Written by Maeve Zimmerman
Each June, the world’s top art collectors and dealers descend upon Basel, Switzerland for the fair that art market expert Magnus Resch aptly calls the “Super Bowl of the art world.” The 2024 edition of Art Basel included artworks from 285 leading galleries from 40 countries, attracting 91,000 attendees (up 9,000 from the previous year’s fair). Art Basel Switzerland sets the tone for the market for the upcoming year and provides the opportunity for visitors to gauge the international art market.
The fair opened with an invite-only VIP Day that yielded several splashy sales. The standouts were David Zwirner’s sale of Joan Mitchell’s “Sunflowers” (1990-91) for $20 million and Hauser and Wirth’s sale of an Arshile Gorky work on paper for $16 million. Also of note were Gagosian’s sale of a 1982 Basquiat drawing for over $13.5 million and Pace’s sale of Agnes Martin’s Untitled #20 (1974) for $12.5 million.
Despite these blue-chip sales and the buzzy atmosphere of VIP Day, collectors and dealers alike played it safe at this year’s fair. High inflation and interest rates combined with political unrest created a buyer’s market and suffused an air of caution through the week. According to art advisor Amanda Schmitt, collectors were discerning, “weighing their acquisitions more carefully,” while dealers relied upon steady established artists instead of emerging artists.
Although blue chip sales were strong, many dealers reported that business was not as good as it was at Art Basel 2022 due to the market slowdown. The cooler market was most noticeable on the first floor of Messe Basel, where the booths exhibiting younger emerging artists was markedly quiet. With the slowing of wet paint artists’ secondary markets, collectors have become more hesitant to take risks investing in their careers with no guarantee of a positive ROI. Brussels-based collector Frederick Gordts added that younger collectors are tiring of paying $20-30K for works by new artists, adding that “you’re put on a waiting list, but young collectors don’t want to play that game anymore. More and more are walking away.”
Overall, the market that Art Basel displayed was one still in flux, characterized by uncertainty and caution. Wendy Cromwell, a New York- based art adviser, noted, “A lot of American collectors who were buying actively over the last 25 years are now aging out of the market. The Asian market has pulled back. And there’s a general sense of uneasiness about the world right now.” Yet, many dealers still described Art Basel in a positive light, perhaps because their expectations going into the fair were so low. Although business at Art Basel this year was not as good as in past years, in the words of Magnus Resch again, it “was not a disaster.”