Art Fair Growth Slowing

Skate's new Art Fairs Report to be published on April 20th notes that the growth in art fairs is starting to slow. The report notes that the first quarter 2015 attendance failed to grow at a double-digit pace, up only 8.4% over the first quarter of 2014. Participation of galleries also increased by 7.3%.

Skate's reports

The latest Skate’s Art Fairs Report will be published on April 20, 2015, with a wealth of fresh data on international art fairs and key trends in the off-auction segment of the global art market.

As predicted by Skate’s in prior reports, the growth of art fairs is slowing down. Q1 2015 was the first quarter in 10 years of Skate’s art fairs tracking in which galleries and visitor participation failed to grow at a two-digit pace, on a like-for-like basis. 1,920 galleries participated in the top 12 art fairs in Q1 2015, only a 7.3% increase from the same period last year.

The top 12 art fairs welcomed 642,000 visitors in Q1, 2015, up 8.4% from the same period in 2014 — although established fairs in traditional collector markets like New York and Brussels saw flat or declining attendance. Some have blamed this on poor weather, but the data over the last five years has shown no correlation to speak of between air temperature and attendance.

Out of 12 major art fairs conducted in Q1 2015, one reported a decline in attendance and four claimed identical attendance numbers to those in 2014, which Skate’s interprets as operators simply being shy about a drop in visitors. Four of the 12 major Q1 fairs reported a decline in the number of galleries attending, and four had less than 100 galleries participating. Galleries are increasingly focusing their effort on digital marketing and sales, and are capping their art fairs participation costs accordingly.

It’s no wonder galleries have cooled off. Instead of buying a booth at all of the 12 major fairs in Q1, a gallery would have been able to access just as many visitors by simply advertising for one month on www.artnews.com1. Galleries have noticed that converting collector contacts to sales is increasingly easier online, and have scaled back the expensive travelling circus of art fairs.

Source: Skate's