Day of Reckoning for Art World Looming?

MOMENT OF TRUTH FOR AUCTION HOUSES?
written by James Stevens in New York

In a recent noteworthy article in the Wall Street Journal,
international art journalist Alexandra Peers surveys the current art
market landscape and the possibility of the current US credit crisis
negatively affecting the current seemingly untouchable art ecosystem
which has seen exponential growth over the last 17 years. A definite
must read for an examination of the various viewpoints regarding the
health of the art market today.

In the article, CEO of Sotheby's William Ruprecht, always reliable for
a bullish view of the market and salient, optimistic viewpoints,
comments that the naysayers of the art world, "are all shooting arrows
at the same target: Will the market go down?" But,
"twenty-million-dollar pictures have been flying around in the past
two weeks," he says.

Perhaps the contrarian contemporary art collector of our time, Eli
Broad, states in the article, "dramatic rise in contemporary art
values in recent years, it is now time for a major downward adjustment
in values."

In the auction world at least, the next 10 days are pivotal for
judging the impact of the current credit crisis (here in the US and
Europe) on the global art market. Here's the link to her article:
<href ="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121002756855268963.html?mod=hpp_us_personal_journal">Art
Sales Boom</a>

Comments