The Results Are In...

And apparently not great, as reported by ArtInfo. I don't think any of us are surprised, yes?

A Bad Year for Contemporary Art at Sotheby’s and Christie’s

December 5, 2008

NEW YORK/LONDON—Annual sales of contemporary art at Sotheby’s and Christie’s flagship auctions in New York and London have dropped 17 percent in 2008, according to Bloomberg. The significant drop from a total of $2.4 billion last year to just below $2 billion this year comes after two years of more than doubling in sales.

The ongoing international economic crisis hit the two premier auction houses in the last quarter of 2008. In November, Sotheby’s and Christie’s evening contemporary art auctions in New York raised $125.1 million and $113.6 million respectively, with fees, far below their presale lower estimates. Almost a third of lots failed to sell at both houses.

“Next year’s going to be very tricky,” said Philip Hoffman, chief executive of the London-based Fine Art Fund and a former Christie’s employee during the last major art market recession, in the early 1990s. “People aren’t going to put things up for sale. Volumes at auction could be 30 or 40 percent down on this year. It’s going to hit the auction houses badly.”