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"[Sellers] just aren?t into gambling anymore and auctions are no longer a sure thing"

By Intellectual Property Law, Esq.

Carol Vogel had a piece in yesterday's New York Times on the increase in private sales (at the expense of auctions): "For many sellers, the driving factor is fear. Fear that their friends will discover they need money. Fear that if a [work] does not sell at auction, it will be considered yesterday?s goods." She reports that "[g]enerally Sotheby?s and Christie?s charge 5 to 10 percent of the purchase price of an artwork," as compared to "25 percent of the first $50,000, 20 percent of the next $50,000 to $1 million and 12 percent of the rest" on auction sales.

Full post as published by The Art Law Blog on April 27, 2009 (boomark / email).