The sale room at Sotheby's Modern Evening Art Sale with a man standing at a podium that reads "Sotheby's," three paintings hanging behind him, and a group of phone bidders to his left. An audience sits in the foreground
Sotheby's New York Modern Evening Auction, May 2024. Photo courtesy of Sotheby's.

This article is part of the Artnet Intelligence Report Mid-Year Review 2024. Our analysis of the first half of the year’s market trends provides a data-driven overview of the current state of the art world, highlighting auction results and trends, and spotlights the artists and artworks shaping the dialogue.

Slower and fewer sales come as no surprise given the gloomy economic outlook of the last year, but the full picture of 2024 is still coming into focus as we move toward the last quarter of the year—and it isn’t looking great. According to the Artnet Price Database, fine-art sales at auction between January 1 and June 30 totaled just over $5 billion, a 29.5 percent decrease from the same period in 2023.

© 2024 Artnet Worldwide Corporation.

The number of lots sold was also down, by 4.8 percent, and the average price per lot dropped to $27,301—the lowest figure in a decade.

One major reason for this decline is the dearth of high-priced masterpieces coming up for sale. So far this year, no works have been sold for over $50 million, and just three were knocked down for more than $40 million. For reference, three works sold for more than $50 million each in 2023, and 13 exceeded that figure in 2022.

Brice Marden’s Event (2004–07), which was withdrawn from a May sale at Christie’s, after being estimated to sell for $30 million to $50 million. Courtesy of Christie’s Images Ltd. 2024

Even the higher-priced works that have come up for sale have largely hammered at the low end of their estimates. The last-minute withdrawal at Christie’s New York in May of a Brice Marden painting estimated to fetch $30 million to $50 million further suggests a lack of market demand for works at high price points.

Although global inflation is expected to ebb this year, interest rates have been slow to come down, with many central banks delaying further rate adjustments until the fall or later. Additionally, political uncertainty has affected economic confidence, with a historic number of countries—50—holding elections this year, among them the U.S., U.K., France, and India.