"The moment the art market plummets is almost always signalled by a sudden catastrophic sale. This time was quite different. The top of the market can be narrowed down to the two-hour cocktail slot on Monday, September 15th 2008, when Oliver Barker raised more than $107 million in the first session of “Beautiful Inside My Head Forever”, the epic sale of Damien Hirst by Damien Hirst.
Thousands of people came to see the show in London during the ten days it was on view in the run-up to the sale. So many people registered to bid that Sotheby’s had to open up two extra rooms to accommodate the overflow. Against a background of one of Mr Hirst’s colourful spin paintings, Mr Barker worked the rooms hard. Just two lots of 56 failed to sell, and only three sold for less than the low estimate" reported The Economist.com this past December.
As this year begins, what are the prospects for the art market? “As long as you see wild fluctuations on Wall Street, no one will spend a lot of money on art. I think 2009 is going to be very difficult,” says Per Haubro Jensen of the venerable New York dealers Knoedler & Company. To this must be added the psychological impact of the meltdown—for many, it seems the wrong time to be buying what is, after all, an inessential purchase.
But, is art an inessential purchase? In Pittsburgh over the past decade city arts organizations have invested in new exhibits, productions and venues; waged sophisticated campaigns to lure new patrons, and walked the tightrope between crowd-pleasing blockbusters and avant-garde adventure. New data show the effort has paid off. When Pittsburgh Today, the regional benchmarking project based at the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Social and Urban Research, recently measured 2002 arts attendance versus sports attendance, the arts won the match-up hands down. It was reported that more than 53 percent of Southwestern Pennsylvania residents attended an arts event that year versus 36.2 percent who attended sporting events. In the same year, the percentage of folks participating in the arts totaled 67.8 percent versus 39.4 percent for sports. In 2006, the region exceeded the U.S. average for attendance at classical-music performances, musicals and nonmusical plays.
Yet the past year [2008], the arts community has been hard hit by the downward shift in the economy. As the city and country go, so too will go the arts. "There's a feeling that cultural institutions have to be more relevant than ever before," says Janet Sarbaugh, senior program director for the Heinz Endowments. The Endowments recently funded the Arts Experience Initiative to test new ways to enhance audience interaction. "They must demonstrate the way they connect to a multicultural audience of all ages." Sarbaugh also points out that the arts are influenced by consumer behavior, and that consumption patterns have changed.
Gen X-ers, those born between 1965 and 1980, and Millennials, born in the 1980s and '90s, seek a chance to socialize with like-minded peers; they've responded eagerly to invitations for cocktails and conversation before Pittsburgh Public Theater performances or after shows at Pittsburgh Opera. And, to the dismay of arts groups, they resist making commitments to standard season subscriptions, the most reliable segment of a company's support. Instead, they'll go online to buy a single ticket on the day of a performance (and take advantage of student rush and under-26 discounts whenever possible). Attempts to make programs more casual and more convenient have increased audiences. The Pittsburgh CLO Cabaret series has yielded a 50 percent increase in new single-ticket buyers of any CLO production. "We wanted to introduce light entertainment, shows we couldn't do on an enormous Benedum Center stage," says Van Kaplan, the CLO's executive producer. "It's an informal atmosphere, an easy access point for people who are new to the District. And we've been successful in turning them into CLO subscribers." Carnegie Museum of Art's decision to change the dates of the 2008-'09 Carnegie International from a traditional fall opening to spring and the decision to extend the length of the exhibit were factors in record high attendance rates at the Museum of Art and Carnegie Museum of Natural History. From May 3 through the end of December (at press time), attendance at both museums was 266,442. Charlie Humphrey observes an even deeper willingness to engage among volunteers on local arts boards. "There's an eagerness to mix labor with infrastructure," he says. "It's not about balance sheets - they love the access, the chance to look under the hood."
