Christie’s Cyber Attack Threatens Spring Auction Sales in New York

New York – After a downturn in the global art market in 2023, the main auction houses Christie’s and Sotheby’s are launching their spring sales in New York on Monday, in a rather optimistic climate after good results in London and Paris.

But one of the most popular weeks of the year risks getting off to a bad start: Christie’s, owned by Artémis owner French billionaire François Pinault, revealed on Friday that it was the target of a cyber attack : “Technological security The problem has affected our (IT) systems, including our website,” explained a spokesperson.

The prestigious auction house, based in London, New York and Paris, which generates billions of dollars on the art market each year, assured that it “regrets the inconvenience caused to (the) clients” and “does everything to minimize violations”, without. specifying whether his big swanky nights on Tuesday and Thursday in New York would be affected – also on the Internet and by phone.

As every spring – six months after the autumn sale – the list of works by modern and contemporary European and American painters offered for sale blows the mind: we found the masters Van Gogh, Picasso, Monet, Hockney, Bacon, Carrington, Mitchell, Marden, Warhol, Basquiat, Giacometti, O’Keeffe.

High fork

Christie’s hopes his roughly 900 works will fetch $578 to $846 million and Sotheby’s, owned by Franco-Israeli billionaire Patrick Drahi, is targeting between $549 and $784 million for his 700 works, a range of “slightly ” higher than in May 2023. .

Sotheby’s will open the ball on Monday night, after winning the lion’s share in November with 1.1 billion dollars in revenue: “Femme à la montre” (1932) by Picasso was sold for 139 million dollars – the second price ever reached for the Spanish master – – and … a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO went for $51.7 million, the second most expensive car ever sold at auction.

“The market is defined more by supply than by demand,” Lucius Elliott, head of contemporary art sales at Sotheby’s, explains to AFP. “We don’t have a problem selling products, we have more of a problem convincing people to put them up for sale.”

The expert acknowledges that the market is “well contracted, very little at the margin” compared to 2022 but shows his “confidence” with good sales in March in London, an art and financial center another international.

Wars

In the context of wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, with fewer Russian buyers on the market, global art auction sales reached $14.9 billion last year compared to $16 billion in 2022 (-14.5%). year when the pandemic came down. all roofs.

Half of the customers come from the United States and Asia continues to lead the market.

At Christie’s, the most iconic works come from two private collections. In the picture of Norman Lear, an American television producer, director and actor who died at the age of 101 in 2023, the painting “A Lawn Being Sprinkled” (1967) by David Hockney is estimated to be between 25 and 35 million dollars.

“If you are looking for the best works today, there is no need to look elsewhere,” Max Carter, vice president of Christie’s, told AFP, who is delighted with the results. among the most important we’ve ever had” in London. and “appropriate” in Paris at the beginning of the year.

For Sotheby’s, the gem of the week is a painting made in 1966 by Francis Bacon of his partner at the time, George Dyer, estimated between 30 and 50 million dollars.

Finally, the auction house’s big toe, Phillips, is offering 30 lots on Tuesday, including a Basquiat valued at $40 million and a Picasso estimated at between 12 and 18 million (AFP).