Less than a week away, the much anticipated fall auction season in New York will open on November 7 with several hundred million dollars’ worth of drawings, paintings, and sculptures, at the big auction houses in town, namely, Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips de Pury & Company. A vast range of renowned art works are being sold by collectors who wish to take advantage of growth in the global art market, according to a recent New York Times article.
Among this fall’s predominant sellers are American collectors who have decided to sell their art now in view of the political uncertainty in the future. These collectors fear that capital gains taxes could significantly increase from the current 28 percent rate, which is much higher than the 15 percent federal rate on the gains from the sale of stocks and bonds.
Tobias Meyer, head of Sotheby’s contemporary art department worldwide observes, “[t]hat concern is what accounts for more discretionary selling this fall,” in which “[c]ollectors are looking closely at their assets and evaluating their collections.”
Some of the world’s most regarded collectors comprise the sellers during these next two weeks in New York, including, among others, hedge fund billionaire Steven A. Cohen, publisher Peter M. Brant, casino owner Stephen A. Wynn, and television producer Douglas S. Cramer.
While a number of paintings are estimated to sell for over $35 million, no artwork is expected to come close to the $120 million world record for a version of Edvard Munch’s iconic work “The Scream” sold at Sotheby’s earlier this year. As reported by the New York Times, these paintings include one of Monet’s signature canvases of the lily pond at the artist’s former home in Giverny, France, a 1954 red-and-blue work by Mark Rothko, and a 1932 Picasso portrait of the artist’s mistress Marie-Therese Walter.
In addition to several notable American billionaires, the newly affluent hailing from such geographic areas as the Middle East, Russia, and Brazil, are fueling the global art market.