Art Market

Amid Fears, Frieze London Opens To Hyped Audience

October 12, 20242 Mins Read


Beyond the London-Paris debate, the 2024 edition of Frieze London opened to great enthusiasm from dealers and buyers alike.

For years, there has been an ongoing debate about whether London or Paris is the art capital of Europe. For decades, London has maintained its position as the biggest art hub in the European continent. From classical to contemporary art, or from paintings to portraits, the city has something to offer to everyone. But Paris has been steadily growing – directly eating London’s share in the global art market. The debate flared particularly when Art Basel added Paris as a new venue in 2022.

However, when Frieze London opened on October 9 this week, such concerns did not seem apparent. In fact, most dealers admitted that the real problem wasn’t London’s decline or Paris’ growth, but rather the lack of artists. A sharp rise in inflation since the pandemic has increased the costs of everything – including transportation and art materials. In contrast, the art market has barely touched the pre-pandemic levels. This mismatch has led to a situation where most art fairs struggle to fill their booths.

Few others pointed out the dismal situation of auction houses, where a recent report called Spring 2024 the worst season for auction houses in a century. While auction houses have the luxury to turn away artworks they think are unsellable, art fairs don’t.

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Despite this, Freize London was met with excitement on its opening day. The initial two VIP Days saw decent footfall and revenue. This included a combined total of $915,000 from the ‘Shadow’ series at Hauser & Wirth, as well as a $2.2 million painting by Lisa Yuskavage at David Zwirner. The fair will end on October 13.





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