Steib, who will take on the role of chief executive at the media company Tegna, will remain in an advisory role with Artsy through July and a board member following his departure. 

Since joining the company in 2019, Yin has overseen Artsy’s strategy and operations, as well as investments in the company and investor relations. Yin also oversaw the expansion of Artsy’s e-commerce transaction capabilities, which now include 37 countries and three currencies, the dollar, the British pound, and the euro.

In an email interview with ARTnews, Yin said that he doesn’t foresee any abrupt shifts in Artsy’s business strategy. Rather, his focus will be enhancing current efforts and “supporting our gallery partners, building out our secondary market business, and expanding the reach of artists globally.”

“My approach will bring a renewed focus on a few specific areas,” Yin said. “I have been involved with the business for five years, ensuring a deep understanding of our strategy and operations.”

Yin cited his passion for collecting works by emerging LGBTQ+, AAPI, Californian, French, and Italian artists as being influential to the company’s future path under his leadership. “My personal connection to these communities and regions … drives my commitment to diversity and representation within the art world. This perspective will shape our strategies and initiatives moving forward.”

He moves in to his new role at a time of cautious optimism in the art market, which over the last two years have shown collectors to be more thoughtful about their spending.

“The art market has proven uneven for many over the last year,” Yin said. “However, collectors continue to buy on Artsy and offline, and I am cautiously optimistic about the resilience of the art market because the joy people feel when collecting and appreciating art hasn’t diminished.”

According to the 2024 Global Art Market Report by Art Basel and UBS, online collecting, which began in earnest following the Covid-19 pandemic and was thought by some to be in decline after restrictions eased, has grown significantly in the last years. Per that report, online sales accounted for $11.8 billion last year alone, a 7 percent rise from 2022’s figure.

Economist Clare McAndrew, who authored the report, attributed the decline to various factors, including high interest rates, inflationary pressures, and geopolitical instability, all of which contributed to a slowdown in sales, particularly at the top end of the market (artworks that sell for $10 million or more).

“It was inevitable that things would slow down a little bit considering how remarkable the post-Covid bounce back was,” McAndrew told ARTnews. “But you don’t need a lot of those $50 million–$100 million plus sales to make a big difference. They do put a big dent in it both ways. Luckily, this isn’t a dramatic contraction of the sort we saw in 2014 or 2009. This is a much more normal, more natural dip that reflects the context of the time.” 

Apart from fewer sales in eight and nine figure last year McAndrew said the rising costs of doing business posed a significant challenge in 2023. The increasingly high interest rates that affected collectors’ purchasing power at the top level also caused dealers to shift focus from sales to profitability and from expansion to sustainability.

Examining regional dynamics, the report found that the United States held on to its position as the leading global art market, accounting for 42 percent of sales by value, though it experienced a 3 percent decline year-on-year. Unsurprisingly, China surpassed the UK to become the world’s second-largest market, with a 19-percent share. Sales in China increased by 9 percent to an estimated $12.2 billion, bolsters by relaxed Covid-19 restrictions in the country, a bourgeoning auction scene flush with inventory from postponed sales, and the launch of several new art fairs across Asia.

Meanwhile, the UK fell to third place with a 17-percent share of the market with sales having decreased by 8 percent to $10.9 billion in 2023. According to the report, the country’s declining global position is likely due to the sharp decline in high-value evening sales, which have historically been reserved for auctions in London and New York, as well as France’s 7-percent share of global sales, ranking it at fourth place.

The US art market, which reached a historical peak of $30.2 billion in 2022, witnessed a 10 percent decline to $27.2 billion in 2023. Despite this contraction, the US remained a key center for high-value sales, but they came in slightly below pre-pandemic levels in 2019. 

“Although down year-on-year, core collecting audiences remained actively engaged with the art market in 2023 and helped support prices on balance – albeit through a more value-driven and quality-conscious lens,” Noah Horowitz, Art Basel’s chief executive, said in a press release.

That focus on quality was clear in one of last year’s most watched sales at auction: Agnes Martin’s Grey Stone II (1961). The sale, which took place during Sotheby’s Emily Fisher Landau sale in New York in November, made clear that, while collectors were holding their wallets tighter than they had been in preceding years, the right work could still fetch an astounding price. Unsurprisingly, public auction sales declined by seven percent to $25.1 billion, with a substantial decrease in high-value lots, offset by growth in middle- and lower-priced works.

“Overall,” Horowitz said, “the reversal of trend at the high end of the market after years of compounded acceleration was one of the defining features of the art business last year, as it also creates an opening in the market for exciting new trends and narratives to emerge.”

The report revealed a slowdown in dealer sales by 3 percent to $36.1 billion last year, but, like the auction market, there was a reversal of roles. Smaller dealers (defined as having an annual revenue of less than $500,000 per year) experienced an 11-percent increase in average sales, while larger dealers ($10 million or more in revenue per year) saw a decline by seven percent, a sign that reflects a change in collector behavior. 

Art fairs accounted for 29 percent of dealer revenues, down six percent from 2022 but 27 percent higher than the Covid-era low of 2021. Larger dealers, the report says, are optimistic about 2024 with 50 percent expecting their sales at art fairs to increase, while across the financial spectrum only 39 percent of art dealers believe sales at fairs will increase. 

Online sales experienced a seven percent increase to $11.8 billion, underscoring the growing importance of digital platforms in facilitating art transactions. Though the online art sales are technically down from a $13.3 billion high in 2021, they are still nearly double that of 2019 or any of the preceding years, and this year were especially driven by dealer-owned channels and websites, the report said. Despite the decline in sales of art-related non-fungible tokens (NFTs) outside the art market, the report noted continued interest in NFTs, with sales remaining significantly higher than pre-pandemic levels. 

Looking ahead to 2024, the report says dealers on the whole expressed cautious optimism, with 36 percent anticipating increasing sales and only 16 percent foreseeing decline. Still, many dealers said the future looks rocky, with political and economic uncertainty looming over the market and the cost maintaining relationships with clients and participating in art fairs among the biggest concerns.

Economist Clare McAndrew, who authored the report, surveyed several hundred international galleries and more than 2,000 high-net-worth art collectors based in the U.S., the U.K., Asia, and Europe.

The U.S. remains the largest national market in the art trade, occupying 43 percent of the total value share. In second and third place are China and the U.K., which account for 20 and 17 percent, respectively.

The U.S. saw sales increase by 33 percent, to around $28 billion, in 2021. Sales in greater China increased by 35 percent, reaching $13.4 billion.

“Dealers and auction houses successfully adjusted to a new two-tier system of online and offline sales and events, and the rising wealth of the [high net worth] collectors helped to support demand at the higher end of the market,” McAndrew said in a statement accompanying the report.

Perhaps the most prominent art-market trend of the past year was the NFT boom. Based on McAndrew’s report, it appears that many collectors invested in that trend.

Nearly three-quarters of the collectors surveyed had purchased art-related NFTs in 2021, and NFT sales via online platforms accounted for $2.6 billion. More than half of the collectors surveyed reported an interest in acquiring digital artworks in the next year, with millennials accounting for the majority.

Gallery sales reached $34.7 billion in 2021. That marks an increase in 18 percent from 2020. More than half of the dealers surveyed said their sales increased in 2021, while 26 percent reported a drop in sales compared to the same period in 2020. Thirteen percent of dealers saw sales remain at the same level between 2020 and 2021.

In-person events returned in full force last year, but it appears that art fairs are still not helping dealers quite as much as they used to before the pandemic. Sales made by dealers at art fairs accounted for 29 percent of their annual totals in 2021, according to McAndrew’s report. That number is still a far cry from the 43 percent reported in 2019.

McAndrew’s report said that online sales continued to grow in 2021. Online sales channels accounted for 20 percent of all dealer sales, reaching $13.3 billion (including sales made via art fair–hosted online viewing rooms). The figure is more than double the figures reported by McAndrew for 2019.

The ongoing global crisis has not deterred the ultra-wealthy from investing in art. The median expenditure by the collectors surveyed in the report nearly doubled between 2020 and 2021, reaching $274,000 last year. That rise is being driven in part by baby-boomer collectors, who, despite buying fewer works than their younger counterparts, had the highest average expenditure overall, at $346,000.

According to the report, global sales of fine art and antiques achieved a total of $64.1 billion in 2019, slightly down from the $67.4 billion achieved in 2018. The international market has seen a return to its 2017 marker, down 5 percent in total sales from year to year. The United States, United Kingdom, and China—together, the three top market contributors—led with 82 percent of the sales total. The U.S. ranks as the highest-grossing art market, with a total of $23.8 billion in annual sales for 2019, marking a firm standing from last year with a market share of 44 percent. China maintained a stable market share of 18 percent down only 1 percent from last year, and achieved an estimated $11.7 billion in sales overall.

Notably, the trade sector remained flat, and auction private sales increased; but global public auction figures saw a drop in 17 percent overall after steady growth over the past two years. As widely anticipated throughout the year, this decline in worldwide auction sales is mainly attributable to the slimmer availability of ultra-high-value lots. The recent announcement by Sotheby’s of their $1 billion total private sales achievement this year is telling of the advantage to fixed-price strategy. For emerging investors especially, this transactional option is attractive to those looking to incur less risk and test the market before contending at auction.

Despite the global art industry’s historical resilience in times of economic and political turbulence, Clare McAndrew, founder of Arts Economics, notes the tendency of dealers to veer toward more conservative transactional measures “in periods of uncertainty”—emphasizing that “the relative security and confidentiality of private sales” is likely a contributing factor to the recent growth in this sector of the auction market.

Together with UBS and Arts Economics, the survey garnered data around the collecting habits of 1,300 high-net-worth individuals across the U.S, the U.K., Europe, and Asia. The findings revealed that the largest developing collector base across the globe was millennials. Among the 61 percent of those surveyed who have consigned works from their collection, 71 percent were millennial collectors. Overall, the figures show that emerging ultra-wealthy collectors are both buying and selling apace in the fine art category across varied sales channels.

The international art fair market, which remains a crucial stakeholder in the art world’s transactional flow, also reported a plateau in growth. Fairs are known largely to be most valuable in their service toward relationship-building among dealers, collectors, and industry specialists, and as sites of merging critical discourse. Yet, with a total of 64 percent of sales taking place during exhibitions, it is clear that the undercurrent of deal-making amid social fanfare is effective for helping meet annual targets.

News

The Musée d’Orsay in Paris has received $22.3 million from an anonymous American donor that will see its administrative spaces converted into galleries and education areas. [The New York Times]

According to the Global Art Market Report, published by Art Basel and UBS, the global art market dipped 5 percent in 2019, though private sales were up across the board. [The Art Newspaper]

The Armory Show opened in New York yesterday to invited guests, with “business as usual” despite fears of the coronavirus. [ARTnews]

An unknown drawing by Albrecht Dürer, dated to 1503 and titled Virgin and Child, is being sold by the London dealer Agnews. [The Art Newspaper]

Artists

For a new show at Regen Projects, L.A.-based photographer Catherine Opie presents a series of images of the swamp, which she calls “a beautiful, vulnerable ecosystem.” [Los Angeles Times]

In a solo show at the Serpentine Gallery in London, Cao Fei presents various works in which “the pervading melancholy is punctured by moments of surreal beauty and humour.” [The Guardian]

Lisa Yuskavage talks about early criticism of her provocative paintings, which are on view in a solo show at the Aspen Art Museum: “If you throw a hard punch, something is going to come back at you. I just kind of got used to it and started to embrace it.” [Aspen Public Radio]

For a show at Hauser & Wirth in L.A., Nicolas Party “deftly fuses influences of post-Renaissance Northern European art history with pop art, natural science, mythology and mural culture.” [LA Weekly]

More Fairs

The Art Newspaper has compiled a wish list of what to buy at the European Fine Art Fair (TEFAF), which runs March 7–15 in Maastricht, the Netherlands. [The Art Newspaper]

In case you missed it, here’s what galleries have brought to the Armory Show. [ARTnews]

Misc.

The Guardian has a cheeky headline: “The miracle new sustainable product that’s revolutionising architecture – stone!” [The Guardian]