped-up buoyancy, but a reliable, stable one.