The Art Newspaper

Sold on a jpeg?

Before fairs, most dealers send out images of the works they will offer

By Georgina Adam, Charlotte Burns and Riah Pryor. From Art Basel Miami Beach daily edition
Published online: 01 December 2011

Cheim & Read’s Adam Sheffer (Photo: David Owens)

The hot topic in Miami Beach yesterday was the collector Adam Lindemann’s call for a boycott of the fair, proclaiming that he would not attend (although he eventually did). He singled out pre-selling for particular opprobrium: “Galleries aggressively pre-sell everything they can before the fair opens,” he wrote in The New York Observer, saying that he refuses to buy a work of art he hasn’t seen.

Sales were indeed made before the preview, and yesterday a good number of the works on display were already on hold or even sold. If Lindemann was looking to place blame, he need look no further than the jpeg. Before fairs, most dealers send out images of the works they will offer. “It gives clients time to think about a work,” says Iwan Wirth, the co-founder of Hauser & Wirth (L17). “That way, they don’t have to make a snap decision at the fair.” Before the opening, he already had holds on several works, including pieces by Rashid Johnson, Thomas Houseago and Paul McCarthy, all of which sold at the opening.

Other dealers concluded sales before the official opening, again thanks to jpegs. Cheim & Read (L8) sold a bright painting by Tal R for $95,000 and placed Louise Bourgeois’s Life Flower, 1960, priced $650,000, with a New York collector. Alison Jacques (E3) of the eponymous London gallery sold two works by Lygia Clark for between €195,000 and €275,000 before the fair opened.

“There is no official policy,” says Marc Spiegler, the fair’s co-director. “While many galleries reserve works for top clients, they try to keep works available for building relationships with new clients, which, after all, is the main reason people come to events like this.”