Kobel's
Art Weekly

Kobel's Art Weekly 51 2025

According to Julia Stellmann's comments in the FAZ (paywall), Art Antwerp is becoming both more regional and more international: "In 2021, international exhibitors were eager to participate in the few events that were held due to the empty exhibition calendar caused by the pandemic. However, sales remained poor for many galleries, including those from Germany, so that the fair lost its international character with each subsequent edition. Art Antwerp has now become a truly regional fair, primarily showcasing figurative painting from Belgium – and apparently with great success. [...] With 79 galleries from eleven countries, the number of exhibitors at Art Antwerp has increased slightly compared to last year. Forty-three per cent come from Belgium, and around a quarter from the Netherlands. Support from France has grown significantly stronger.” Last year, the proportion of Belgian exhibitors was above 50 per cent. I was in Antwerp for the Handelsblatt and Artmagazine.

Katya Kazakina examines Art Basel's handling of galleries that have cancelled their participation in the Miami Beach edition for Artnet (possibly paywall): "After a three-year contraction in the market, many Art Basel participants are struggling. Some have closed, a few (like Blum and Clearing) in spectacular fashion. A bad week at the Miami Beach Convention Centre could lead to more closures. Dealers are trying to reduce their overheads, and art fairs are among their biggest costs. In July, when Art Basel published its gallery list for Miami Beach, notable absences from its usual lineup included London's Sadie Coles HQ. Following the brutal summer in the art industry, some exhibitors decided to drop off the list. (Galleries had to withdraw by 1 August to get back 100 per cent of their booth fee, and by 1 October to get 50 per cent back.) Some, like Tilton, Alison Jacques, and Edward Tyler Nahem, withdrew after the August deadline, according to an early floor plan I viewed. It’s safe to assume they had to pay cancellation fees.”

Naomi Rea recorded changes at the fair and in the media for Artnet in Miami: “Art Basel’s leaders understand that the ground is shifting. Early in the week, the company announced it had hired Elena Soboleva, David Zwirner's former director of online sales, as global head of audience growth and intelligence. She will focus on engaging the next generation of collectors. You could see the same reorientation playing out in the media ecosystem orbiting the fair. More art publications arrived camera-ready, churning out short-form videos and live-streaming podcasts while readying their market reports. “I’m a content creator now,” quipped the Gray Market’s Tim Schneider, a former Artnet staffer who is now an independent business journalist.

Jason Farago offers an entertaining comparison (“NFT class clown Beeple”) of all four Art Basel fairs this year in the New York Times: "Miami Beach now feels, like Hong Kong, to be a regional edition, directly targeted at American collectors as Hong Kong targets Asia's, with a mix of good-but-not-life-changing historical work [...] and South Beach-validated vulgar pop. In both Hong Kong and Miami Beach I saw the same 8-foot, busty, gold-plated “sexy robot,” sculpted by the Japanese artist Hajime Sorayama and floating in a mirrored box. I can’t tell you the repeat encounter merited the carbon emissions. To each his chosen Basel, to each her chosen vibe. At all four editions you will encounter promotions from private jet furnishers and manufacturers of seven-figure watches (Hopp Schwiiz!); all have pushcarts selling official sponsor champagne, though only the Swiss venue has a fondue station. Wearing a tie helps in Paris; in Basel some Germanophones wear gentleman-farmer felt jackets; Hong Kong requires layering, as you move from humid megacity to air-conditioned show; Miami Beach welcomes both big logos and little lap dogs.‘

Cristina Ruiz explains in detail at Artnet how the Gulf states are building their cultural infrastructure with Western expertise: ’The Saudi artist Ahmed Mater also welcomes the hiring of foreign specialists. “We need expertise in the Gulf and we should work with anyone who can provide it from the US, UK, Egypt, Japan, everywhere,” he said. But he warned that the extended use of consultancies comes with risks. Since MBS came to power, Saudi Arabia has relied heavily on major firms like McKinsey, KPMG, and PricewaterhouseCoopers to implement his economic transformation plan. ‘They are focused on visitor numbers, the most famous works of art institutions can purchase, blockbuster programming—consultancies are benchmark-driven businesses,’ Mater said. The artist, who has written about Saudi Arabia's relationship with these large firms in his forthcoming book ‘Prognosis/Saudi Arabia: an artist's odyssey’ (Booth Clibborn Editions, 2026), fears that what is being lost are opportunities to grow institutions organically, from the grassroots up. ‘Consultants are shaping our culture and deciding what it should look like. The landscape needs to be more diverse.’

With its move to the Met Breuer Building in New York, Sotheby's is broadening its base, explains Elisa Carollo in the Observer: "It's striking how Sotheby's, globally, is toeing the line between museum and luxury brand, deploying a form of intentional brand dilution designed to multiply its symbolic capital across price tiers and target audiences within an economy shaped by content, experience and spectacle. Altogether, the rollout appears to be a successful expression of Sotheby's ‘New World’ experience, which saw the auction house opening boutique-style flagships across its Hong Kong, Paris and now New York venues, with full cross-category luxury environments designed to attract audiences far beyond traditional art-world insiders—targeting visitors who might not buy at auction but will engage with the Sotheby’s brand at other levels, whether that means shopping for one-of-a-kind jewellery or buying an exhibition souvenir.”

Sabine Spindler reads the dissolution of trends in the art market from the auctions at Ketterer in Munich for the Handelsblatt: "For decades, there were trends in the auction market. After the Expressionists came the ZERO wave, then Pop Art experienced a revival. “Today it's different,” Robert Ketterer told Handelsblatt at the end of last week, shortly after the many highs of the 600th auction of modern and contemporary art. “The new trend is: artists as brands.” The eight million euros in proceeds alone prove him right." In the FAZ on 13 December, Brita Sachs writes: "Total sales of €51 million (including surcharges, excluding private sales) in the second half of 2025 put Ketterer in the top position among German art auctioneers for the 15th time in a row. The book auction in Hamburg contributed €2.3 million, with Walter Barth's collection of Goethe letters proving a particular highlight. The Goethe and Schiller Archive of the Klassik Stiftung Weimar was able to acquire 23 lots from this collection.‘

Christiane Fricke summarises the auctions at Lempertz in Cologne for the Handelsblatt: ’Henrik Hanstein, managing director of the Lempertz auction house, sounds exhausted as he takes stock after a busy week of auctions. “The whole market has seen better years.” But the auctions are doing better. Hanstein is thinking of the many galleries that are up to their necks in water, not his own company. Behind him lie the photo auction, the evening auction – a mix of old masters, three jewels and a Roman relief fragment – and the day auctions for modern and contemporary art. [...9 Including the buyer's premium, the total turnover in front of a well-filled hall amounted to 6.6 million euros, including post-auction sales. Including the day sales, the total result is 11.49 million euros for approximately 395 lots, excluding the photo auction."

Ursula Scheer reports on the final outcome in the FAZ on 13 December in her follow-up report on the auctions at Van Ham in Cologne: ‘Among the works from the inventory of the insolvent Munich gallery Thomas, Wojciech Fangor's square composition “E 31” in bright colours, with which he referred to Josef Albers in 1966, was the highlight and doubled its lower estimate with €125,000.’

The low starting prices of an online auction at the Dorotheum made Freddy Langer foam at the mouth in the FAZ on 13 December: "Goodbye, nobility, hello, DIY store. Now, photographs may be something other than objects for the bathroom, and one would not want to compare the venerable Viennese auction house Dorotheum with eBay. But the way in which the “Photographic Treasures from Daniel Blau Gallery” are being auctioned online there until 2 p.m. on 15 December gives the impression of a clearance sale." Can we now expect three such articles every week, whenever the author comes across an internet auction where this practice is not unusual?

Annie Armstrong, author of the column ‘Wet Paint,’ announces her departure from Artnet (possibly paywall): "What's next for the column? The hunt begins once more for the next actor to play Bond. In the meantime, I hear that several guest contributors will be donning the title in the new year, so stay on your toes. As for me, I’ll be heading out for a new adventure, details to be announced soon, but it will never take me so far away from the art world that I won’t be curious to know what’s going on." Her response to the question of whether her departure was in any way related to the new owner: ‘No comment.’ It is possible that the company has gone from bad to worse with the takeover by Beowulff Capital, owned by financial investor Andrew E. Wolff.