Hrag Vartanian’s Art Market Recession Report

By mid-January, the Cohan and Leslie space was already for rent. Image and caption via: NYFA Current. Image by perke (flickr.com/perke)

Blogger Hrag Vartanian generously capitulated to NYFA’s poorly conceived website sign in requirements and no linking policy, to write an article for their online magazine NYFA Current. I wouldn’t say this about most articles, but there’s enough details in this piece to actually merit the extra navigation to read it.  A few clips below,

Since last fall, a fog of uncertainty has blanketed New York's art world as galleries, artists, and collectors have tried to make sense of the current economic recession. While the economy was still in free-fall, New York Magazine critic Jerry Saltz predicted a dire economic future: “If the art economy is as bad as it looks—if worse comes to worst—40 to 50 New York galleries will close.”….

Collector Mike Hoeh, a hedge fund manager for a large European bank, has his own prognosis of the art world's health. “Are art galleries closing at a higher rate than other industries? Probably not, but judging from other industries you can probably expect 10 percent of art galleries to eventually close.” With roughly 500 art galleries in New York, Hoeh's assessment is in line with Saltz's prediction of 50 or so shuttering of doors.

And this bucker of trends planning to open a second space to coincide with The Armory Show,

“It's counter intuitive to expand, I guess, but we felt like we had to do this for our own development,” says Pierogi cofounder Joe Arnheim. “When we started the gallery in the early 1990s it was the same kind of economic environment. Now we're living off the gallery and we're sensitive to the market but we think that with some elbow grease we can make it,” he says. The new space will not only be a gallery but a community meeting place with plans for panels, readings, and performances.

Here’s hoping Pierogi makes it.