Industry data

PABLO Picasso’s Garçon à la pipe boosted Sotheby’s second quarter sales considerably, alone accounting for about 9.5 per cent of the total.

THE latest figures published by Customs and Excise show a large decline in fine art imports to the UK for 2003.

IN its latest published results, Partridge have recorded a significant fall in both turnover and profits citing again the very difficult trading conditions.

FINANCIAL information giants Bloomberg are to start providing an art market index on their 180,000 global terminals. Stockbrokers, traders, fund managers and investors from across the world will be able to access the Gabrius Art Market Indices in an attempt to provide a new information benchmark for the sector and to make the tools for analysing the art market more widely available to the financial sector.

THE first quarter of 2004 was good news for Sotheby’s, with several major stepping stones to putting their bottom line back on the straight and narrow.

ONLINE auction giant eBay have announced a record 59 per cent increase in turnover for the first quarter of 2004.

CHRISTIE'S have announced worldwide sales totalling £1.2bn ($2bn) for 2003. This includes auction sales of £1.1bn ($1.8bn) and private sales of £90m ($150m).

SOTHEBY’S have just published their fourth quarter and year-end results for 2003, showing the company to be in a much better financial state than at the end of 2002.

MUNICH-based auctioneers Ketterer Kunst reported “steady growth” in 2003 to post an auction turnover of €15.5m (£10.7m), boosted by the €5.7m Tremmel Collection in May.

More than half of those of who responded to the latest LAPADA survey have reported a decrease in turnover in 2003. The annual survey sent out in December by the UK’s largest antiques dealer’s association, was this year completed by 158 members – 25 per cent of the association’s membership. Last year, it was 151 members, or 22 per cent, which indicates that the association has lost a net of 54 members – eight per cent – over the past year.

Belgian rooms content but no more with 2003 performance: 2003 was a “slightly up-and-down year” for Horta of Brussels, according to firm director Jean-Pierre Julien, but he was satisfied with a four per cent increase in sales from 2002, making it Horta’s most lucrative year since they were founded in 1982.

Total turnover at UK picture and sculpture sales in 2003 was down 10 per cent on the previous year, according to figures just published by Art Sales Index. This reflects the similar contraction in the international market during the 2002-2003 season announced by ASI in the autumn.

Brightwells Fine Art, the Leominster based saleroom covering the Marches, Wales and the West Midlands announced their turnover for the year ended December 2003, which, including premium, was £3.16m.

EBAY, the great survivors of the dot-com boom and bust, have again posted a record set of results to complete a remarkable year in which the company reaped revenues of over $2bn. There were 41 million people who have bid, bought or listed on eBay over the past 12 months.

Christie’s have become France’s leading auction house in terms of market share after posting 2003 Paris sales of €80.3m (£55m), a rise of 40 per cent on 2002.

Despite the unpredictable trading conditions of the last 12 months, Tennants posted record trading figures for 2003. Aided by a bumper £1.62m autumn catalogue sale, total sales at The Auction Centre, Leyburn from January to December 2003 were £8.44m (not including premium), a substantial improvement upon the previous year when the North Yorkshire operation posted hammer sales of £7.4m.

Despite a year that saw substantial declines in brown furniture prices and a tailing off in the demand for general silver, most of the UK’s top provincial auctioneers held steady in a difficult market.

THE latest figures published by Customs and Excise show a significant leap in fine art and antiques imports and exports for 2002. Exports to non-European Union countries rose by more than 20 per cent from 2001, while imports went up by 16.5 per cent.

HOUSE price gains have outstripped furniture price increases in the south east of England for the first time in 34 years, according to the Antique Collectors’ Club Antique Furniture Index. It is the first time property has taken the lead since the Index started at 100 in 1968. Furniture recorded a slight drop at the end of 2002, falling from 3575 to 3492.

THE prospect of tax relief for the maintenance of historic properties has come a step closer thanks to a new Government-backed study. If introduced, it could stem the disposal of works of art, whose sale currently funds 26 per cent of maintenance on such properties.