From Jeff Koons to Gerhard Richter — works by international art stars, as well as by young talents, are featured alongside classics of the modern era at the Basel Art Fair. Over 4,000 artists are represented at the stands of the 290 galleries from 34 countries — with among them of course the world's leading art dealers such as Gagosian, White Cube, David Zwirner or Thaddaeus Ropac.
Art Basel 2019 is therefore once again the art fair of superlatives, attracting the super-rich of the world, for whom art is often more an investment than a form of expression.
Yet Marc Spiegler, Art Basel global director, is not celebrating times of expansion in the art market, but rather lamenting the fact that less-renowned galleries are facing difficulties. The art fair hopes to attract them as participants with discounted registration fees.
Kristian Jarmuschek
Galleries going out of business in Germany too
The number of small and middle-sized galleries has been shrinking in many countries for years.
In Germany alone, about 30 art dealers are closing shop every year. "The problem is manifest," says Kristian Jarmuschek, chairman of the Federal Association of German Galleries and Art Dealers (BVDG).
For the association's 700 members, it is becoming increasingly difficult to pay the high rents and the expensive participation fees of art fairs.
Market observers speak of a worldwide trend that has hit London, Berlin, Zurich or Madrid as well as New York, the hotspot of the international art trade. Artnet, the art market website, was reporting about the closure of galleries with exhibition programs in 2017.
The art fair takes place from June 13 to 16 in Basel
Large galleries dominate the market
Meanwhile, with one record sale after the other, auction houses and leading galleries like Gagosian and co are profiting from the booming art market with a handful of artists.
The Art Market Report, recently published by Art Basel and the Swiss bank UBS, estimates that the 2018 turnover of worldwide auction houses and art galleries is about $67.4 billion (€59.4), 6% more than the previous year.
Art market economist Magnus Resch, who is also a bestselling author and founder of the Magnus app, the "Shazam for art," believes that it's exaggerated to claim that galleries are dying.
Resch rather compares the art world to a pyramid, with a few influential galleries at the top. The smaller players at art fairs are only there "to entertain the big guys — like clowns, with no chance to ever make it to the main act."
Magnus Resch
The 34-year-old German, who teaches art management at Columbia University, explains that there is a major demand problem. There are artists "like sand by the sea, but no one is buying their work." He sees the lack of transparency in pricing as a detrimental factor. That's why his Magnus app provides historic and recent prices of auctions and galleries, as Resch believes that "it should be easier to buy art!"
BVDG director Jarmuschek is less worried by the closure of galleries than by the lack of newcomers in the field. The behavior of potential art buyers is changing, he says; it is becoming increasingly difficult to lure them into galleries. Digitization has also contributed to this trend. "The gallery as a social space, as a place for encounters has had it's day," believes Jarmuschek, who also runs a gallery with partners in Berlin. Art needs to become louder, wilder and more colorful: "It has to become hip again to be in a gallery."
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Monet's 'Meules': $110.7 million
The French painter Claude Monet created multiple landscape series that depict the same subject in different types of light and seasons, showing off his ability to capture atmosphere. The painting "Meules" (1890), from his "Haystacks" series, fetched $110.7 million (€98 million) at a Soethby's auction — the record for a Monet and the first impressionist painting to cross the $100-million threshold.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Da Vinci's 'Salvator Mundi': $450.3 million
Created around 1500, this painting of Christ attributed to Leonardo da Vinci is one of the master's 20 still existing paintings. In 1958 "Salvator Mundi" was sold for just $60 because it was thought to be a copy. But it fetched more than four times Christie's pre-sale estimate on November 15, 2017, when it was sold for over $450 million (€382 million) — setting a world record for auctioned art.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Picasso's 'Women of Algiers': $179.4 million
From 1954-55, Pablo Picasso did a series of 15 paintings inspired by Delacroix's "Les Femmes d'Alger," with versions named "A" through "O." He started them after the death of Henry Matisse, as a tribute to his friend and artistic rival. "Version O" broke the world record for an auction sale, selling for $179.4 million (167.1 million euros) at Christie's in May 2015.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Modigliani's 'Reclining Nude': $170.4 million
At a Christie's auction held in November 2015, seven potential buyers spent nine frantic minutes bidding on this painting. It was finally snapped by a telephone bidder from China. The nude, painted in 1917-18, provoked a scandal at its first exhibition in Paris. The police shut down the art show after a crowd gathered outside the window.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Modigliani's 'Nude lying on her left side': $157.2 million
Modigliani's work "Nu couché (sur le côté gauche)" caused such a controversy when it was first shown in Paris in 1917 that the police had to close the exhibition. The Italian artist's oil painting became the most expensive artwork to have been sold at New York auction house Sotheby's in May 2018.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Klimt's 'The Woman in Gold': $135 million
This 1907 painting by Gustav Klimt is considered one of the most elaborate and representative of his "golden phase." In 2006, it was sold through a private sale brokered by Christie's for a record sum for a painting, $135 million. That same year, Jackson Pollock's classic drip painting "No. 5 1948" broke that record, obtaining $140 million through another private sale.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Van Gogh's 'Portrait of Dr. Gachet': $149.7 million
Van Gogh allegedly said of the homeopathic doctor Dr. Gachet, whom he painted here in 1890, that "he was sicker than I am." The plant is a foxglove, which is used to make the drug digitalis. In 1990, the work was auctioned off to Ryoei Saito, Japan's second-largest paper manufacturer, for $82.5 million, making it the world's priciest painting at the time (the price above has been adjusted).
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Bacon's 'Three Studies of Lucian Freud': $142.4 million
This 1969 triptych documents Francis Bacon's friendship and rivalry with fellow painter Lucian Freud. At the time it was sold, in November 2013, it obtained the highest price for a work of art at an auction, until Picasso - and now Modigliani - surpassed that record in 2015.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Renoir's 'Dance at Moulin de la Galette': $141.7 million
This 1876 work by Impressionist master Renoir depicts a dance venue for high society on the outskirts of Paris, the Moulin de la Galette. One of Renoir's most famous works, it exudes the joie de vivre that is characteristic of his style. In 1990, the work was purchased for $78.1 million (adjusted price above) by Japanese buyer Ryoei Saito, along with van Gogh's "Portrait of Dr. Gachet."
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Picasso's 'Boy with a Pipe': $130.7 million
This portrait of an adolescent holding a pipe and wearing a garland of flowers in his hair was created during the Spanish master's "Rose Period" in 1905. Just a little under a century later, the painting fetched an impressive sum of $104.2 million at a Sotheby's auction in 2004 (price adjusted above).
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Munch's 'The Scream': $119.9 million
This agonizing character painted by Edvard Munch is one of the most iconic paintings in the world. The Expressionist artist had actually made four versions of it: Three are in Norwegian museums, and the fourth one was sold for the screeching price of $119.9 million in May 2012 at Sotheby's, which would be adjusted to $130.7 million today.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Picasso's 'Young Girl with a Flower Basket': $115 million
Picasso is well represented among the highest earning painters. His 1905 masterpiece "Fillette a la corbeille fleurie" ("Young Girl with a Flower Basket") was sold – along with two other Rose Period paintings – by the artist himself to writer Gertrude Stein in a sale that helped launch his career. The work, which was later part of David and Peggy Rockefeller's collection, sold for $115 million.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Picasso's 'Nude, Green Leaves and Bust': $106.5 million
Inspired by his mistress Marie-Thérèse Walther, Picasso created this painting in a single day in 1932. If you add the eight minutes and six seconds it took for the auction record bid at Christie's in May 2010, it still appears to be well-invested time. Its price could be adjusted to $115.7 million today.
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Most expensive artworks sold at auction
Botticelli's 'Young Man Holding a Roundel': $92.2 million
Sandro Botticelli's masterpiece was sold at auction at Sotheby's in January 2021 for $92.2 million. The Italian Renaissance master had never fetched so much at auctions before. Prior to the sale, the work had been estimated at about $60 million.
Author: Elizabeth Grenier, Kate Müser
