Susan Washington


There’s a version of the art world you’ll read about in headlines - $100 million auctions, celebrity-curated openings, mega-galleries raking it in. But that’s not the market most of us are living in. And for artists and galleries working under the $12,000 range, the energy right now is off.

I showed at a fair earlier this year. The crowd was great. The booths were full. But the sales? Sluggish. That wasn't just my experience. Friends, curators, and even gallerists who usually sell easily were feeling it. Last year, one of my galleries even called to ask how things were going. Not because they had a sale, but because they didn't. She said she was trying to figure out whether it was just her, or the market. I think we both knew the answer. 

This year doesn’t feel worse than last. But it does feel different. A little more hesitant. People aren’t scooping up finished works the way they used to. I’m getting more commissions, which tells me people still want art. They just want it on their terms, and maybe on their timeline.

The anxiety is real. Economic, political, maybe both. I don’t have a macroeconomic model. I just know that the market many of us depend on, the quieter, under-the-radar one - is shifting.


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According to the 2025 Art Basel & UBS report, global art sales dropped by 12% in 2024, falling to $57.5 billion. But the number of artworks sold increased by 3% to around 40.5 million. That means people are still buying art, but they’re buying differently. They’re spending less per piece, with works under $50,000 now making up 85% of dealer sales volume.

Meanwhile, the high end is hurting. Auction sales dropped by 25% in value, and works over $10 million declined by nearly 45% year-on-year. Major galleries like Blum and JTT have shuttered. Others are scaling back, downsizing, or ditching public-facing models altogether.

So when someone says “the art market is thriving,” I have to ask. Whose market?

Like a lot of artists, I’ve adjusted. I used to focus heavily on online sales, thinking that would give me the biggest return on my marketing. But recently, I’ve started shifting toward something I used to ignore entirely: my local market.

I’m making work tied to Baltimore - its surfaces, its stories, its people. Not because I’ve lowered my sights, but because I’m paying closer attention.

The audience I’m finding here isn’t casual. They’re not scrolling. They’re showing up. They want the work, and they want it to mean something right here, not just float in the algorithm.

This isn’t a glamorous pivot. It’s not something you see in flashy Art Basel coverage. But it’s real. And it’s working.



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One curator I spoke to in the Hamptons said:
_“The same old people are still buying art. The young ones? They’re investing in AI. It’s not about Trump.”_

I don’t know if that’s true. Maybe it’s not just about Trump. But it is about something. Inflation. Recession anxiety. Culture fatigue. A sense that everything feels a little less certain.

AI has pulled some cultural capital away from artists, sure, but I don’t think it’s replacing us. I think the bigger issue is what’s happening in the invisible market, the one no one writes headlines about. The one where most of us live. Where a sale at $4,000 means a rent payment, not a press release.

There’s a shift happening, not just at the top, but below it. The under-$12K market has often been overlooked, even dismissed as “emerging.” But it’s a real market. It moves volume. It supports careers. And right now, it’s under pressure.

Collectors are still out there. But they’re cautious. They’re slower to commit. They’re asking for commissions instead of picking off the wall. They want more for less. And we’re adjusting.

That’s not a collapse. It’s a recalibration. But don’t confuse quiet with failure. What’s happening now is a kind of reset. And the artists who survive it won’t be the ones chasing the old models. They’ll be the ones building new ones - quietly, persistently, and with eyes wide open.

Are you feeling the same shift? Are you seeing something different? I’d love to hear from artists, gallerists, and collectors navigating the moment.


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This isn’t the art market you see in headlines. It’s the one most of us work in, and it’s shifting under our feet.



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