For much of the past year, in my rounds through gallery shows and art fairs, I have anecdotally heard rumbles about slowing demand for photography, about much of photography being “out” at the moment, and other muted tales of woe, but without looking at the private sales books of gallery owners, it’s difficult to get a feel for just how much of a slowdown was actually occurring, and whether it was driven by broad economic malaise or something more intrinsic to the medium. And as the year passed, in tracking the auction data from sale to sale, I had an ... Read more at Collector Daily.

The results for the photography lots available in Phillips’ 20th Century & Contemporary Art sales in New York last week were generally uneventful. Two notable withdrawals (works by Andreas Gursky and Jim Hodges) recalibrated the numbers a bit, but the top lot Barbara Kruger work found a buyer within its estimate range. With an overall Buy-In rate for photography of roughly 12% but no positive surprises to juice the numbers, the Total Sale Proceeds for photography (of roughly $740K) fell at the lower end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

The few photography lots included the contemporary art sales at Christie’s in London last week generally met expectations. The top lot Barbara Kruger print sold within its estimate range, and the overall Buy-In rate for photography came in below 20%, leading to Total Sales Proceeds for photography (of roughly £810K) that tallied up in the middle of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

The photography included in last week’s 20th Century and Post-War and Contemporary Art sales at Christie’s in New York performed admirably. The top lot Man Ray solarized nude found a buyer above its estimate range, and with a low overall Buy-In rate for photography (of just 5%) and a few positive surprises, the Total Sale Proceeds for photography came in above $2.6M, above the top end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

There was very little photography on offer at Sotheby’s in its recent run of contemporary art sales in London – no lots in the Now Evening auction, 1 lot in the Contemporary Art Evening auction, and 2 lots in the Contemporary Art Day auction. That said, the top lot Barbara Kruger pairing performed well, finding a buyer above its estimate range, and the other lots sold above their estimates too, leading the Total Sale Proceeds for photography (of roughly £1M) to come in above the top end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

An invisible psychological ceiling was boldly smashed this past year in the auction market for photography. For the first time, a photograph sold at auction cleared the $10M mark in May, and then the same threshold was breached again by another photograph later in November. The previous auction record for a photograph was well under $5M, so these two outcomes felt altogether unexpected and frame-breaking. And while the two vintage prints in question, the first a 1924 print of Man Ray’s Le Violin d’Ingres and the second a 1905 print of Edward Steichen’s The Flatiron, were undeniably iconic photographic rarities, ... Read more at Collector Daily.

Led by an early 1980s work by Barbara Kruger that found a buyer above $1.5M, the photography included in Sotheby’s Contemporary Art sales in New York sale last week delivered admirably. The overall Buy-In rate for photography was a respectable 27%, and buoyed by a couple of positive surprises, the Total Sale Proceeds for photography (of roughly $3.8M) came in above the high end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

Sotheby’s had the most photography on offer of the three major auction houses this past week, and its results were the strongest by a decently wide margin. The photographs in the Contemporary Curated sale were led by a 1980 multi-image work by Richard Prince and a Wolfgang Tillmans abstraction from 2003, but both were ultimately topped by a late 1980s work by Barbara Kruger. With nearly all of the photo lots finding buyers (there was just one passed photo lot), the Total Sale Proceeds for photography (of roughly $1.1M) came in above the top end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.

There were only a handful of photographs on offer in the recent Contemporary Curated sale at Sotheby’s, but they performed well. The top lot John Baldessari work sold within its estimate range, only to be bested by a pair of works by Barbara Kruger. With all of the photo lots finding buyers, the Total Sale Proceeds for photography (of roughly $605K) came in near the top end of the aggregate pre-sale estimate range.... Read more at Collector Daily.