Michael Johnson Market Update - australianartmarket.com Michael Johnson is one of the artists that I find one needs to take the time to understand before their talents can truly be realised and appreciated
the Artemis Auctions sale of A Private Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art’ in Melbourne. The massive 137×365 oil on canvas titled ‘Untitled 1999′ has an estimate of 60,000-$80,000 which seems like a fair price especially considering this work fetched $73,937 (including premium) when it was sold by Sotheby’s in 2003. However, considering that the last time this work was sold it fetched $73,937 (including premium), Artemis auction are running the risk of selling this work for less than it sold for last time it went to auction especially with the current market climate.
A hammer price of $70,000 or more would be a record for the artist at auction when the buyers premium was added on which puts even more pressure on Artemis. With prices for contemporary art having been affected by the art market correction buyers are much less likely to be buying works for record prices unless they are extremely rare and desirable. With plenty of beautiful works available at Tim Olsen Gallery, albeit at a higher price, there is no shortage of works by Johnson available for purchase which may hurt the desirability of the work being sold by Artemis. There is no doubt that the Johnson work being sold by Artemis is worth more than the $60,000-$80,000 estimate and is a great investment piece for the long term. Whether buyers will be more tempted by the new works on offer at Tim Olsen or are willing to pay a record price for a Michael Johnson painting at this point in time remains to be seen.
You can see the works available for sale at Tim Olsen Gallery here:
http://www.timolsengallery.com/pages/exhibitions_sheet.php?exhibition_id=207
and the work by Johnson being sold by Artemis here:
http://www.artemisauctions.com.au/artwork-detail.asp?idImage=25533&idAuction=1142
**Nicholas Forrest is an art market analyst, art critic and journalist based in Sydney, Australia. He is the founder of http://www.artmarketblog.com, writes the art column for the magazine Antiques and Collectibles for Pleasure and Profit and contributes to many other publications.
