According to the authors of the review, contemporary art is the most vibrant segment of the art market, primarily because it focuses on it and each work has enormous financial potential. It affects not only public interests, but also the interests of corporate foundations, sponsors, curators, journalists everyone who buys art writes about it and finances it. For the still life painting this is the best option now.

All this creates a “self-reinforcing mechanism” that affects the contemporary art market price changes on it can be faster and more significant than in any other segment of the art market. A vivid example is the auction fate of a single copy of Wolfgang Tillmans Gillian & Christopher (1993) in October 2015, it was sold for $ 50 thousand at Christie’s London auction, and in May 2017 it left for $ 150 thousand for a new one Sotheby’s York auction. Between the two sales, Tilmans joined the artists of the David Zwirner gallery and held two great retrospectives – at the Tate Modern and the Beyeler Foundation.

• A significant event in the contemporary art market was the record $ 110.5 million paid on May 18, 2017 by Japanese billionaire YusakuMaezawa at Sotheby’s New York auction for Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Untitled painting (1982). This is all the more impressive since a year ago the record for the work of Basquiat , also acquired by Maezawa, was $ 57.3 million. The results of public auctions clearly show that transactions are accelerating and becoming more global. Contemporary art breaks the traditional rules governing the art market, which is becoming increasingly transparent, liquid and efficient.

Recovered growth

New growth in sales of contemporary art, after some fall, began in the first half of 2017, when the global auction turnover grew by 14%. For the period from July 2016 to the end of June 2017, the auction turnover in the segment of contemporary art amounted to $ 1.58 billion, which is 3.2% more than the previous year. At the same time, the number of lots sold decreased by 2%. The percentage of unsold lots remained stable at 41%. An increase in turnover with fewer transactions means higher prices for the proposed work. The average price of a work of contemporary art has grown over the year from $ 26,160 to $ 27,600.

• Proportionally, the art of modernism remains the largest segment of the art market, although the market share of contemporary art, which is growing at a higher rate than post-war art, is increasing: in 2000, contemporary art accounted for 3% of the global art auction market, and 17 years later 15 % Now, contemporary art is no longer a marginal and fragile segment of the art market, but one of its main locomotives.

The appointment of businessman Ted Smith in 2015 as executive director of Sotheby’s initiated a long process of reorganization of the art market. Loaded in the endless race for auction records and constant expansion, large auction houses now strive for greater stability and efficiency. The reorientation to the middle market segment and the improvement of risk management made it possible to consolidate unstable balance sheets. In the past year, the leader in the auction market for contemporary art was Sotheby’s house (1978 lots sold, revenue $ 541 653 155), followed by Christie’s (2271 lots sold, revenue $ 421 349 302), Phillips (1753 lots sold, revenue $ 191 400 871), Poly International and China Guardian.