The Art Market Year in Review

It has been a roller-coaster year for the art market. The start of 2025 set the tone for a tough ride, with art sales down 12% in 2024, having already fallen 3% in 2023, according to the Art Basel and UBS Global Art Market Report. By the summer, the gloom seemed cemented as the three main auction houses (Christie’s, Sotheby’s and Phillips) recorded an average fall in sales of 6% in the first half compared to the previous year.

By the end of this year though, things were looking brighter, with good vibes and strong sales reported from the October season of art fairs in London and Paris. This was followed by a much-improved auction series in New York, at which sales of art above USD 10m (and indeed USD 100m) were back on the scene. As a whole, auction sales at the three main houses have risen year-on-year for the first time since 2022, by 15% (as at 12 December, 2025), according to the analysis firm Pi-eX.

The mixed results reflect the art market’s sensitivity to a volatile macroeconomic and sociopolitical environment. The year had a high number of new national leaders in some of the world’s most powerful countries, including the United States, while wars in the Middle East and Ukraine continued to dominate the news cycle. President Trump’s drive to impose tariffs on the US’s international trading partners, flagged when he was sworn in at the start of the year, added to the economic jitters.

Within the art market, the macro uncertainty combined with a shift in collector demographics, as Boomer wealth began its shift to either the next generation or spouses, predominantly widows, adding younger and female buyers to the mix.

Key moments at auction during the year were bookmarked at Sotheby’s, which in May 2025 spooked the scene when it failed to sell Alberto Giacometti’s hefty 1950s sculpture of his brother’s head, Grand tête mince, estimated at USD 70m. Six months later, the same auction house sold Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer (1914-16) for USD 236m, the highest price ever made at auction for a Modern work of art.

Sotheby’s had also had a hit in London, where its GBP 59m auction of the collection of Pauline Karpidas in September arguably got the market’s motor going again in 2025. This sale illuminated a change in taste as design objects, notably by Les Lalanne, prove particularly in demand on the art market. By the end of the year, François-Xavier Lalanne’s copper Hippopotame Bar, piece unique, made a record USD 31.4m for the artist and for any design object offered at auction. Its estimate had been a mere US 7-9m and the work attracted a rare 26-minute bidding war. “We are in a market driven by masterpieces, and this was the 'ultimate icon' by the artist,” says Jodi Pollack, Sotheby’s Chairman and Co-Worldwide Head of 20th Century Design, noting too “the continued momentum” behind Lalanne.

Elsewhere, taste has erred towards the tried and tested as buyers adopt a ‘safety first’ mindset. At the same time, estimates have generally come down to more realistic levels, helping to generate the magic of auction, plus ensuring more work actually gets sold. The increasing level of third-party guarantees, which the auction houses use to secure sales while mitigating their own risks, has helped the so-called ‘Bought In’ rates (the percentage of works that don’t get sold). Pi-eX finds that these sat at just 4% by value, one of the lowest levels ever, at the November sales in New York.

For art galleries, essentially small businesses where activity lags the more voluminous auction segment, some of the pinch from the market’s 2023 decline began to be felt this year. The most notable closure was of Blum Gallery, which in July announced that after more than 30 years, with a staff of nearly 50 people and a roster of about 60 artists, it was time to “sunset” its public spaces in Los Angeles and Tokyo. With the closures, ambitious plans to open in New York’s Tribeca in the autumn were also shelved. Blum described the nature of the gallery business as “a relentless, hamster wheel grind” of “cyclical intensity”. His views chimed across the sector, facing increasing costs in an inflationary economic environment and with a seemingly unsustainable calendar of art fairs and exhibitions to balance the books. Blum urged that it was this relentless activity that lay behind his decision, rather than purely financial challenges. As the curator and consultant Carrie Scott puts it “What if this isn’t collapse — what if it’s just… retirement?... We conflate legacy with longevity. But maybe this isn’t the end of something bad. Maybe it’s the natural cycle.” Either way, the news sent shockwaves through the market and subsequent closures, including of Venus Over Manhattan and Clearing Gallery (both in New York), were viewed as the beginning of the end of the gallery model.

Elsewhere though, others were meeting the challenges of a reset environment with enthusiasm—and success. Thaddaeus Ropac started the year with the announcement of a new gallery in Milan—a city benefiting from a more tax-friendly regime than much of Europe and, subsequent to Ropac’s decision, the lowest VAT rate on art in the continent (5%) and down from the highest rate (22%).

In London, legendary gallerists including Sadie Coles, Stuart Shave and Maureen Paley, opened new spaces while younger dealers began to open up, often with alternative models that avoided getting in too deep too quickly. For Oscar Sunderland, who co-founded OCD Gallery this year, “the pop-up model is what works for us, we follow the [art market] buzz.” This has the additional benefit of “always looking young and fresh, with new ideas”, something that appeals to artists, he says.

Moving with the market might make sense given some of its fluctuating geographic shifts. While the United States is and will likely continue to be the best place to sell the priciest art, the Middle East was the region that dominated in 2025. The two big-brand art fairs announced new events for next year—Art Basel in Qatar in February and Frieze in Abu Dhabi in November. Meanwhile, Sotheby’s—which is part owned by the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, ADQ—held a ‘Collectors Week’ in the UAE capital in December. This included its first auction there, which made USD 133.4m from luxury items including a Hermès Birkin Voyageur handbag that had been owned by the actor Jane Birkin (USD 2.9m) and a 31.68 carat diamond, called the Desert Rose (USD 8.8m).

Museum building in the region has helped prompt the beeline to the Gulf. The Zayed National Museum opened in Abu Dhabi this month in a sleek Foster + Partners building, while the Guggenheim’s Frank Gehry outpost joins on Saadiyat Island in 2026. In Qatar, the Art Mill museum, which will have 800,000 sq ft dedicated to Modern and contemporary art, is set to open in 2032. Meanwhile, wealthy ruling collectors throughout the region are playing their part, though whether or not there will be enough demand yet for the sheer volume of art that will get offered next year remains to be seen.

The latest Frieze fair—a partnership with the Abu Dhabi Department of Culture and Tourism (DCT)—marks the rise of collaborative efforts, and at all levels. Young galleries such as Pipeline and Alice Black have joined forces for a separate advisory business (Black + Cheneviere), and even at the mega end of the market there’s a sense of ‘together we are stronger’. In December, Pace gallery announced a new venture in combination with the surrealism specialist Di Donna gallery and the ex-Sotheby’s private sales rainmaker, David Schraeder, to create a secondary market sales business called PDS.

It all points to a market that is shoring itself up for the unknowns of whatever might come next. The dominant trend going into 2026 seems to be one of increased diversification—of taste, geography and buying channels—with the art market poised for change.