Collectors Are Not in a Hurry! Art Basel Miami Beach’s 2024 First Sales
David Hammons, Robert Rauschenberg, and Yayoi Kusama’s works lead seven-figure opening day deals.
Jeffrey Gibson’ın “I can hear you” adlı eseri, Houser & Wirth’ın büyük satışlarından biriydi. Fotoğraf: Liliana Mora
Despite the divisive U.S. elections, political instability in other parts of the world, and last month’s drop in auction sales in New York, dealers were largely optimistic about the market’s state on the first VIP preview day of Art Basel Miami Beach.
This marks the first edition under the new director Bridget Finn, who had previously participated in the fair as a gallery partner with Reyes Finn in Detroit. She felt optimistic the evening before the VIP preview.
“We’re in a post-election period. What we saw in Paris—at Art Basel Paris in October—was quite positive, and that’s a good indicator that energy and collector commitment will continue,” says Finn. “Although the auctions (in New York) were smaller compared to previous years, the results were strong. Our VIP attendance rate is incredible. I feel we’re going to have a very strong fair.”
This year’s fair hosts 286 galleries from 38 countries, including 34 first-time participants. Among these new participants is Pearl Lam, one of China’s most influential galleries, with spaces in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Lam notes that Art Basel Miami Beach serves as a market temperature check.
“Customers… are optimistic; otherwise, they wouldn’t be here. They’re not coming just to look—they want to acquire something.”
—Pearl Lam, Gallerist
“This year, a soft market prevailed globally,” Lam says. “However, the clients we’ve met here are generally positive; otherwise, they wouldn’t have come. They’re not just here to look around—they want to buy something.”
By Wednesday afternoon, Hauser & Wirth reported the fair’s most valuable sale, with David Hammons’ untitled tarp painting from 2014 selling for $4.75 million. The gallery also sold George Condo’s “Female Portrait Abstraction” (2024) for $2.5 million and Jeffrey Gibson’s “I Can Hear You” (2024) for $500,000.
Other galleries also made seven-figure sales in the fair’s early hours. Thaddeus Ropac sold Georg Baselitz’s sculpture “Dresdner Frauen-Die Elbe” (1990/2023) for €2.5 million and Robert Rauschenberg’s metal composition “Everglade (Borealis)” (1990). Meanwhile, David Zwirner reported selling a 2017 painting from Yayoi Kusama’s Infinity Nets series for $3.5 million and a 2008 work by Noah Davis for $2 million.
New York-based art advisor Jessica Arb Danial notes that dealers at the fair have reported an increase in sales since mid-November. While some anticipated a “Trump bump” to boost sales, Danial believes that the stability brought by the election results has given buyers confidence. She adds that while business has picked up, it’s moving slower than a few years ago, though this isn’t necessarily a negative.
Even Larry Gagosian acknowledged the slower pace. His gallery reportedly sold works by Maurizio Cattelan, Roy Lichtenstein, Richard Prince, Ed Ruscha, Jenny Saville, and Jeff Koons for undisclosed prices. Gagosian described the sales as “a great start to the fair” but noted that “collectors are not in a hurry.”
At Sprüth Magers, an untitled work from 2024 by Anne Imhof sold for €250,000, while John Baldessari’s “Vertical Series: Fun” (2003) fetched $325,000, and Richard Artschwager’s “Exclamation Point (Yellow)” (2001) sold for $425,000. Perrotin sold five paintings by Danielle Orchard, each priced between $45,000 and $100,000, alongside works by Nick Doyle, Vivian Greven, JR, Paola Pivi, and Leslie Hewitt, priced between $35,000 and $60,000.
New Collectors Show Interest
Charles Moffett, a New York gallerist featuring works by Kim Dacres and Melissa Joseph at his booth in the Nova sector, reported making numerous sales to collectors with whom the gallery had never worked before—all within the first 30 minutes of the VIP preview.
“My expectation is that presentations always sell out, whether it’s at our fair or gallery, but how we get to that point has definitely changed over the past year,” Moffett says. “We’re lucky to be doing very well. It just takes a bit more work and effort.”
At Lehmann Maupin’s booth, Calida Rawles’ painting “I’ll See You on Your Way” (2024), whose solo exhibition is currently on view across town at the Pérez Art Museum Miami, sold for between $150,000 and $200,000. Marilyn Minter’s “Left on Red” (2024) sold to a Canadian collector for $200,000.
“There is a lot of instability in the world. But on the other hand, people still want to do what they’ve always wanted to do, and that is to look at art,” says Rachel Lehmann, co-founder of Lehmann Maupin. “Art isn’t going away… But the way people look at it and who looks at it is changing.”
