The art market has emerged from the recession faster than anyone expected with a dizzying series of record prices. The market barely had time to digest the US$104m paid for Giacometti’s L’homme qui marche in February before a buyer paid US$106.5m for Picasso’s Nude, Green Leaves and Bust in early May. These prices have pulled
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The results of the recent June sales in London are showing that the Russian art market is making a tentative recovery after a dire 2008 and worse 2009. Average prices had increased from US$139,425 to $181,122 between 2006 and 2007 before falling back to $109,945 in 2009. The number of lots sold for more than
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Drawing Conclusions………By Ivan Lindsay The recent record price of £29.2m for a Raphael drawing confirms demand for important Old Master drawings. On Tuesday 8th December at Christie’s London a Raphael drawing entitled Head of a Muse was sold for £29.2m, doubling its estimate of £12m–16m and setting a world record price for a work on
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Family Jewels Faberge heirs buy back the name and relaunch the jeweller by Ivan Lindsay Fabergé, jeweller to the last tsars, the British royal family and the European aristocracy before WWI, has been re-launched this summer by Sarah and Tatiana Fabergé.  The two cousins, the last surviving great-granddaughters of Peter Carl Fabergé, have teamed up
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‘Russian Art Revolution,’an introduction to the emerging Russian art market, Country House magazine, Issue No. 3, May 2007. A sleeping bear awakes Anyone working in upmarket real estate, oil, gas, diamonds, timber, mining or metals will already be aware that the Russians have arrived. The marriage between Russia’s vast natural resources and Western markets is
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Art thieves thrive in times of economic hardship. Ooh, the sneaky little villains! Hanging’s not good enough for ’em, says Ivan Lindsay As the recession deepens and the losses filter out from the financials into the wider economy, unemployment is on the rise. In the same week in December as Citicorp announced 50,000 layoffs, the
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Precis of a speech given by Ivan Lindsay at the ‘MENSA at Cambridge 2008′ conference at Magdalene College, Cambridge University, 1/7/2008 The Seven Deadly Sins SLOTH     GREED     WRATH     GLUTTONY     PRIDE      ENVY      LUST Join us along with our line up of top International speakers, each allocated a deadly sin to talk on and for you to
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Despite the hype and high-profile exceptions, the contemporary art market is unsustainable and unlikely to offer long-term rewards, says Ivan Lindsay Although the contemporary art market appears to continue its breathtaking ascent, with ever more outrageous prices paid for art on which the paint has only just dried, a close analysis of the recent sales
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Country and Town House magazine, Issue No. 21, January 2009. As the deadline approaches to save the Duke of Sutherland’s Titians for the nation, Ivan Lindsay assesses what the paintings and their potential loss will mean for Britain In late August 2007, the National Gallery of Scotland, in Edinburgh, received the news it had been
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In a recent GstaadLife editorial, Taki, Gstaad’s self-appointed gatekeeper and commentator, wrote an article entitled ‘The fabric of Gstaad’, in which he wonders if Gstaad is going to follow Courcheval, Chamonix and Verbier in becoming a playground for the Russian oligarchs and a Monte Carlo in Saanen. He blames the Russians for the problems in
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