“VIP” is a common expression in the world of luxury – but this week it has been given a totally new meaning. Saturday, 23rd January was the inauguration of the VIP Art Fair, but here the famous letters stand for ‘Viewing in Private’, and describe the world’s first major online art fair.
The founders of this ground-breaking fair are James and Jane Cohan, art dealers in New York, who, for the past 3 years, have been dreaming of and planning the fair which finally launched last weekend, and is scheduled to close on 30th January. With more and more transactions happening online – for example some galleries sell in a similar fashion to amazon.com and major auction houses accept online bids – it seems that art collectors don’t necessarily have to view works in person before knowing they love and want it. And so begins the online art fair.
The circuit is already so crowded with fairs from Hong Kong, London, Miami, Basel, New York, Dubai to Paris, that the cost of travelling and shipping make it almost impossible for galleries or collectors to see them all – in this climate it makes sense to go virtual. Although galleries still have to pay for booths, ranging from $5,000 – $20,000, the expense saved from not having to transport works is significant.
The fair’s first major success was in convincing big hitters like Gagosian, White Cube, Hauser and Wirth and an interesting range of younger galleries to buy booths and set up a display of works. Beyond that the basic logistics of the site were successful – the lay out and interface were extremely user-friendly allowing visitors to search galleries and chat with their staff 24 hours a day.
So was it a success? I would say yes and no. The major failing has been that due to high user demand the website has been incredibly slow, to the point that they have had to disable the chat feature, suggesting visitors email or call the gallery instead. The problem with this is that specific prices are not listed, and not a lot of details are provided about each work; while you can see the artist’s CV and biography there is no actual description provided, meaning some works’ significance and purpose can, unfortunately, be lost.
Having said that, I think the idea of the online art fair is a major step forward. This fair has more than 1900 works on view, and the whole reason the website has had problems is because of overwhelming interest and demand – there have been a staggering 3.3 million views on the site, from 130 countries and it’s still only half way through the fair.
Whether sales have been high is still unknown, but it cannot be contested that even if people aren’t buying online, they are being made aware of different galleries and different artists to investigate in the future.
Technological glitches aside, the Cohans should be proud of what they’ve accomplished and hopefully will do it again next year with a bit more experience under their belts.
