Liquidity has returned to the art market, praise be. And even though we don’t fully understand the reasons for the unprecedented three-year slide that only showed signs of a real reversal last November, it now seems clear there is a robust (but still cautious) market for high-value art. More importantly, the money is visible beyond the big-name collections that were sold earlier this week and last, and the billion-dollar one-night totals. The true indicators of a solid market are instead apparent in last night’s more humble $115 million evening sale at Phillips, and the $304 million modern evening sale at Sotheby’s shortly thereafter.

In both events, artworks were resold at par or even a slight loss. While this might seem like a light capitulation, it’s actually an important market milestone. Despite the popular fixation on making money from owning art, the truth is that its real value is in the experience of living with it. Getting most of your money out when you sell is a small but tangible victory for the vast majority of collectors.

That dynamic has been missing from the market in recent years. Sure, some sellers were compelled to off-load works on account of the inexorable duo of death and taxes. But discretionary sellers—or buyers who might have regretted a purchase, or experienced a change of circumstances, or just needed the money—have mostly been opting not to sell their art for some time, perhaps waiting out the uncertainty that shrouded the market during the past few years.

This behavior has been reminiscent of the retrenchment that followed the global financial crisis in 2009, when collectors who bought in the euphoria of the market boom from 2004 to 2007 required a few years of soul-searching and wound-licking to resell those pieces. In 2011, however, a number of works came back to market after prices reached a point where penitent buyers could sell at only a slight loss. This behavior released market tensions, gave sellers a sense of relief, rewarded buyers, and helped to revive the market. As we go through the recent sales at Phillips and Sotheby’s, this dynamic may be resurfacing.

I was surprised to learn at the end of Sotheby’s modern evening sale that the total was almost $304 million. Only half of the top 10 lots saw much bidding above the low estimates, though Henri Matisse’s La Chaise lorraine was the night’s surprise battle—three bidders, including David Nahmad, seated in the front row, pushed the hammer price 60 percent above the $25 million estimate. In the end, the work sold to a telephone bidder for more than $48 million with fees. Dealer Per Skarstedt lobbed in a bid on Pablo Picasso’s cubist Arlequin (Buste), from 1909, but it was a half-hearted attempt. The work sold for $42.6 million with fees, suggesting it went to the holder of the irrevocable bid. The other Matisse in the sale, La Séance du matin, sold for $20 million—again, a number that should indicate the buyer was the irrevocable bidder. Taiwanese singer Jay Chou is bragging about it on his Instagram.

Sotheby’s revealed that 11 of the lots had bidding from Asian clients, and that five were acquired by those bidders. The lack of Asian, particularly Chinese, buyers in the past few years has been a major feature of the market slowdown.

Ten of the 41 lots sold at Sotheby’s made prices below the low estimate. So, as at Phillips earlier in the evening, consignors had to come to grips with market realities. Buyers balking at sellers’ expectations isn’t a new thing, nor is it a surprise in the modern category. The night before, at Christie’s, a Renoir that had not been on the market for generations sold to a backer for just shy of the low estimate.

A similar story played out with the watercolor on paper by Vincent van Gogh. An undeniably great work of art, it sold at the $25 million low estimate to make a premium price of a little more than $29 million. It was last sold in 2003 for $10 million, which would be more than $18 million in today’s terms; a previous buyer paid $14 million for it in 1997, or $29 million in today’s purchasing power. In an additional indicator of the market’s swings, another van Gogh watercolor sold in 2021 for nearly $36 million. Yes, timing is still everything in the art market.

Two Alberto Giacometti works made it into the top 10 at Sotheby’s, including La Clairière, a bronze cast in an edition of six from 1960, which had been owned by the consignor since 1981. It sold for $23 million. A similar work sold for almost $16 million eight years ago. And Annette d’après nature, one of five bronzes cast in 1954, sold for $8 million.

Finally, surrealist works by Óscar Domínguez, Leonora Carrington, Leonor Fini, René Magritte, Yves Tanguy, and Dorothea Tanning all did well, selling solidly above the estimates. The Tanguy made a price almost twice the estimate.

That’s it for today. But we’re not done with the auctions yet. I’m at Christie’s tonight, and tomorrow I’ll be at their postwar and contemporary day sale to see if they can match the heat Sotheby’s brought last Friday. I’ll have a final report on these sales at the end of the week before the holiday.

Until then,
M