PARIS, March 4, 2014 /PRNewswire/ --
As Artprice had sensed, and indeed written, during 2013, this
was indeed the best year ever recorded in auction history (over
$12 billion), and the best sale ever
for Christie's in its 247 year-old history - achieved in addition
for post-war and contemporary art, with an absolute record for a
hammer price: $127 million. This went
to a work by the British artist Francis
Bacon. 2013 was marked by nearly 15,000 new records for
artists, and over 23,000 if first bids are included.
This splendid year was shored up by a globalised demand,
particularly with buyers from Asia, the Middle
East and Russia, who played
a crucial role in the market's fine performance, and displayed a
voracious appetite for flagship artists of the 20th century,
landing them in a spate of records.
Artprice.com has been the world leader in art market information
since 1987. Each year, it analyses auction results throughout the
world, together with variations in the market, quoted values and
price indexes for artists and works, and the forces involved in
this specific market. It also examines the various cultural
sensibilities and the intrinsic relationship between art and money,
which produces much covetousness, and a few disappointments as
well.
Introduction
In 2010, the several hundred thousand results compiled by
Artprice showed that the world of art had been drastically changed
by the emergence of a power that no player in the market could
hitherto ignore: China, whose
annual sales results crushed those of the superpower America for
the first time in history. For the fourth year running,
China has held out on the US,
because the results for 2013 have put it at number one yet
again.
In China and the US alike,
sales of art works have never been so vigorous. The total of global
annual sales was up by 13%, rising from $10.6 billion to $12 billion, and the global
price index gained 15 points last year, making for an overall rise
of 80% in 10 years.
Are the escalating prices and the prestige sales arousing
frenzied competition, where profit can climb by several millions in
a few minutes, the symptom of a new speculative bubble? The answer
is no, according to the market players, who consider that there has
been a profound change in the state of affairs.
Because the art market no longer depends on a handful of wealthy
buyers whose withdrawal from the game would cause a general
collapse, but is now nourished by a growing number of extremely
rich buyers who have been won over to the high spheres of the art
market for various reasons. We are now seeing the emergence of new
museums designed to make nations shine; private collectors
rubber-stamping their pedigrees through the quality of their
collections; investment funds which sometimes revise their choices
after nurturing micro-bubbles and productive to-ings and fro-ings
over new names, and new billionaire buyers for whom the acquisition
of a major work is simultaneously a personal adventure, a form of
social enhancement and a prime investment.
In addition, eight of the fifty top bids in 2013 went to living
artists and the Top 50 bids even include a 21st century work: The
Last Supper (2001) by Chinese artist Zeng Fanzhi.
Key figures for
2013
China's revenues were up yet
again in 2013 (+21%) despite an excellent year for the Americans (a
rise of around 20%). The twin pole of China and the US controlled nearly 70% of the
art market in terms of sales volumes, and the two superpowers were
neck and neck. China, number 1 in
the global market, posted a total of $4.1
billion; the US also achieved over $4
billion, thanks to a very wealthy globalised demand for
names considered as trophies.
Given this steady rise in power, the other market places were
left far behind. At $2.1 billion, the
UK generated half the revenues of the leaders, but its 3rd place
was challenged by no other country, as France, 4th in the ranking, made $549 million (4.5% of the market), followed by
Germany ($207 million; 1.7% of the market), Switzerland ($159
million; 1.3% of the market) and Italy ($110
million; 0.9% of the market), the only ones who succeeded in
passing the revenue threshold of $100
million.
With an unsold rate of 34% in an overabundant offering, the
market had never been so greedy in its history, digesting twice as
many works as it did ten years ago. This shows how much broader it
has become over the past decade. Sales totalled $12.005 billion, an absolute record in auction
history - up by 13% compared with the vintage year of 2012* and by
2.3% compared with the previous record year, 2011, with revenues of
$11.78 billion.
*Total sales in 2012 came to $10.6
billion for Fine Art as defined by Artprice.com, i.e. sales
of paintings, drawings, sculpture, photography, prints and
multimedia for the works of clearly identified artists, the figures
of AMMA Artron in the 2012 report being based on a broader
spectrum.
Artprice publishes this exclusive report on the art market in
six languages. It is quoted by 6,300 international institutions and
media each year. Produced using the bidding results from 4,500
auction houses, the 2013 Annual Report consists of macro-economic
and micro-economic analyses updated according to new sales and
variations in the price of art works. The report, published by
Artprice press agency ArtMarketInsight with the econometrics
department of Artprice, also contains original rankings such as the
Top 500 of artists by turnover, and the list of the 100 highest
bids of the year.
thierry Ehrmann
Source: http://www.artprice.com (c)1987-2014 thierry Ehrmann
SUMMARY
Introduction
Key figures for 2013
Media
Periods
Geography of the market
Conclusion
Format PDF - 138 pages
Download the complete PDF format document:
http://imgpublic.artprice.com/pdf/trends2013_en_fr_de_es_online.pdf
About Artprice:
Artprice is the global leader in art price and art index
databanks. It has over 27 million indices and auction results
covering more than 500,000 artists around the world. Artprice
Images(R) gives unlimited access to the largest Art Market resource
in the world: a library of 108 million images or prints of artworks
from the year 1700 to the present day, along with comments by
Artprice's art historians.
Artprice permanently enriches its databanks with information
from 4,500 auctioneers and it publishes a constant flow of art
market trends for the world's principal news agencies and
approximately 6,300 international press publications. For its
2,500,000 members (members log in), Artprice gives access to ads
posted by members. This space represents the world's leading
Standardised Marketplace® for buying and selling art. These sales
take place under two systems: either fixed price sales or
auction-sales (regulated by paragraphs 2 and 3 of Article L 321.3
of the French Code of Commerce).
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