When a financial crisis hits, its the peripherals that go first – advertising, additional human capital, fringe benefits and speculative investments. American’s witnessed this first hand during the last few weeks as markets plunged and art speculators shied away from Asian art auctions.
When Asian auctions opened the week beginning September 15 in New York, around the same time as Wall Street crashed, art connoisseurs picked up well researched collectors pieces from India, China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. Those who didn’t know their art and would have otherwise picked up paintings and sculptures purely for their decorative value, preferred to abstain from making high value payments, as a result, many collectibles were auctioned off well below their estimated price
The only difference with the summer auctions, the international herald tribune said was that silly showoff buying has stopped. The uninformed newcomers of yore unconcerned with art and on the lookout for expensive fun are gone. This was made crystal clear at Christie’s and Sotheby’s Chinese sales of Sept. 16 and 17, and was further borne out in the auction of Japanese and Korean art held at Christie’s on Sept. 18, just as the financial crisis was reaching an apex.
That day, many 19th- and 20th-century Japanese lacquer pieces that were O.K. but neither rare nor marvelous, were up for sale with foolishly exaggerated estimates. They fell unwanted, without anyone trying for them.
While many pieces auctioned to art experts sold well, some also didn’t quite strike the right note.
Describing the artifacts on auction, the Tribune said a gilt copper figure of the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara from 14th-century Nepal opened the short session devoted to “Masterpieces from the Zimmerman Family Collection,”. The bronze statuette estimated at, US$250,000 to $350,000 plus the sale charge is 12 inches, or 30.5 centimeters, high, had already made the rounds of several museums in a touring exhibition that took it from Newark, New Jersey, to Tampa, Florida. At the end, it managed to sell for US$242,000 says all about the intensity of the desire that drives collectors and gives the art market its enduring vigor, added the IHT.
