TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
New York's in-person art auctions return with world's most expensive collection
Change Size
A person looks at Frida Kahlo's final 'Bust' Self-Portrait 'Diego y yo' (Diego and I) at Sotheby's on November 5, 2021 in New York City. (AFP/Angela Weiss)
A
fter more than a year, in-person auctions return to New York this week with the sale of the Macklowe collection -- the world's most expensive to hit the market.
At auction houses Christie's and Sotheby's, the message is the same: the art market is thriving.
With sales starting November 15 estimated to bring in more than $1 billion in a week, "this is our largest sale season... since 2015," a record year, said Brooke Lampley at Sotheby's.
"Throughout the pandemic, there was great demand from our buyers, who weren't experiencing the same level of supply as they were accustomed to," she told AFP.
Experts say the pandemic has not negatively impacted the funds nor appetite of potential buyers, who are increasingly in Asia and younger than their predecessors.
For the first half of 2021, when it saw sales increase by 13 percent compared to 2019, Christie's noted that 30 percent of its buyers were new clients, and 31 percent of those were millennials.
"A lot of people are looking at their walls, thinking about the art they want to add to their collection, because they're spending so much more time in their homes," said Emily Kaplan at Christie's, which resumes in-person auctions on Tuesday.
