African art gains global respect
SOUTH Africa controls nearly half of high end paintings in Africa, with prices rising nearly 28 percent in the past 10 years.
New World Wealth analyst Andrew Amoils said the prices compared well with the global surge of 12 percent during the period.
Amoils said the global top-end art market was valued at around
$75 billion (R1 trillion).
He said South Africa was a front runner as it had about 10 top bankable artists for 2020.
“African art accounts for around $1bn of this, with $480 million held in South Africa specifically,” Amoils said.
The African Business Magazine reported earlier this year that a burgeoning cross continental collector class, underpinned by industrialists and bankers from Africa’s biggest economies such as South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, and Senegal were propelling the African arts sector further.
Some of the top South African painters include JH Pierneef, Irma Stern, Maggie Laubser and Alexis Preller. Other artists are Gerard Sekoto, Vladimir Tretchikoff, sculpture Sydney Khumalo and William Kentridge.
The country’s top galleries are in Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria and Stellenbosch, with dealerships dominated by Strauss & Co, Stephan Welz and Aspire Art.
“Irma Stern is currently the most valuable South African artist,” Amoils said.
“Her paintings can fetch up to $2.5m each, with an average price of around $350 000 per painting.” However, local art still lags behind the most expensive in the world.
Globally, artworks by Leonardo da Vinci, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso and Claude Monet regularly fetch over $30m at major auctions in London and New York.
Sotherby’s Hanna O’leary said that African paintings would bank on growing global recognition to fetch higher prices in the next few months.
“We are finally seeing some recognition for artists from the continent that were previously overlooked by the international art world,” said O’leary. “We should be ready for paintings from Africa making six, seven figures as standard, whereas 12 months ago or 24 months ago, those prices were really very exceptional.”