Who Buys at Art Basel Miami Beach?

‘Tis the season for Art Basel Miami Beach, when the art world heads south and articles about prices for questionable forms of “art” (like bananas and sandcastles) make headlines. 

Our team from New York, Toronto, Minneapolis and Los Angeles is thrilled to be together in South Beach for the week, but it is not all fun in the sun. We approach the week with a solid plan, knowing that an element of unexpected frenzy always comes into play.  Typically this frenzy revolves around buying. With art prices going into the millions of dollars, and countless pieces to be seen in a short period of time, who is actually buying art at this level, seemingly on whim?

image courtesy of Artsy

First, we’ll clarify a few terms of buying in Miami.

Each fair has different rules about what can be “pre-sold” before the fair opens. Why would the gallery want to pre-sell and THEN pay for transport art from anywhere in the world to Miami when they could use the booth real estate to actually show available works?  Well, those pre-sales certainly help cover cost, and at the fair, they signal scarcity… which simply makes some collectors all the more eager. Those collectors then end up buying pieces not even at the fair, sight unseen, or develop a relationship with a gallery and get on a waitlist for a future sale. Ultimately this pent up demand and limited supply drives prices up.  

Importantly, galleries are often forbidden from pre-selling everything in their booth, but they do start the process of promoting inventory well before fair doors even open.  Gallery previews flood inboxes starting mid-November so that collectors and advisors can get a sense of what to expect.  Advisors then prep their clients accordingly, buy works of interest if possible, or prioritize going to a particular fair and gallery booth if buying is not allowed until fair doors open. 

Second, prioritizing a particular fair is not so straightforward.

The fairs have so many “VIP” openings now that it’s hard to track if you are getting in first, second, third, or with the common folk.  Art Basel Miami Beach has embraced this concept to a special degree.  Their first VIP opening is the morning of Wednesday, December 6th, and their main VIP opening is Thursday at 4pm.  The fair is not even open to the public until Friday morning, and it closes Saturday afternoon.  As a result, you may skip over with your VIP pass Wednesday at 3pm, only to realize the pieces you eyed in previews were sold that morning. 

Finally, how are people buying such pricey pieces so quickly?

Our typical transactions do not work this way: usually, we present options to clients who consider them, go for viewings, get answers to specific questions, then ultimately acquire the piece.  In Miami, however, the sale cycle is expedited. Yes, many people saw previews and go with a clear idea of what they want to secure, but there are hundreds or thousands of additional artworks to be discovered. Sales are happening within minutes of people entering a booth, on WhatsApp and via text, and certainly before and after fair opening hours. Sometimes galleries can hold pieces for a few hours, but that is a courtesy that can be broken if a new buyer comes forward. 

When we do buy for our clients in Miami, we ensure our clients are on board with this process. It is not for everyone, but those clients who know us well and have built trust in our recommendations, are okay reviewing images via text and can make quick decisions, are those we focus on during the fairs.  We absolutely keep other clients in mind, though work for those clients is more around researching artists and galleries for future consideration vs. buying something on the booth wall that day. 

Art Basel Miami Beach is always a good time, and an exhausting one. There are many competing interests, and the hype of the fairs definitely adds pressure to advisors, clients and gallerists alike.  It’s certainly a scene to see but is not the keystone of the art world. Good art is timeliness and travels around the world, and the highest demand artists are constantly creating new work to be discovered.