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Chloe Henson

Enid Tsui

The global pandemic is dragging on and 2021 is ending with a new, highly transmissible mutant strain. Yet auction houses this week reported a bumper year that was boosted by Asian demand, a surge in online bidding and a new acronym that has dominated art market news this year: NFT.
The two biggest auction houses in the world sold a total of US$14.4 billion of art, watches, jewellery, wine and other collectibles in 2021, 53 per cent more than their combined sales in 2020.
Sotheby’s retained its number-one spot with record turnover for the auction house of US$7.3 billion, while Christie’s followed closely with US$7.1 billion, its best in five years.
The third largest player looks set to be China’s Poly Culture Group, which has yet to report its final figures but has seen its Hong Kong and mainland Chinese auctions turnover increase by 40 per cent to US$1.6 billion this year. That figure includes the US$176 million from two sales it co-hosted in Hong Kong with Phillips, which has been aggressively growing its art and design sales and clocked up a company high of US$1.2 billion in sales this year (which also includes the results of the joint sales with Poly in Hong Kong).

Christie’s calculates that Asian buyers contributed a total of US$1.7 billion to its sales this year, up 32 per cent from 2019, with Asian spend accounting for around a third of all auction (excluding private) sales.
Sotheby’s says Asian collectors are some of its biggest spenders, with nearly half of the bids made for pieces over US$5 million coming from the region. In one instance, an Asian collector paid £18.6 million (US$25 million) for one of the most unusual artworks sold this year: Banksy’s Love is in the Bin. This was famously “made” in 2018 when the artist arranged for an older work called Girl with Balloon (2006) to run itself through a paper shredder built into the frame just after it was sold for £1 million in a London auction.
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That a half-shredded painting would be worth nearly 20 times more than when it was whole is just one example of many incredible moments in the art market this year.
In March, the US$69 million sale of Beeple’s Everydays – The First 5,000 Days (2021) became a landmark for digital art and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
NFTs – digital assets authenticated by the technology behind cryptocurrencies – have been eagerly embraced by auction houses this year. Apart from boosting total turnover, the inclusion of NFTs in auctions has helped houses engage with people who had never bought art or taken part in an auction before. According to Phillips, 88 per cent of bidders in its first NFT auction this year were new to the company.
Auction houses are also hoping a young generation of crypto-millionaires will become a significant force in traditional categories of the art market. In November, Chinese cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun bought Alberto Giacometti’s Le Nez (1949/1965) for US$78.4 million, which Sotheby’s eagerly promoted as “a landmark crossover” purchase by a Chinese NFT collector.

Bidding online is another major trend in a year when normal international travel remains off-limits. Half of the lots sold in Phillips’ live auctions were sold to online buyers, while Sotheby’s and Christie’s turned their traditional spring and autumn auctions in Hong Kong into hybrid sales designed for live-streaming around the world.
While 2021 headlines were dominated by new formats and new art forms – NFTs accounted for a staggering 8 per cent of all contemporary art sales at Christie’s, mostly due to the Beeple sale mentioned above – established artists and categories are still the bread and butter of the auction market.
In October, Sotheby’s Hong Kong sold Zhang Daqian’s Mist at Dawn (1968), previously owned by the M K Lau Collection, for HK$214.6 million (US$27.5 million). Poly’s top lot in its autumn auctions was a Qing dynasty celadon-glazed “dragon” jar that sold for HK$52.8 million.
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China Guardian, the number two auction house in China, which saw total turnover of almost HK$920 million from its two Hong Kong auctions this year, sold a calligraphy piece by Ming-dynasty master Dong Qichang for HK$57.8 million.
Strong Asian demand during the pandemic appears to have reaffirmed auction houses’ plans for expansion in the region. Earlier in the year, Christie’s announced plans for a new Asia-Pacific headquarters in Hong Kong, where it would start year-round sales in 2024. Phillips, meanwhile, has also just signed a contract for exhibition and sales rooms in the West Kowloon Cultural District, to be ready in the autumn of 2022.


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Auctions

How NFTs, online bidding and Asian demand helped auction houses to a bumper 2021, with Sotheby’s and Christie’s selling US$14.4 billion alone

***PLEASE CLEAR COPYRIGHT BEFORE REUSE*** 1. Beeple, Everydays The First 5000 Days $69 million, March 2021, ChristieÕs Beeple, Everydays Ð The First 5000 Days NFT, 21,069 pixels x 21,069 pixels (316,939,910 bytes). Image courtesy the artist and ChristieÕs. On February 16, ChristieÕs announced that it would offer itÕs first-ever purely digital blockchain artworkÑa claim that is now being contestedÑselling a collage of BeepleÕs first 5,000 ÒEverydays,Ó the digital drawings he had been creating since May 1, 2007. (BeepleÕs recent pieces in the series are sophisticated digital renderings, but the earlier pieces are more akin to rough doodles, and much of the imagery is offensive.) Bids started at just $100, but quickly skyrocketed into the millions, before selling for an astonishing $69 millionÑmaking Beeple not only the creator of the most expensive NFT art ever, but the third-most-expensive of all living artists, behind only Jeff Koons and David Hockney.

The US$69 million sale of Beeple’s Everydays - The First 5,000 Days (2021) contributed to NFTs accounting for a staggering 8 per cent of all contemporary art sales at Christie’s in 2021. Photo: Beeple

Agents take phone bids from clients during Christie’s Hong Kong autumn auctions on November 28. Photo: Getty Images for Stephen Silver

Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun in 2019. Photo: Getty Images

Art project aims to change the conversation about tourist-trap village Sok Kwu Wan on Hong Kong’s Lamma Island

Converted shipping containers in front of Sok Kwu Wan’s Tin Hau temple provide an information centre, galleries and film screening rooms for “Lamma Mia”. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

Artist So Wing-po with her work “Invisible Island” for the “Lamma Mia” public art project in Sok Kwu Wan, Lamma Island. Fifteen artists from elsewhere in Hong Kong are taking part. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

From left: Anthony Leung Po-shan; curator Wu Pui-shan and artist So Wing-po at the site of “Lamma Mia”. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

Anthony Leung at the site of “Lamma Mia”, with the ferry that connects Sok Kwu Wan with Hong Kong Island in the background. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

A visitor inspects “The Ray of Sight” by Siu Wai-hang at the site of “Lamma Mia”. The artist turned a nearby cave into a camera obscura for this artwork. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

“Wave Collection” by Martin Cheung for “Lamma Mia”. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

A 3,500-year-old Chinese bronze owl-shaped wine jar sells for over US$1.5 million at Christie’s auction

This Shang dynasty era owl wine vessel fetched US$1.52 million at a Christie’s auction. Photo: Handout

The zun was adorned with designs called ‘leiwen’. Photo: Handout

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Incredible moments include the US$69 million sale of Beeple’s NFT Everydays – The First 5,000 Days and the US$25 million sale of Banksy’s Love is in the Bin
Nearly half of bids made for Sotheby’s pieces over US$5 million came from Asia, while Asian spend accounted for a third of all auction sales at Christie’s



Sotheby’s and Christie’s sold a total of US$14.4 billion alone in a year marked with incredible moments, such as the US$69 million sale of Beeple’s Everydays – The First 5,000 Days.
