Christie’s International and Sotheby’s reported record sales for 2014 as purchases of contemporary works surged and new buyers entered the market.
Sales of art and collectibles at Christie’s rose to 5.1 billion pounds ($7.7 billion), a 12 percent increase from 2013, the world’s largest art broker said in a statement. Sotheby’s said today its auction sales rose 18 percent to $6 billion.
More wealthy individuals are increasing their spending on art, particularly for contemporary works that are seen as strong investments. New clients at Christie’s represented 30 percent of all buyers last year as the auction house expanded in New Delhi, Hong Kong and Shanghai. Sotheby’s said one-third of its customers in 2014 were new.
“It was a rather banner year,” Stephen Brooks, global chief operating officer of Christie’s, said in a phone interview. “We’re focused on getting the highest caliber of art that we can find and connecting it to a global network of clients.”
Both auction houses are under pressure to land the best works and are undergoing management turnover, as auctions worldwide rose 10 percent to $16 billion in 2014, according to figures by New York-based researcher Artnet.
New Leaders
Last month London-based Christie’s named Patricia Barbizet, the longtime adviser to the auction house’s owner, French billionaire Francois Pinault, as chief executive officer, replacing Steven Murphy. Sotheby’s, based in New York, lost its leader in November when William Ruprecht stepped down following calls from activist investor Daniel Loeb to cut costs and increase shareholder value.
Christie’s was acquired by Pinault’s holding company, Artemis SA, for $1.2 billion in 1998. The auction house, which doesn’t report revenue or profit, releases sale totals twice a year.
Barbizet has been chairwoman of Christie’s for about 15 years and is “a completely known individual within the company who knows a lot about the art business and is deeply involved in the strategic decisions,” said Brooks, who joined Christie’s in 2009 and was appointed to his new post in December. “The transition is very easy.”
Art market analysts have questioned whether the use of guarantees — when the auction house or a third party agrees to pay the seller a minimum sum, regardless of whether or not the work finds a bidder — cuts into profit.
‘Highly Profitable’
Guarantees are “a feature of the art market which our clients particularly value,” Brooks said. “They were in evidence in 2014, but were not more prevalent than in the past. We expect client appetite for it in 2015.”
Brooks declined to disclose numbers but that “we remain highly profitable by every measure in all of our businesses.”
Sotheby’s, a publicly traded company, said that its auction sales don’t include private sales or other revenue. The auction house said it will report 2014 earnings next month. In the three months ended Sept. 30, Sotheby’s had a loss of $27.7 million, or 40 cents a share, compared with $30.1 million, or 44 cents, in the same period in 2013. Ruprecht will remain CEO until a successor is found.
Christie’s and Sotheby’s said sales increased in several major categories. Contemporary art sales at Sotheby’s were $1.6 billion, up 20.3 percent; Impressionist and modern art sales totaled $1.4 billion, up 26.7 percent. Jewelry sales were $602.5 million, a 13.8 percent increase. The top lot was Alberto Giacometti’s “Chariot” sculpture that fetched $101 million in New York in November.
Record Evening
At Christie’s, postwar and contemporary art sales of 1.7 billion pounds rose 33 percent from a year earlier. Christie’s on Nov. 12 in New York sold 75 contemporary works for $852.9 million, a record for an evening auction.
Christie’s said 86 works fetched more than $10 million each while 870 lots exceeded $1 million. Among the top lots at Christie’s in 2014 were works by Barnett Newman, Andy Warhol and Francis Bacon.
Warhol’s “Triple Elvis,” a 1963 silkscreen of Elvis Presley in a publicity image for the movie “Flaming Star,” sold for $81.9 million. “Four Marlons,” a 1966 canvas by Warhol depicting four identical images of a young Marlon Brando in a still from the movie “The Wild One,” fetched $69.6 million. Both works were sold in November in New York.
Newman’s “Black Fire I” went for $84.2 million during the New York May sale, an artist record.
Private sales at Christie’s rose 20 percent to 916.1 million pounds, and its online auctions continue to gain in popularity, as sales of 21.4 million pounds surged 54 percent from 2013. New registrants online increased 57 percent, with 15.6 million visitors from 228 countries, Christie’s said. Sotheby’s said 10 lots sold for more than $500,000 to online bidders.
Christie’s said sales to customers in the Americas accounted for 38 percent of the activity; Europe and the Middle East made up 35 percent of sales; Asia was 27 percent.
