Introduction
As the new art season begins, uncertainty reigns in the global art market. Notable galleries have been closing, and auction results are off sharply. Total auction sales for the first half of 2024 were $5.05 billion, down from $7.17 billion during the same period in 2023, according to the Artnet Price Database.
The state of play in the auction world’s four main cities—London, Paris, Hong Kong, and New York—is topsy-turvy, too. Over the past decade, these art markets have been reshaped by dramatic political, economic, and legal developments, from the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused deep dips in all four hubs, to Brexit in London and pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong.
The New York art market has maintained its pole position over the past decade, but the other three hubs have been engaged in close competition as auction houses shift strategies, make new investments, and respond to local developments.
As the art market continues to globalize, each city’s status and offerings are in flux, while intriguing regional peculiarities endure. In Part 1 of this report, Morgan Stanley, in collaboration with Artnet, will draw on the Artnet Price Database to examine how the markets in the four cities have been changing over the lookback period of 2013 to 2023—and where they might be headed. Part 2 surveys the events of the past 18 months, while charting developments on the horizon.1
Part One: The State of Play, 2013-2023
The Big Picture
As displayed in the chart above, one of the most notable trends among the four cities over the 2013-2023 period has been the significant decline of London’s market following the 2016 Brexit vote. From a $3.4 billion high in 2018, its auction sales fell to $1.7 billion in 2023—a precipitous 49 percent drop.
Meanwhile, New York has remained dominant, but not without its considerable ups and downs determined in part by the availability of blockbuster private collections. The titanic $835 million sale of the Peggy and David Rockefeller collection at Christie’s in 2018 helped generate a $5.82 billion total, which nearly equaled the $6.09 billion haul of 2015, when the house scored its first $1 billion auction week. New York’s biggest year was 2022, with sales reaching $7.33 billion, as material once owned by Paul G. Allen came to market.
Hong Kong’s auction totals have also seen peaks and valleys while following a general upward trajectory over the lookback period, going from $1.16 billion in 2013 to a high of $1.8 billion in 2021. As the Chinese property crisis took hold in 2022, though, questions began to swirl about the country’s economy, and auction results have softened. All three major Western auction houses have been investing in infrastructure in Hong Kong over the past 18 months, hoping that economic troubles and a crackdown on dissent will not affect the city’s status as a hub for business and the arts.
Speaking of turmoil, there was speculation that London’s troubles would be Paris’s gains following the 2016 Brexit referendum. The French capital saw annual results climb 10 percent that year and 23 percent the following one. It registered totals just above $1 billion in 2021 and 2022, and despite a retreat to $864 million in 2023, its sale totals are up 30 percent over 2013.
The Masterpiece Market
When it comes to history-making sales, New York retains bragging rights, as evidenced by the whopping totals it derives from lots above $10 million. (Morgan Stanley and Artnet took a close look at the “Masterpiece Market” in last year’s Artnet Intelligence Report Mid-Year Review 2023.)2
In 2022, New York’s biggest auction year, $3.76 billion of its $7.33 billion total came from $10 million-plus lots, led by a $195 million Warhol. It is the city where the houses conduct their most high-profile business. For instance, while London has long been known as the Old Masters capital (more on this below), Christie’s picked New York in 2017 to hammer Leonardo da Vinci’s Salvator Mundi (ca. 1500), which made $450.3 million, the most ever paid for an artwork at auction.
The other three cities do not even come close in this regard. In London’s strongest year in the $10 million-plus bracket, 2014, such sales brought in $921.7 million, or 63 percent less than New York.
Hong Kong was generally a reliable third-place finisher but managed to edge out London in 2020 and 2021 as its market grew. In 2013, the city sold just $90.6 million worth of works in this price bracket; by 2021, that figure had more than quintupled. Paris barely even charts. In four of the past 11 years, there were exactly zero works sold at auction at this level.
The mania for Ultra-Contemporary artists (born since 1974) has been a defining characteristic of the 2013-2023 period; the tapering of that mania could define the coming years. (Morgan Stanley and Artnet News analyzed the market for these young artists in the Artnet News Pro Spring 2022 Intelligence Report.)3 As the market for such work roared in the early 2020s,4 New York and Hong Kong broke away from their rivals, registering results of $269.4 million and $206.1 million, respectively—12 times and 24 times their 2013 totals. A number of buyers in both cities grew wealthier amid COVID lockdowns and, as the data shows, were eager to spend on coveted new art, although some argue that the buying, particularly in Hong Kong, has been speculative and profit-driven.5
While London reigned supreme in Old Masters at the start of the lookback period, New York and London have duked it out in the area over the years, with the Big Apple getting a massive boost in 2017 from the singular $450.3 million sale of Salvator Mundi—which accounted for a huge portion of its $572.9 million genre total for the year.
London has dropped notably over the 2013-2023 period. After a $473.6 million high in 2014, driven in part by a landmark $117.1 million sale at Sotheby’s, the English capital’s Old Master market declined to $216 million in 2023. Concurrently, a record-smashing painting by 18th-century Frenchman Chardin and a long-lost Michelangelo drawing helped push Paris’s Old Master market to a decade high in 2022.
Historic sales of major estates stocked with Impressionist and Modern masterpieces sent New York’s totals to dramatic highs in several recent years, and three nine-figure canvases (by Picasso, Modigliani, and Giacometti) helped drive 2015 sales to New York’s second-highest total over the 2013-2023 period.
In London, $45 million-plus masterpieces by Monet, Bacon,6 and the like helped prop up its 2014 results, but its annual total has dropped some 59 percent over the course of the lookback period.
In the Postwar and Contemporary realm, New York is the undisputed king. The blockbuster $852.9 million sale in the category at Christie’s New York—the house’s largest ever—sent the New York market to its second-highest total for the decade in 2014, surpassed only by the $2.87 billion haul in 2022. Runner-up London realized its highest total in the category, which was $1.1 billion in 2015, after which sales in the genre also saw a decline by some 40 percent through 2023.
While in New York, London, and Paris the market for decorative art (which encompasses furniture, clocks, manuscripts, and other collectibles) is dwarfed by that for fine art, in Hong Kong decorative art has a sizable presence, even surpassing the city’s fine art market in 2014 and 2015.
These highs were driven partly by the 2014 sales at Christie’s Hong Kong of several scroll paintings that went for multiples of their estimates,7 as well as the sale at Sotheby’s that year of a $39 million porcelain cup, nicknamed the “Chicken cup,” which one Hong Kong dealer called “the Holy Grail of ceramics.”8
The Auction Players in Each City, Total Fine Art Sales 2013-2023
Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips are the top three players in New York and London, with Sotheby’s ahead in London over the lookback period, Christie’s placing first in New York, and Phillips the perennial bronze-medal winner. Sotheby’s and Christie’s led in Hong Kong, but the state-owned Poly Auction came in third, followed by Phillips. In Paris, home-grown Artcurial, Piasa, Millon, and Tajan follow Sotheby’s and Christie’s in the rankings, in that order. These names are reminders that, even in our globalized times, and even as Bonhams snaps up one regional house after another,10 the auction world is not yet a full oligopoly.
Part Two: Recent Developments—and a Look Forward
London Falling
Galleries
• Gagosian closed a major outpost in 2023.11
• Galleries folding included Addis,12 Vitrine,13 Simone Lee,14 Marlborough,15 Fold, and Darren Flook.16
Museums
• The embattled British Museum tapped National Portrait Gallery chief Nicholas Cullinan17 as director in March 2024 and announced in May that it had recovered 626 of the approximately 1,500 objects pilfered from its storerooms.18
• In December 2023, the British Museum struck a $63 million partnership deal with BP, over objections from climate activists.19
• Many arts institutions have faced a financial crunch, with the Guardian reporting that U.K. funding dropped 16 percent between 2017 and 2022.20
Art Fairs
• Frieze Week gained another satellite in 2023, the Women in Art Fair (WIAF), designed, per its founder, in response to “industry-wide discrimination”—a rare instance of corrective action instead of market correction.21
Auction Houses
• In May 2024, sources indicated that Sotheby’s was considering cutting as many as 50 jobs in London, its second-biggest base worldwide.22
• Christie’s canceled its regular June evening sales of 20th- and 21st-century art 23
• In July 2024, Christie’s nevertheless set an auction record for Titian, selling The Rest on the Flight into Egypt (1508–10) for £17.6 million ($22.1 million).
Other Developments
• As many as 9,500 people with more than $1 million in liquid investable assets are expected to depart the U.K. in 2024, more than double 2023’s number, according to one report. Labour’s July victory could signal higher taxes for top earners.24
• Continued upheaval in government surely hasn’t helped, with five prime ministers serving since 2013, including Elizabeth Truss, who served just 45 days.25
Paris Triumph
Galleries
• Commercial art galleries have flocked to the city. Hauser and Wirth, Mendes Wood DM, Thomas Zander, Stuart Shave’s Modern Art, Moretti Gallery, Esther Schipper, and others opened spaces in the French capital between 2022 and 2024.26
Museums
• After 30 years, the private Fondation Cartier will move into a grand space in the Louvre des Antiquaires building. Slated to open in 2025, the new 172,000-square-foot space is 13 times bigger than the original and will make the Cartier the city’s largest private art center.27
Art Fairs
• In 2024, Art Basel rebranded its Paris+ fair, which it launched in 2022, as a full-on Art Basel event. (For more on the shift, read an interview with its director, Clément Delépine, on page 27 of the full Mid-Year 2024 Intelligence Report.)
Auctions
• Sotheby’s will move its Paris headquarters in October 2024 to the former home of the legendary Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, which occupies some 10,800 square feet spread over five floors, an increase of 30 percent from the house’s previous location.28
Other Developments
• France’s left-leaning political parties aligned in July 2024 to defeat the far right. The left-wing New Popular Front argues for taxes on “superprofits,” a wealth tax, and an increase in cultural spending.29
Hong Kong, Die Another Day?
Galleries
• The Hong Kong Art Gallery Association reported a 27 percent increase in member galleries between 2021 and 2023.30
• In January 2024, Hauser and Wirth relocated to a 10,000-square-foot, street-level, Selldorf Architects-designed space in Central.31
• In July 2024, Lévy Gorvy Dayan, which has locations in New York and London, said it would shutter its Hong Kong venue, a partnership with Rebecca Wei, who said that “client behavior has changed.”32
Art Fairs
• Art Basel Hong Kong returned to its pre-pandemic size in March 2024, with 242 galleries, up 37 percent from 2023.33
• In June of 2024, Shanghai’s Art021 fair announced that it will debut an invitation-only Hong Kong edition with events running from August 28 to September 8.34
• After nixing its New York fair, Photofairs, which runs shows in Shanghai and London, said that it will present a March 2025 Hong Kong event.35
Auction Houses
• Phillips opened its Asia headquarters last spring in a 52,000-square-feet space in the Herzog and de Meuron-designed WKCDA Tower in the West Kowloon Cultural District.36
• Sotheby’s opened a new flagship in Central in July 2024, occupying 24,000 square feet on two floors of the Landmark Chater.37
• In September 2024, Christie’s will open in 50,000 square feet on four floors of the Henderson, a new Central skyscraper designed by Zaha Hadid Architects.38
Museums
• In early 2024, officials with the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority said that it was running low on funds. In July, it received permission to sell land to bolster its finances.39
Other Developments
• Hong Kong has lost 4 percent of its millionaires over the past decade.40
• There is widespread speculation that a draconian 2020 national security law, expanded in 2024, will erode the city’s status as a global business hub.41
New York, New York!
Galleries
• More than a dozen galleries—most, but not all, emerging or mid-tier—have closed over the past year, including Foxy Production, Cheim and Read, Mitchell-Innes and Nash, and Marlborough.42
• Tribeca remains hot. The number of galleries there tripled from late 2020 to mid-2022, and Marian Goodman will move there in October 2024.43
• Ever-expanding mega-gallery Hauser and Wirth opened another Chelsea space,44 for editions, last September, and in November 2023 it inaugurated a SoHo gallery, where an outpost of its popular L.A. restaurant Manuela will launch soon.45
• Two-year-old blue-chip quartet LGDR (Dominique Lévy, Brett Gorvy, Amalia Dayan, and Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn) became a trio last August with Rohatyn’s exit.46
Museums
• Several smaller institutions have closed or reconfigured: The Rubin Museum will shutter to focus on traveling shows and loans.47 In June 2024, the Center for Italian Modern Art closed after more than a decade.48
• At the mid-level, the Studio Museum in Harlem will reopen next year, in a David Adjaye-designed building, as will the New Museum, on the Bowery, following an OMA-designed expansion.
• At the top of the pile, the Metropolitan Museum of Art will unveil a wHY Architecture-led renovation of its wing for Sub-Saharan African art, ancient American art, and Oceanic art next year. In May 2024, it said it had reached its $550 million fundraising goal for a new modern and contemporary wing designed by Frida Escobedo.49
Auction Houses
• A hack of the Christie’s website before marquee May auctions led to a class-action lawsuit. A representative for the company said it “will defend the lawsuits vigorously.”50
• Sotheby’s acquired the Breuer building on the Upper East Side from the Whitney Museum for a reported $100 million and said it will open to the public there in 2025.51
Other Developments
• The number of millionaires in the city has grown over the past decade by a formidable 48 percent.52
Conclusion
Market experts will be watching how central banks handle interest rates in the coming months, and many may be holding their breath about the U.S. presidential election, which could lead to significant changes in international trade. London’s new Labour government and Paris’s reshuffled parliament may have profound effects on tax regimes and cultural spending. Paris appears to be surging as London stagnates, and Hong Kong’s future remains an open question.
Amid all these fluctuations, some regional differences are clear, based on the data collected in this report. New York remains the go-to city for Postwar and Contemporary art, as well as the highest-priced lots of any genre; London is a hub for Old Masters; Hong Kong is a hot spot for decorative arts; and Paris is continuing to benefit from Brexit with moderately increased auction sales and a steady flow of gallery openings. These distinctions are a reminder that even in a hyper-globalized auction market, cities can reflect unique local tastes, trends, and consumer behavior.
But if there is one lesson to be gleaned from the past decade—or just the past couple of month —it is that facts on the ground can change very quickly.
Endnotes:
1. For the avoidance of doubt, all sale records come from the Artnet Price Database, as do all other figures cited in this report, unless otherwise indicated. This report reflects results from 1,041 auction houses worldwide from January 1, 2013–June 30, 2024, that were in the Artnet Price Database as of July 31, 2024.
3. https://news.artnet.com/market/morgan-stanley-intelligence-report-triumph-contemporary-2109417
5. https://www.yieldstreet.com/blog/article/how-the-asian-market-is-changing-the-art-landscape/
9. Phillip’s figure includes its sales in association with Poly Auction, which totaled $178.7 million.
10. https://news.artnet.com/market/bonhams-bruno-vinciguerra-2181811
11. https://news.artnet.com/market/gagosian-closing-britannia-street-gallery-london-2300533
12. https://www.ft.com/content/8a403d01-8857-4404-90d5-8a5be61b57a0
16. https://www.timeout.com/london/art/gallery-closures-2024
17. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/british-museum-nicholas-cullinan-2460242
18. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/british-museum-recovery-program-2489764
19. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/british-museum-bp-partnership-2412030
21. https://news.artnet.com/market/woman-in-art-fair-arriving-alongside-frieze-2352894
22. https://news.artnet.com/market/sothebys-eyes-job-cuts-in-london-other-offices-2494850
24. https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/18/business/uk-millionaires-loss-record/index.html
25. https://www.gov.uk/government/history/past-prime-ministers
26. https://news.artnet.com/market/paris-galleries-second-wave-2378978
27. https://www.timeout.com/news/paris-is-getting-a-huge-new-art-museum-110323
28. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/sothebys-paris-relocation-galerie-bernheim-jeune-1234710539/
32. https://news.artnet.com/market/paint-drippings-art-industry-news-july-12-2512115-2512115
33. https://news.artnet.com/market/art-basel-hong-kong-2023-2397432
34. https://news.artnet.com/market/art021-fair-co-founder-kylie-ying-on-expanding-to-hong-kong-2502046
35. https://news.artnet.com/market/photofairs-plans-hong-kong-debut-after-nixing-new-york-fair-2512645
36. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2023/02/21/phillipss-hong-kong-headquarters
39. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/hong-kong-west-kowloon-funding-2490283
40. https://www.henleyglobal.com/publications/wealthiest-cities-2024
41. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-68636561
43. https://news.artnet.com/market/gray-market-shifting-gallery-district-new-york-2266990
46. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/jeanne-greenberg-rohatyn-leaves-lgdr-2348374
47. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/rubin-museum-to-close-building-for-decentralized-model-2426220
48. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2024/06/14/center-italian-modern-art-new-york-closing
49. https://www.metmuseum.org/press/news/2024/tang-wing_fundraising-milestone
52. https://www.henleyglobal.com/publications/wealthiest-
Disclosures
Morgan Stanley Disclosures: This material was published in September 2024 and has been prepared for informational purposes only. Charts and graphs were published by Artnet News in the 2024 Artnet Intelligence Report. The information and data in the material has been obtained from sources outside of Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC (“Morgan Stanley”). Morgan Stanley makes no representations or guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of the information or data from sources outside of Morgan Stanley. The information and data provided by the third-party websites or publications are as of the date when they were written and subject to change without notice.
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Artnet Price Database: From Michelangelo drawings to Warhol paintings, Le Corbusier chairs to Banksy prints, there are more than 14 million color-illustrated art auction records dating back to 1985 in the Artnet Price Database. The Artnet Price Database covers more than 1,800 auction houses and 385,000 artists, and every lot is vetted by Artnet’s team of multilingual specialists.
Artnet Disclosures: This Artnet Intelligence Report Mid-Year Review 2024 (“the Report”) was published by Artnet Worldwide Corporation (“Artnet”) in September 2024 and has been prepared for informational purposes only. Portions of the information and data in the Report have been obtained from sources outside of Artnet. Artnet makes no representations or guarantees as to the accuracy or completeness of the information or data in the Report, including from the sources outside of Artnet. This material is not investment advice, nor does it constitute a recommendation, offer or advice regarding the purchase and/or sale of any artwork. It has been prepared without regard to the individual financial circumstances and objectives of persons who receive it. It is not a recommendation to purchase or sell artwork nor is it to be used to value any artwork. Investors must independently evaluate particular artwork, artwork investments and strategies, and should seek the advice of an appropriate third-party advisor for assistance in that regard as the Report does not provide advice on artwork nor provide tax or legal advice. Tax laws are complex and subject to change. Investors should consult their tax advisor for matters involving taxation and tax planning and their attorney for matters involving trusts and estate planning, charitable giving, philanthropic planning and other legal matters. The Report does not assist with buying or selling art in any way and merely provides information to parties interested in learning more about the different types of art markets at a high level. Any investor interested in buying or selling art should consult with their own independent art advisor.
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