Billionaires have a rich history of art collection. Today they also buy auction houses where such pieces are sold.
0.1%, building a legacy long involved amassing million-dollar artworks and bankrolling those who create them. Today billionaires also buy auction houses where such pieces are sold—especially if said billionaires are French. François Pinault of Kering, a luxury-goods group, bought Christie’s in 1998. Bernard Arnault of, a rival, owned Phillips for a bit in the 2000s. On June 17th Sotheby’s announced its sale to Patrick Drahi, a telecoms tycoon, for $3.
Mr Drahi is not the buyer many expected—and not just because his fortune, which Bloomberg puts at $8.6bn, has humbler origins than fine wine and fashion. Unlike Mr Pinault, whose 3,500-piece collection is worth over $1.4bn, he is an art-market neophyte. Leveraged deals and cost-cutting at his mobile provider,, cast him as a financial engineer rather than a savvy manager. For Mr Drahi, a self-made man, Sotheby’s is a trophy asset, says François Godard of Enders, a research firm.
It will now be freer to court high-profile sellers more aggressively—and also to invest in selling more lower-priced pieces, which in the topsy-turvy art world offer higher margins than the big-ticket lots auction houses fight over. Boosting online auctions would help here. So would more private sales—where Sotheby’s acts as a broker and which have grown fast, reaching $1bn last year. Alex Maroccia of Berenberg, a bank, says it may spend more on.
Buyers and sellers of all but the priciest pieces may rue the increased opacity of the houses’ already baffling commissions. But one group will rejoice. Some of Mr Drahi’s fellow plutocrats make a killing from financing the guarantees that auction houses offer. For them, the more art that goes under the hammer, the better."Behind the curtain"
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