Auctions and the Price of Art

This paper contains a review of the burgeoning new research of the last decade that has been designed to shed light on how the art auction system works, what it indicates about price formation, and how well it performs. We begin with a short description of the mechanics of the auction system and then organize the remainder of our discussion around two major topics: how auction prices can be used to determine and compare overall price movements within the art market and with other markets; and how the auction mechanism influences prices.

[1]  Yaron Raviv,et al.  New Evidence on Price Anomalies in Sequential Auctions , 2006 .

[2]  J. Mcmillan,et al.  Selling Online Versus Live , 2005 .

[3]  Roberto Zanola,et al.  The Market for Picasso Prints: A Hybrid Model Approach , 2005 .

[4]  Francis Vella,et al.  Auction Price Anomalies: Evidence from Wool Auctions in Australia , 2004 .

[5]  Paul Smaglik.  Upping the ante , 2003, Nature.

[6]  Neil Gandal,et al.  Sequential Auctions of Interdependent Objects: Israeli Cable Television Licenses , 2003 .

[7]  Daniel R. Vincent,et al.  How to Set Minimum Acceptable Bids, with an Application to Real Estate Auctions , 2002 .

[8]  Gerard J. van den Berg,et al.  The Declining Price Anomaly in Dutch Dutch Rose Auctions , 2001 .

[9]  Victor Ginsburgh,et al.  Art Experts and Auctions: Are Pre-Sale Estimates Unbiased and Fully Informative? , 2006, Recherches économiques de Louvain.

[10]  Bidding in Sequential Auctions: 'Catalogue' vs. 'Order of Sale' Effects , 2000 .

[11]  W. Landes,et al.  Winning the Art Lottery: The Economic Returns to the Ganz Collection , 1999, Recherches économiques de Louvain.

[12]  Paul R. Milgrom,et al.  A Theory of Auctions and Competitive Bidding II , 2000 .

[13]  Victor Ginsburgh,et al.  Absentee Bidders and the Declining Price Anomaly in Wine Auctions , 1998, Journal of Political Economy.

[14]  Kathryn Graddy,et al.  Declining Values and the Afternoon Effect: Evidence from Art Auctions , 1997 .

[15]  Corinna Czujack,et al.  Picasso Paintings at Auction, 1963–1994 , 1997 .

[16]  Lars P. Feld,et al.  The Impact of Museum Purchase on the Auction Prices of Paintings , 1997 .

[17]  V. Ginsburgh,et al.  The relevance of hedonic price indices , 1996 .

[18]  Victor Ginsburgh,et al.  Economics of the arts : selected essays , 1996 .

[19]  Louis-André Gérard-Varet,et al.  Auction Theory and Practice Evidence from the Market for Jewellery , 1996 .

[20]  Daniel R. Vincent.  Bidding Off the Wall: Why Reserve Prices May Be Kept Secret , 1995 .

[21]  V. Ginsburgh,et al.  Long-term comovements in international markets for paintings , 1995 .

[22]  B. Frey,et al.  On the rate of return in the art market: Survey and evaluation , 1995 .

[23]  David Genesove.  Search at Wholesale Auto Auctions , 1995 .

[24]  Stuart E. Thiel,et al.  Bidding behaviour in second-price auctions: rare stamp sales, 1923–1937 , 1995 .

[25]  Ignatius J. Horstmann,et al.  Secret Reserve Prices in a Bidding Model with a Re-Sale Option , 1995 .

[26]  Ian L. Gale,et al.  Bottom-Fishing and Declining Prices in Sequential Auctions , 1994 .

[27]  N. M. Fehr,et al.  PREDATORY BIDDING IN SEQUENTIAL AUCTIONS , 1994 .

[28]  D. Bernhardt,et al.  A Note on Sequential Auctions , 1994 .

[29]  Kenneth M. Lusht.  Order and price in a sequential auction , 1994 .

[30]  Returns of impressionist, modern and contemporary European paintings , 1994 .

[31]  M. Hashem Pesaran,et al.  A generalization of the non-parametric Henriksson-Merton test of market timing , 1994 .

[32]  Richard Engelbrecht-Wiggans,et al.  Sequential auctions of stochastically equivalent objects , 1994 .

[33]  V. Ginsburgh,et al.  Returns of impressionist, modern and contemporary European painters, 1962-1991 , 1994 .

[34]  Victor Ginsburgh,et al.  Revisiting Baumol's Art as floating crap game , 1993 .

[35]  Daniel R. Vincent,et al.  The Declining Price Anomaly , 1993 .

[36]  Paul Graeser,et al.  Rate of Return to Investment in American Antique Furniture , 1993 .

[37]  William N. Goetzmann,et al.  Accounting for Taste: Art and the Financial Markets over Three Centuries , 1993 .

[38]  J. E. Pesando,et al.  Art as an Investment: The Market for Modern Prints , 1993 .

[39]  David de Meza,et al.  Systematic Price Differences Between Successive Auctionsare no Anomaly , 1992 .

[40]  Bruce Vanderporten.  Timing of bids at pooled real estate auctions , 1992 .

[41]  O. Ashenfelter,et al.  Testing for Price Anomalies in Real Estate Auctions , 1992 .

[42]  Strategic behavior in pooled condominium auctions , 1992 .

[43]  Ronald J. Balvers.  VARIABILITY AND THE DURATION OF SEARCH , 1990 .

[44]  Bruno S. Frey,et al.  Muses and Markets: Explorations in the Economics of the Arts , 1989 .

[45]  O. Ashenfelter.  How Auctions Work for Wine and Art , 1989 .

[46]  Myron H. Ross,et al.  Capital Gains and the Rate of Return on a Stradivarius , 1989 .

[47]  William J. Baumol,et al.  Unnatural Value: Or Art Investment as Floating Crap Game , 1985 .

[48]  J. Campbell.  Stock Returns and the Term Structure , 1985 .

[49]  Paul R. Milgrom,et al.  A theory of auctions and competitive bidding , 1982 .

[50]  Steven T. Buccola,et al.  Price Trends at Livestock Auctions , 1982 .

[51]  V. Smith,et al.  Research in experimental economics : a research annual , 1979 .

[52]  J. Stein,et al.  The Monetary Appreciation of Paintings , 1977, Journal of Political Economy.

[53]  Robert C Anderson,et al.  PAINTINGS AS AN INVESTMENT , 1974 .