Art Basel Hong Kong Opens with Seven-Figure Sales, but Dealers Describe a Careful Market
Art Basel Hong Kong’s first day delivered what the art trade most wants to see right now: real transactions, quickly concluded, across a wide range of price points. Yet behind the early flurry, dealers also described a market that feels deliberate rather than exuberant, with confidence building more slowly than cash is changing hands.
The fair, which brings together 240 galleries, offered a cross-section of that mood on Day One. At Hauser & Wirth, president Marc Payot presided over a crowded booth and characterized the opening as a strong start, citing attendance from serious collectors across Asia. By late afternoon, the gallery had placed several headline works.
Among the confirmed sales were two works by French American artist Louise Bourgeois (1911–2010): the 2002 sculpture “Couple,” which sold for $2.2 million, and “À Baudelaire (1)” (2008), an etching and mixed media work on paper that fetched $2.95 million. The gallery also sold “Prismatic Head” (2021), a painting by American artist George Condo (b. 1957), for $2.3 million.
Payot said the booth’s highest-priced offerings also found buyers: “Horizontal,” a 1956 mobile by American sculptor Alexander Calder (1898–1976), and “Chat et crabe sur la plage (Cat and Crab on the Beach)” (1965) by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso (1881–1973). Hauser & Wirth did not disclose prices for either work. The gallery also reported a sale by South Korean artist Lee Bul (b. 1964), whose work has been the subject of a major survey at M+ in Hong Kong: “Untitled (“Infinity” wall)” entered another private museum in Asia for $275,000.
Payot framed the booth’s strategy as a deliberate pairing of blue-chip historical material with the gallery’s contemporary program. He described combinations such as Calder alongside Avery Singer and Picasso alongside Roni Horn, adding that the gallery aims to keep significant works available for the fair and does not bring this caliber of material to other Asian art fairs.
Other major dealers also reported early seven-figure results. David Zwirner said it sold a 2006 painting by Chinese artist Liu Ye (b. 1964) for $3.8 million, as well as a 2002 painting by South African artist Marlene Dumas (b. 1953) for $3.8 million.
Across the aisles, additional high-end sales were reported by a range of international galleries. Berlin’s Bastian gallery placed Picasso’s 1964 oil painting “Le peintre et son modèle” for €3.5 million. Waddington Custot sold works by Chinese French painter Zao Wou-Ki (1920–2013) for $2.8 million and by Chinese French painter Chu Teh-Chun (1920–2014) for $1.3 million. White Cube reported a sale of “Take me to Heaven” (2024) by British artist Tracey Emin (b. 1963) for £1.2 million. The day also included a $1.3 million sale of “Flowers 1” (2011) by American painter Alex Katz (b. 1927).
Lehmann Maupin described a steady pace of activity as well, reporting the sale of two early 2000s works by Lee Bul for $200,000 to $300,000 each to an Asian museum, and a sculpture by Argentine Korean artist Kim Yun Shin (b. 1935) for around $100,000 to $150,000 to a European collector. In a statement, cofounder David Maupin said Hong Kong’s market appears to be in a “steady phase of recovery,” with renewed energy felt across both the fair and the city.
At Pace Gallery, CEO Marc Glimcher struck a similarly optimistic note, saying conditions in Hong Kong are stronger than they have been in years after a period he described as shaped by the pandemic and the city’s political climate. Without disclosing prices, he said a new painting by Korean American artist Anicka Yi (b. 1971), who recently joined the gallery, had sold, and that the booth’s presentation of Chinese painters including Mao Yan, Wang Guangle, and Zhang Xiaogang was drawing strong interest.
Still, the most conspicuous price talk on Day One centered on Amedeo Modigliani (1884–1920). Pace is bringing to the fair a portrait newly authenticated through Institut Restellini’s forthcoming catalogue raisonné, a project three decades in the making and tied to a 2027 exhibition jointly organized by Pace and Restellini. Glimcher expressed hope that the Restellini publication will become the definitive reference, and said the gallery plans to show a work from the Restellini catalog at each upcoming fair. In Hong Kong, prospective buyers were reportedly bidding from the equivalent of $13.3 million for the Modigliani on offer, positioning it as the fair’s most expensive work.
Taken together, the first-day reports suggest a market that is functioning — and, in places, surprisingly liquid — while remaining selective. If the opening is any indication, Art Basel Hong Kong’s next test will be whether that early decisiveness extends beyond the headline names to the broader middle of the fair.
