For Art Dealers, the Place to Be Is Still London
The interior of the Colnaghi gallery in St. James’s. Credit Matthew Hollow/Colnaghi
These are early days, but the Hieronymus Bosch vision of a socioeconomic apocalypse that many feared would follow Britain’s June 23 vote to leave the European Union has yet to materialize.
True, the pound has lost about 10 percent of its value against other major currencies, and a huge amount of political uncertainty still remains, but retail sales rose 1.4 percent in July, according to the British Office for National Statistics, and unemployment claims fell.
The medium and long-term challenges facing the British economy outside the European Union remain formidable, however, as do the questions hanging over the future of London as Europe’s unofficial capital of finance.
Dealers in high-end art, at least, remain confident that London will retain its mojo. At least four international galleries are investing in showpiece spaces in the capital.
“Brexit is a technicality,” said Thaddaeus Ropac, a contemporary art dealer with galleries in Paris and Salzburg, who in June signed a 15-year lease on Ely House, a grand 18th-century mansion in Mayfair that had once housed the antique dealers Mallett.
“It will be expensive and complicated,” Mr. Ropac said, referring to the likelihood of additional paperwork and tariffs on art sales. “But London is London,” he added. “The museums are here. The auction houses are here. The best galleries in the world are here. I do not see another city taking London’s place. Madrid? Los Angeles? I just don’t see it.”
Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac London, set to open next spring, will join the most comprehensive array of contemporary art galleries in any city in Europe. International names such as Gagosian, Pace, David Zwirner, Hauser & Wirth, Michael Werner, Dominique Levy, Skarstedt and Marian Goodman have all opened spaces in the West End since 2010, joining established British dealers such as White Cube, Sadie Coles and Timothy Taylor.
Ely House, the site of Thaddeaeus Ropac’s new gallery in London. Credit Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac
With five floors spread over some 16,000 square feet, Mr. Ropac’s gallery in the Palladian-style residence, once home to the Bishop of Ely, is one of the boldest interventions yet. The building, remodeled by the New York architect Annabelle Selldorf, will feature four contrasting gallery spaces — a sort of contemporary art “multiplex.”
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Mr. Ropac’s Paris and Salzburg dealerships represent major international artists including Antony Gormley, Adrian Ghenie, Anselm Kiefer and Gilbert & George. He expects his Ely House branch to concentrate on historical shows by his gallery stable, artists’ estates, “secondary” sales of works that have already appeared on the market and shows by artists who are not yet represented in the city. His inaugural show in the spring, for example, will feature new work by the young British sound sculptor Oliver Beer.
“We have wanted to have a stronger secondary market for a while,” Mr. Ropac said, adding that it was easier to sell such works in London than in Paris. “The art market is more strongly developed in London.”
In 2015, Britain’s auction houses and dealers generated 21 percent of the world’s art and antiques sales, compared with 6 percent in France and 2 percent in Germany, according the 2016 Tefaf Art Market Report, published in March.
The Paris and Brussels gallerist Almine Rech is another European dealer lured by the strength of the London art market. Having opened a first-floor gallery in Savile Row in 2014, she is expanding into an additional 2,400-square-foot ground floor showroom at Grosvenor Hill, opposite Gagosian’s new flagship Mayfair gallery. She is also opening in New York on the Upper East Side, debuting on Oct. 27 with a show devoted to Picasso and Calder.
“I was surprised there was such a quick and good response to our Savile Row space,” said Ms. Rech, who added that her London gallery had attracted at least 10 collectors whom she had never met before. “But I needed to present larger shows.”
Her inaugural exhibition at Grosvenor Hill, which opens on Oct. 4 during the week of the Frieze art fairs in London, is devoted to Jeff Koons, who is also represented by Gagosian. The show will include at least four new “Gazing Ball” paintings and sculptures (the former inspired by old masters, the latter by Duchamp ready-mades) and at least one stainless steel “Ballerina” sculpture. Prices range from about $1 million to about $8 million.
Ms. Rech is optimistic about the prospects for London after Britain leaves the European Union. “London has been the capital of European business and finance,” she said. “They don’t want to give that up. I’m sure they will find a solution.”
A ballerina sculpture by Jeff Koons will be at the opening of the Almine Rech gallery in Grosvenor Hill. Credit Jeff Koons/Courtesy of the Artist and Almine Rech Gallery, via Photo by Consultatio Real Estate
Others, like Bona Montagu, the director of the London branch of the New York dealership Skarstedt, see an exit from the union as an opportunity for the art trade.
“It could be positive,” said Ms. Montagu, suggesting that Britain could try to attract sellers by charging lower rates of tax on artworks imported into Britain as well as abandoning the “droit de suite” royalties to artists and heirs levied by the European Union on sales of contemporary art.
Skarstedt, like Rech, is opening a plush new street-level gallery in London. Its 1,765-square-foot space, around the corner from the Ritz hotel, will open on Sept. 30 with a joint exhibition of Cindy Sherman “History Portraits” from 1988-90, and David Salle “Tapestry Paintings” from 1989-91, priced at $500,000 to $1.2 million.
The show will complement the gallery’s booth at the Frieze Masters fair, opening the following week.
The Frieze Masters, started in 2012 as a younger sibling of the main Frieze fair, has been at the forefront of efforts by the art trade to reinvigorate the moribund market for pre-20th century pieces. One initiative has been to mount paintings on neutral gray backgrounds to encourage crossover buying from collectors of contemporary art. It is not clear how much has been achieved, but the 225-year-old London old master dealership Colnaghi has adopted this minimalist palette for its new building on Bury Street in St. James’s.
Colnaghi merged last year with the 10-year-old Madrid dealership Coll & Cortès, and the company’s new partners, Jorge Coll and Nicolas Cortès, who specialize in 17th-century Spanish painting and sculpture, have been the driving force behind a contemporary makeover of the space. Colnaghi’s 10,000-volume library is sunk, like a conceptual art installation, in the center of the 4,000-square-foot gallery space. The new-look Colnaghi is expected to open next month, when the dealership will be exhibiting at Frieze Masters.
“We need to acknowledge the time we live in and reach a new audience,” said the gallery’s director, Tim Warner-Johnson.
It is certainly a challenging time for major galleries to open ambitious new spaces in London. Aside from the “Brexit” vote, uncertainty around America’s presidential election and other macroeconomic issues have cooled demand for high-end contemporary art.
“Perfect timing,” said Mr. Ropac, the Salzburg, Paris and now London gallerist. “We can now see the limits of the art market. We have to be more inventive, more creative.”
