A bumper year for the auction houses

Will the auction world have an even better year than in 2021? It has its work cut out. The previous 12 months have seen a tidal wave of released pent-up demand stemming from the first year of the pandemic. According to art market research firm ArtTactic, auction sales at the big three auction houses – Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips – reached an all-time high of $12.5bn in 2021 up to 10 December, a rise of 69% on the same period in 2020, and 1.6% higher than the previous high, set in 2018. Sotheby’s accounted for almost half of that figure, with its sales figure for the year to mid-December the strongest in its 277-year history. Its auction sales, at $6bn, were 71% higher than last year, and even 26% higher than in 2019, before the pandemic.

Rival Christie’s also had a stand-out year. It projected its sales (including private sales) for 2021 to reach $7.1bn, a five-year high and 54% and 22% higher than in 2020 and 2019 respectively. It also stole the bragging rights for having sold the most expensive artwork of the year, while also being arguably responsible for setting the hottest trend of 2021 – NFTs (see left).

Phillips only managed to grab a comparatively measly 7.7% slice of that $12.5bn sales figure mentioned above. But it won’t be feeling sorry for itself. The watch department at Phillips found a buyer for every watch it offered last year, the first time any auction house has achieved that feat, to achieve a record-high auction total of $209.3m. It sold 27 timepieces for more than $1m – the highest price fetched, at a little over CHF7m (£5.7m), was for a “fabled” gold Patek Philippe Ref. 2523 (pictured). Phillips has asserted itself as the leading auction house in this lucrative and growing collectables market.