This article is part of the Artnet Intelligence Report Year Ahead 2024. Through in-depth analysis of last year’s market performance, the new edition paints a data-driven picture of the art world today, from the latest auction results to the artists and artworks leading the conversation.

The number of women among the 100 top-selling fine artists at auction in 2023—tied with 2022 as the largest proportion we’ve ever recorded.

The average price (in USD) of a fine artwork sold at auction last year, down almost 16 percent from 2022.

The revenue (in USD) from fine art auction sales in China last year. While that figure represents a 13 percent increase over 2022, it is the second lowest total the country has seen in a decade.

The dip in total fine art sales generated by the Big Three auction houses—Sotheby’s, Christie’s, and Phillips—year over year.

The number of artists who made their auction debuts at Sotheby’s, Christie’s, and Phillips last year. Only 2.2 percent of them failed to find a buyer on their debut.

The total (in USD) spent on fine art at auction in 2023—down 12.7 percent year over year.

The sell-through rate for fine art at auction in 2023—higher than in any year in the past 10 years except 2021 and 2022.

The decline in revenue generated by the highest-end artworks at auction. Sales of art valued at more than $10 million dropped by just under $2 billion last year.

The dip in total auction sales of work by ultra-contemporary artists (those born after 1974) between 2022 and 2023.

The revenue (in USD) from online-only sales at Sotheby’s, Christie’s, Phillips, Bonhams, and Artnet Auctions last year—down 12 percent from 2022.

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With a body made from a motorcycle fender, wings from bike chain guards, and legs from tapestry staples and spectacle case parts, a beady-eyed owl comes to life from discarded metal.

French artist Edouard Martinet (previously) has a knack for revitalizing materials like motor components, medical implements, bicycle parts, and other accessories into meticulously detailed animals. While one fish takes shape from fan blades, cake molds, spatulas, and oil lamp badges, another’s teeth and bones are composed of upholstery staples and tablespoons.

Martinet sources his materials from flea markets and garage sales, seeing potential in a wide range of shapes, densities, and textures. In the studio, he painstakingly manipulates the metal into unique puzzle-like pieces that fit together precisely, relying on screws to fasten them together rather than welding.

If you’re in Paris this April, stop by Galerie Bettina, where Martinet will exhibit a combination of bronze and unique sculptures. In November, the artist will present a solo exhibition of new work at Sladmore Gallery in London. Until then, follow Martinet on Instagram for updates.

Underside detail of “Hercules Beetle (Dynaste Hercules)” (2022), bronze, from an edition of 8, cast using the lost wax process at Fonderie Rosini, Paris, 24 x 60 centimeters. Photo courtesy of Sladmore Gallery

“Hercules Beetle (Dynaste Hercules)” (2022). Photo courtesy of Sladmore Gallery

Detail of “Chouette (Owl)” (2023). Photo by Laurent Guizard

Photo by Laurent Guizard

“Stickleback” (2022), metal mixed media sculpture, 24 x 120 centimeters. Photo courtesy of Sladmore Gallery

Photo by Xavier Scheinkmann

Photo by Xavier Scheinkmann

Left: Martinet in his studio. Photo courtesy of Sladmore Gallery. Right: “Autruche.” Photo by Xavier Scheinkmann

Photo by Xavier Scheinkmann

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Over the past year, AI-powered creative tools have radically transformed art. Designed for content creators, visual effects artists, designers, and animators, these resources have the potential to generate stunning visuals, and many professional artists embrace AI for everything from automating mundane tasks to concept inspiration and quickly iterating visual references. These tools take repetitive tasks off of artists’ plates, enabling them to focus on elevating their creative outputs and achieving projects on a grander scale.

Renowned artist and director Bradley G Munkowitz, a.k.a. GMUNK, has been breaking new ground in experimental filmmaking and digital art for more than 20 years using tools such as Autodesk Maya and Adobe Creative Cloud. Challenged to take his practice to the next level as one of the creators behind a new music video for German alt-pop duo Milky Chance, GMUNK evolved his craft using compute-intensive cloud simulations and AI-powered experimentation.

GMUNK and a team of Z by HP global ambassadors, whom HP provided with product and payment, collaborated across continents to produce a stunning CG music video for Milky Chance’s new dance anthem, “Synchronize.” To match the feel-good synth-filled track, the artist employed complex simulations, real-time rendering, ray tracing, global illumination, and AI, all requiring significant computational resources.

He created visuals of rotating clouds using EmberGen, a real-time fluid simulation software from JangaFX. In the earliest stages of the project, the artist ran tests morphing those simulations through AI-powered tools like Stable Diffusion and Topaz Labs. “Until about a year ago, there was one way to achieve these types of effects. Now with AI and the power of the Z8 Fury, there are ten ways to do it, and the results are all incredible,” he said.

EmberGen is based on real-world physics with controls to manage combustion, emission of fuel, flames, temperature, and smoke, and it’s up to the artist to combine them and determine how they react in the final simulation. The software runs 100 percent on the GPU, as does the terrain generation software Gaia from Procedural Worlds, which GMUNK used to build landscapes.

He also utilized Topaz Labs’  VideoAI tool to interpolate slowdowns of smoke-simulation flythroughs from 24 frames-per-second to 200 frames-per-second to get better results out of Stable Diffusion in his early development. While those tests don’t appear in the music video, they did serve as visual inspiration for a new artwork in his Breathing series, “Bali Moon”, which sold at Christie’s during Art Basel in December 2023.

With experimentation at the heart of his work, GMUNK uncovered another technique for running smoke simulations through a mesh built in SideFX’s Houdini so that the color and movement of the smoke drive quickly moving and morphing triangles, creating a spectacular shattered glass effect.

“As I continued to experiment with these simulations, they got more interesting,” he says. “I’m very excited about a breakthrough new technique that produced a fantastic mosaic-like effect that is an homage to stained glass windows. This was done as a post-process of the simulations in Houdini where we mapped all the pixels to a triangulated mesh capturing the color values of the smoke simulation underneath the distortion.”

To create the heavy simulations using the Maxon renderer Redshift, GMUNK needed a powerful workstation that enabled him to run massive 225 million-voxel simulations that were still interactive. “I can see exactly what I’m doing. It’s extraordinary to have this kind of computing power at my fingertips,” he says.

GMUNK even revitalized some of the approaches he’s used for years, including modeling and animating in Autodesk Maya, an application that favors clock speed over the number of cores and is largely reliant on the CPU. “The Z8 Fury is rendering Maya scenes almost in real-time. Depending on the software I’m running, it’s five to ten times faster than any other computer I’ve ever used. Everything I’m doing in Maya, in EmberGen, in rendering–it’s all super-powered. As a creator, that feels large, like an extension of my mind is constantly giving me feedback instantly in all realms of what I’m doing.”

Learn more about this exciting collaboration by watching the behind-the-scenes reel. Visit Z by HP online to learn more about how these workstations can help you realize your creative vision.

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In 1982, Charles Sampson became the first Black man to win the world championship bull-riding competition. Becoming a cowboy was his childhood dream, and despite breaking nearly every bone in his body during his relatively long career, Sampson continued to climb atop the ornery animals and bolt into the arena. Even after an incredibly tough ride, he was known to vault himself off of the bull and land on his feet. He feels, to be cliché, that he was born to ride.

But there’s nothing cliché about Sampson’s story. As he writes in the introduction to the forthcoming book Eight Seconds: Black Rodeo Culture, “Every year there are fewer Black cowboys in America as the population ages, and young Black people believe the western lifestyle isn’t for them.”

Published by Damiani, Eight Seconds comprises 118 images by Ivan McClellan, a Portland, Oregon-based photographer who’s spent nearly a decade documenting the lives, wins, and losses of the Black rodeo community from Alabama to Los Angeles. He offers an insider’s view, capturing the addictive energy of the sport and the rich sense of camaraderie it fosters.

“I didn’t expect for this work to take over my life and become a passion/obsession for the better part of a decade,” McClellan tells Colossal, sharing a sentiment not unlike that of the people he photographs. “I kept going where I was useful and needed, and this book is a love letter to the culture that has transformed my life.”

Patrick Liddell, Las Vegas, Nevada

The slim volume is packed with a mix of portraits and candid, action shots that evidence the range of emotions within a single day of rodeo life. McClellan visits the teenage sensation Kortnee Solomon at her family’s ranch in Texas and a beaming rodeo queen in Okmulgee. He also photographs the Compton Cowboys, a collective devoted to bettering the lives of inner-city kids through equestrian training. “I’ve stood in front of a charging bull, walked through snake-infested fields, and laid on the ground while horses ran past me all to get a good photo,” he says. “Getting the shot is more important to me than my fear.”

McClellan self-published Eight Seconds in 2022—the title, of course, references the eight wild seconds riders must stay on their animals, one hand in the air, to score points—and the forthcoming edition adds to the original. Together, the photos unveil a firmly rooted ethos of care for both the animals and each other. “I’ve learned that Black cowboys treat you like a family member until you prove yourself unworthy of their trust. Sacrifice is required to live the cowboy lifestyle. I’ve seen cowboys go hungry so they could afford to feed their horse or get their cell phone cut off to pay for rodeo fees,” he says.

Keary Hines, Prairie View, Texas

Eight Seconds comes at a time when Black cowboys are gaining attention, in part because they counteract a White-washed historical narrative. In much of American pop culture, the term cowboy conjures an image not unlike a dusty, gun-toting Clint Eastwood in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. But the word itself originated as a derogatory alternative to cowhand and was often given to Black men working with cattle. After emancipation, one in four cowboys were Black.

Last spring, an exhibition at the Harwood Museum of Art in Taos opened as a corrective to the narratives that center on the White, Americana hero. Spanning pre-Civil War to the present day, the show featured McClellan’s portraits, alongside works by artists like Alexander Harrison and Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe. And in Denver, another recent exhibition devoted itself to expanding the range of perspectives on what it means to be a cowboy.

While visually striking and exuding a warmth and comfort possible only after years of interaction, the photos are effective in part because they challenge these long-held notions about who partakes in the sport and what the rodeo lifestyle looks like in the 21st century. The photographer references the fashion choices emerging from the arena and beyond as a prime example of how Black cowboys both buck stereotypes and harness the independence associated with the archetype. He adds:

To be a Black cowboy is a defiant declaration of self. Going against conventional expectations of Black and White culture requires confidence and a sureness of one’s truth. Fashion is the most obvious way this comes to life. See cowboys riding in gold chains and Jordans, long braids and acrylic nails blends hip-hop culture and the west in interesting and surprising ways.

Eight Seconds, which is edited by Miss Rosen, is available for pre-order on Bookshop. Find a larger archive of McClellan’s work on his site and Instagram.

Marland Burke, Brandon Alexander, James Pickens Jr., Los Angeles, California

Rodeo Queen, Okmulgee, Oklahoma

Dontez & Floss, Okmulgee, Oklahoma

Jadayia Kursh, Okmulgee, Oklahoma

Bull Riders, Rosenberg, Texas

Cover of ‘Eight Seconds: Black Rodeo Culture,’ Damiani Books (2024)

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Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy has recently become the nucleus of artistic exchange in Dhaka, hosting an innovative event titled ‘Art Market’ aimed at fostering direct connections between artists and art enthusiasts. Initiated on February 19, this two-week extravaganza has turned the Academy’s premises into a vibrant hub of creativity, featuring 100 stalls that cater to a diverse range of artistic tastes and preferences.

Art in Abundance

From intricate crafts to captivating paintings, and from ceramic wonders to unique women’s accessories, the Art Market offers an extensive assortment of artistic creations. Divided into four main categories—Artists, Studios, Universities, and Art Galleries—the event is a testament to the rich tapestry of Bangladeshi art. Notably, young ceramic artist Tanjila Sumaia Siddiqye, with her stall ‘Artist Siddiqye,’ has experienced an overwhelming response from visitors, emphasizing the public’s growing interest in clay and ceramic-based artworks. Abdur Rob, renowned for his film poster and rickshaw paintings, shared insights into the cultural significance and resurgence of interest in rickshaw art, a cherished heritage of Dhaka’s vibrant streets.

Creating Connections

Shawon Akand, the curator of the Art Market, envisions the event as a platform for erasing the traditional boundaries that often separate artists from their audiences. By offering artworks at accessible prices, the market aims to democratize art ownership, allowing people from all walks of life to become art collectors. This initiative not only benefits the artists by providing them with a broader audience but also enriches the cultural landscape of Bangladesh by encouraging a more inclusive appreciation of art.

Looking Ahead

The success of the Art Market at Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy hints at a promising future for similar events. By regularly organizing such markets, the hope is to establish a sustainable ecosystem where artists can thrive professionally, and art collection becomes a common joy rather than an exclusive privilege. As the event continues to receive acclaim from participants and visitors alike, it stands as a beacon of potential growth and expanded horizons for the Bangladeshi art scene.

As the curtains close on this year’s Art Market, the overwhelming response from both artists and the public sends a clear message of enthusiasm and support for the arts. By bridging the gap between creators and collectors, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy has indeed paved the way for a flourishing art market that promises to invigorate the cultural fabric of the nation.

Visitors throng a stall at the on going Art Market organised by Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy on its premises in Dhaka on Saturday. — New Age photo

Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy has organised an art event titled ‘Art Market’ in a bid to connect artists and art collectors on its premises in Dhaka.

The two-week event, which began on February 19, is featuring 100 stalls displaying artworks in four categories, including Artists, Studios, Universities and Art Gallery.

The stalls are displaying crafts, paintings, ceramic works, women’s accessories, dolls and others.

The event has received a huge response from art lovers.

Young ceramic artist Tanjila Sumaia Siddiqye has set up a stall titled ‘Artist Siddiqye’ at the Art Market.

‘I have received a huge response from visitors. People have been showing a lot of interest in buying clay and ceramic-based artworks. If this event is organised regularly, artists will be able to pursue art as a profession,’ she said.

Abdur Rob, a film poster and rickshaw painter, said people were showing interest in buying rickshaw paintings.

‘Rickshaw painting was popular because Rickshaw was the most used by people in Dhaka. As the film industry was flourishing back in the day, Rickshaw painters drew actors on Rickshaws. Now it has become a heritage and the young generation is showing interest in collecting Rickshaw paintings as artwork,’ said Abdur Rob.

Shawon Akand, curator of Art Market, said, ‘We want to create an open art market where contemporary and traditional artists can showcase their artworks and common people can collect artworks at a reasonable price. Common people cannot afford to buy artworks from art galleries. We hope that this art market will be organised regularly and it will create a bridge between professional artists and art collectors.’

Art Market will end today.

Geography meets local pride in a collection of enamel pins from Map Design Gallery. Trimmed with gold details, the tiny, cartographic wearables recreate Japan’s 47 prefectures, their matte color palettes reflecting the crops, landscapes, and cultures of each region. According to Spoon & Tamago, Kagawa is beige, ochre, and green to represent the area’s love for udon, while “Tokyo’s colors are greys and blues, inspired (by) the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.”

Show your preference for Yamagata’s cherry blossoms or Kanagawa’s hydrangeas by picking up a pin from the gallery or collect them all as you chart your travels across the country.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article A Colorful Pin Collection Celebrates the Unique Cultures and Exports of Japan’s 47 Prefectures appeared first on Colossal.

As we enter the month of March, the Indian art world braces up for an interesting time with top three auction houses — Saffronart, Sotheby’s and Christie’s — lining up stellar works of Indian modern art across different sales.

First off the block is Saffronart’s Spring Live Auction on March 13 in Mumbai, which is already generating interest among art market watchers for its top two lots on offer.

The top spot is occupied by two works by two Baroda artists and contemporaries — Bhupen Khakhar (1934-2003) and Gulam Mohammed Sheikh (b. 1937). Khakhar’s 1996 oil on canvas, Untitled (Champaner) and Sheikh’s 1987 oil on canvas, Sursagar, are both estimated between Rs 6 crore and Rs 8 crore each ($731,710 – $ 975,610).

The presence of works by these two artists at the top of a premier auction list augurs well for the growth and maturing of Indian art market as it indicates the broad-basing of the lots on offer. These are names outside the circle of the handful few masters who have ruled and continue to rule the Indian market — the names such as Amrita Sher-Gil, SH Raza, FN Souza, MF Husain, VS Gaitonde, and a few others, with which we are all too familiar.

Of Khakhar and Sheikh, the former has been skimming the top of the auction pyramid for a few years now, a phenomenon celebrated by art aficionados and collectors alike. The works by the latter, too, are now beginning to regularly appear at the top of auction lists as I had analysed in detail in the previous week’s column.

Top lots at Saffronart’s Spring Live Auction

While a canvas each by Khakhar and Sheikh get the top billing at Saffronart’s Spring Live Auction on March 13 in Mumbai, the next in line making up the top 15 include familiar names, which are as follows along with estimates:

1. Untitled (Champaner), 1996, oil on canvas, Bhupen Khakhar, Rs 6 crore – Rs 8 crore

2. Sursagar, 1987, oil on canvas, Gulam Mohammed Sheikh, Rs 6 crore – Rs 8 crore

3. Front-Back Nude, 1950, oil on board, FN Souza, Rs 6.15 crore – Rs 7.79 crore

4. Tearing Apart, 1970, oil on canvas, MF Husain, Rs 4 crore – Rs 6 crore

5. Rajasthan, 1961, oil on canvas, SH Raza, Rs 2.46 crore – Rs 4.10 crore

6. The Lost Self, 1971, oil on canvas, Rameshwar Broota, Rs 1.50 crore – Rs 2 crore

7. Forêt Noir, 1961, oil on jute, SH Raza, Rs 1.50 crore – Rs 2 crore

8. Untitled, circa 1950s, oil on canvas, MF Husain, Rs 1.47 crore – Rs 1.80 crore

9. Untitled, circa 1980s, acrylic on canvas, MF Husain, Rs 1.20 crore – Rs 1.50 crore

10. Arunodaya, 1989, oil on canvas, NS Bendre, Rs 90 lakh – Rs 1.20 crore

11. Toreador, 1966, oil on canvas, FN Souza, Rs 73.80 lakh – Rs 98.40 lakh

12. Untitled, 2004, oil on canvas, Ram Kumar, Rs 55 lakh – Rs 75 lakh

13. Golden Curtain, 2003, watercolour on paper, Bhupen Khakhar, Rs 50 lakh – Rs 70 lakh

14. Untitled (Pindapatha), 1951, oil on canvas, George Keyt, Rs 50 lakh – Rs 70 lakh

15. Untitled, 1948, watercolour on paper, SH Raza, Rs 40 lakh – Rs 60 lakh

As the above list enunciates, a big part of it is populated by the names that even the lay admirers of art are most familiar with. There are multiple canvases on this list by SH Raza, MF Husain and FN Souza. While Ram Kumar and Rameshwar Broota may not have the same recall as the first three, they are part of the elite group of modern artists whose works lead the market. In this well-known mélange, it’s refreshing to see the names of Bhupen Khakhar, Gulam Mohammed Sheikh, NS Bendre and George Keyt. Works by all these masters have been performing well at different auctions of late; in fact, Keyt, the Sri Lankan modern master, has remained a top performer for quite some time.

An interesting, relatively new inclusion is that of Govind Madhav Solegaonkar (1912-1986). His Untitled (Taking a Rest), an oil on canvas featuring a group of women taking a break from work in the outdoors, is a charming work that shows amazing adherence to traditionalism even as it distinctly displays modernist strokes. It is estimated at Rs 10 lakh – Rs 12 lakh. Solegaonkar was born in Sehore, Madhya Pradesh, and educated at Sir JJ School of Art, Bombay. He was a member of the Indore Group, active from 1934-1937, which included artists such as NS Bendre, DJ Joshi and MS Joshi. According to Saffronart, he received many awards and honours during his lifetime and his works are on display at the Rajya Sabha in New Delhi, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and CSMVS, Mumbai.

Alongside, Saffronart will also host an online auction of Indian art on March 13-14, in which the top works on offer are as follows:

1. Portrait of Denyse, circa 1930s, oil on canvas, Amrita Sher-Gil, Rs 12.30 crore – Rs 20.5 crore

2. Untitled, 2003, acrylic on canvas, Ram Kumar, Rs 45 lakh – Rs 65 lakh

3. Untitled, oil and acrylic on canvas, Sakti Burman, Rs 40 lakh – Rs 60 lakh

4. Incantation, oil impasto on jute canvas, Sohan Qadri, Rs 30 lakh – Rs 50 lakh

5. Untitled, 1959, oil on canvas, SH Raza, Rs 40 lakh – Rs 50 lakh

6. Untitled, acrylic and ink on canvas, Avinash Chandra, Rs 40 lakh – Rs 50 lakh

7. The Killing of Jatayu, 2004, oil on canvas, Rs 30 lakh – Rs 40 lakh

The works on offer at the online auction are more affordable compared to the top lots at the live auction, with the exception of the work by Amrita Sher-Gil, Portrait of Denyse, which by pre-auction estimate is the most expensive lot on offer across both the auctions by Saffronart. It will not be a surprise if this work goes past its highest pre-auction estimate because any superlative canvas by Sher-Gil — one of India’s nine National Treasure artists — is always a hot commodity in the market. Her 1937 oil on canvas, The Story Teller, sold for an astonishing Rs 61.80 crore at a Saffronart auction in September 2023, becoming the most expensive Indian work of art ever sold.

(The writer is a New Delhi-based arts journalist

When you log onto any social media platform, it’s hard to deny AI’s pervasiveness. This occurs in both subtle forms like advertisements, or more blatant ways, like the explosion of images on your Instagram Explore page that don’t look quite right. Whatever the case, it’s clear that artificial intelligence is here to stay, and with tech giants running amok, an air of skepticism ceaselessly clouds social networks.

That being said, it’s understandable that coming across striking photos like Tomas Mayer’s “Handmade Miniature Library” can send you into a spiral of questioning how—and who— brought it into existence. Luckily, we have insight.

Working out of his Stockholm studio, Mayer expertly constructs miniatures and dioramas. The “Handmade Miniature Library” is an incredibly detailed scene filled with hundreds of books, scrolls, and shelves, all created with the artist’s dextrous skill and dedication to a tedious craft.

An important part of creating these tiny sets is Mayer’s desire to reuse as many scraps as he can. “I use a lot of different materials in my work and try to resurrect all of it if possible,” he tells Colossal. “It feels good and calming being able to reuse seemingly worthless scrap to build something beautiful. It shows that we need to rethink all wasting actions and processes we have been taught to repeat all over again our world today.”

Each bookshelf is packed to the brim with tomes and scrolls, stacked atop each other and extending into the distance. The dense assemblage creates a feeling of abundance and mystery, inviting viewers into the scene as we wonder how far the seemingly endless maze of shelves actually goes. Despite the plethora of miniature objects included in his scene, Mayer makes sure that the construction of each book receives just as much detail as the last.

Keep an eye on Behance and Instagram for updates to the adorable project, which the artist plans to use as the backdrop for a movie.

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