«I LIKE MONEY ON THE WALL»

There is still a tremendous demand for art, and “the sky’s the limit” for top quality works which are “properly priced and fresh to the market”. This was the message this week from Sotheby’s New York conference for its fourth quarter and full year 2009 results. The firm announced sales of $2.8bn for 2009, a drop of 54 per cent from its 2008 total of $5.3bn; yet it made a net profit of $73.6m in the fourth quarter – the second highest in the company’s history. Asked whether today’s art buyers are from China, Russia and the Middle East rather than the US and the UK, chief executive officer Bill Ruprecht said: “Those driving the art market right now are citizens of the world, they have homes in five, six, 10 different places.” A perfect example is the billionaire “Gilded” Lily Safra, revealed by Bloomberg to be the buyer of the £65m Giacometti, who has homes in London, Geneva, Monaco, the Côte d’Azur and New York.

-Financial Times
March 5 2010