Sotheby's to Open Private Sales Gallery

Bloomberg is reporting that Sotheby's plans on opening a new art gallery for private sales in London.  The first exhibition will include works by German artist Joseph Beuys and will coincide with the Frieze art fair and satellite shows. As we know from financial reporting that both Sotheby's and Chrisite's are expanding their private sales divisions, and the growth in private sales at the duopoly of auctions houses has been extremely strong and profitable. The two auction houses have been looking for ways to continue the growth of private sales.

Bloomberg reports

Sotheby’s (BID), the New York-based auction house, will open a new art gallery for private sales in London this fall with a show of works by the German artist Joseph Beuys during “Frieze Week.”

The debut show at S|2, opposite the back entrance of the company’s New Bond Street auction rooms, will open on Oct. 10, Sotheby’s said last night in an emailed statement. The five-week exhibition will coincide with the Frieze Art Fair, one of the “must-attend” events of the contemporary art world calendar.

“In response to the growing demand from our clients to transact continuously -- not just in the traditional sales seasons -- we plan to host five selling exhibitions per year,” Cheyenne Westphal, Sotheby’s European head of contemporary art, said in the statement.

Discreet transactions are a significant growth area for Sotheby’s and Christie’s International, the world’s two biggest auction houses. London’s Mayfair -- the most expensive square on a U.K. Monopoly board game -- has become a focus for high-end art galleries as international billionaires buy the U.K. capital’s most expensive real estate.

Private sales at Sotheby’s increased 11 percent in 2012, accounting for $906.5 million of a $5.4 billion total.

A figure of 631.3 million pounds ($981 million) -- an increase of 26 percent -- was achieved by London-based Christie’s, which took a record $6.23 billion last year. Christie’s retains the Bond Street gallery of its former wholly-owned dealership Haunch of Venison as an exhibition space for private sales.

New York

Sotheby’s is expanding its own operation. The auction house confirmed in May that it would be opening a private-sales gallery at 31 St. George Street. The company has been holding regular selling events at its S|2 facility in New York since September 2011.

Its Manhattan branch will host an exhibition of works by the Italian Arte Povera artist Giuseppe Penone from Sept. 20-Oct. 20. A pop-up S|2 show of Andy Warhol works on paper will take place in Hong Kong from Sept. 12 to Sept. 24.

“Joseph Beuys Revealed” will consist of 12 works on paper and a bronze sculpture from the early years of the artist’s career, ranging from 1947 to 1966. All the works have been consigned by a private European collector, who bought from Beuys’s first exhibitions at Galerie Alfred Schmela in Dusseldorf.

Prices for the drawings range from 70,000 pounds to 200,000 pounds, said Sotheby’s.

Source: Bloomberg