Last Friday, Lindsay Pollock, always a sharp observer of the global art market, noted the discouraging absence of female artists at Art Basel this year. She uncovered what at first glance is a surprising statistic: of the fair’s forty most exhibited artists, not a single woman could be found.
Provocatively and a bit rhetorically, she poses the question, “Is Art Basel a manfest?”
Lately we’ve spent a lot of time finalizing Skate’s Top 5000 – our ranking of the 5,000 most expensive works of art ever sold at auction. After reading Lindsay’s article, we decided to take a closer look to see whether the dealers at Art Basel were exhibiting sexism or whether, as we suspect, they were simply reflecting the state of the global art market with no other aim than to satisfy collectors’ demands and, in the process, make a few bucks (or a few million bucks).
What we found confirmed our suspicions on some levels and surprised us on others. Art Basel does in large measure reflect what thousands of auction records have told us over the past several decades: works by male artists are in far greater supply and sell for far higher prices than works by female artists.
Yet among the forty most exhibited artists, there were eleven whose market performance to date has been mediocre at best. Plenty of females have performed better in the marketplace than these eleven males.
To see the data, please download the Appendix (Adobe reader required).
