Following standout acquisitions during the VIP preview day of Art Basel Miami Beach 2024 – including the highest-priced reported sale of the week, David Hammons’s Untitled (2014), which Hauser & Wirth sold for USD 4.75 million – galleries continued to see strong sales throughout the week.

Several blue-chip galleries reported significant seven-figure sales. Thaddaeus Ropac (Paris, Salzburg, London, Seoul) sold a Georg Baselitz patinated bronze sculpture with oil paint, weighing approximately 200 kg, for EUR 2.5 million and an oil painting by the artist for EUR 1.2 million. The gallery also sold Robert Rauschenberg’s Everglade (Borealis) (1990) for USD 2.3 million and Sturtevant’s historically important work Flag after Jasper Johns (1967) for USD 1.1 million. Pace (New York, London, Hong Kong, Seoul, Geneva, Los Angeles, Tokyo) sold Sam Gilliam’s acrylic painting on canvas Whispering Wind (1972) for USD 1 million. Over at White Cube (London, New York, West Palm Beach, Paris, Hong Kong, Seoul), the top reported sale was another David Hammons, Rock Head (2000), which went for USD 2.35 million. Also among the big-ticket items, Christine Ay Tjoe’s abstract painting Mischievous Player (2016) sold for USD 1.15 million. Additionally, White Cube placed two Lynne Drexler oil paintings for USD 750,000 and USD 800,000; a Danh Vo sculpture for EUR 400,000; and paintings by Howardena Pindell and Etel Adnan for USD 325,000 and USD 300,000 respectively.

Further strong six-figure sales include a three-part work made this year by Charles Gaines sold by Hauser & Wirth (Zurich, London, Somerset, New York, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Gstaad, St. Moritz, Monaco, Menorca, Paris, Basel) for USD 795,000; two bronze sculptures by Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne sold by Kasmin (New York) for EUR 420,000 and EUR 695,000; and Stanley Whitney’s oil-on-linen Blue Conversation (2024), sold by Galerie Nordenhake (Berlin, Mexico City, Stockholm) for USD 650,000 to a private collection in the United States. Additionally, Nara Roesler (Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, New York) reported the sale of Julio Le Parc’s three-dimensional Mobile losange doré (2024) for EUR 375,000 and Daniel Senise’s wall-based work Untitled (Capela Sistina) (2024) for USD 100,000.

Elsewhere in the Galleries sector, sales by women artists were especially strong. The Olivia Foundation acquired a work by American artist Joan Snyder for USD 500,000 from Canada (New York). Lehmann Maupin (New York, London, Seoul) sold a 2024 painting by Calida Rawles – whose solo show is currently on at the Pérez Art Museum Miami – for a price in the range of USD 150,000 to 200,000. Two editioned Zilia Sánchez sculptures were sold by Galerie Lelong & Co. (Paris, New York) for prices between USD 85,000 and 150,000.

Galleries from and presenting works by artists based in Asia had a strong presence in Miami Beach this year. Tina Kim Gallery (New York, Seoul) sold two paintings by South Korean artist Ha Chong-Hyun, known as a leading figure in the Dansaekhwa movement, priced at USD 250,000 and USD 390,000. Gallery Baton (Seoul) sold paintings by Yuichi Hirako, Koen van den Broek, and Suzanne Song to private collections in the US for prices between USD 38,000 and 46,000. A private US collection also acquired Doki Kim’s LED installation The Moon and Fire (2024) from the gallery for USD 25,000.

Many historical works in the main Galleries sector and curated Kabinett sector found buyers, including a ​1932 work on paper by Pablo Picasso and a shadow painting by Ed Ruscha, which Vedovi Gallery (Brussels) sold for approximately USD 600,000 and USD 1 million, respectively. Mennour (Paris) sold a Francis Picabia for EUR 65,000 and Kasmin (New York) saw a Salvador Dalí drawing on paper go for USD 22,000. Significantly, Hirschl & Adler Modern (New York) sold over a dozen works by Abstract Expressionist Franz Kline, including works on paper for prices ranging from USD 14,000 to 20,000 each and oil-on-canvas works for prices between USD 95,000 and 150,000 each.

GAVLAK (Palm Beach, Los Angeles) sold two historical works by Judy Chicago for a combined total of USD 150,000 to a prominent local collector, while ​​galerie frank elbaz (Paris) sold Mungo Thomson’s large-scale multimedia work Red Wave (2024) for USD 65,000 to the Pérez Art Museum Miami.

Nara Roesler (Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, New York) sold Abraham Palatnik’s oil painting on wood S-31 (2001) for USD 60,000. In the same range were Sam Moyer’s Clipping 3 (2024), a work made of marble and acrylic on plaster-coated canvas mounted to MDF, sold by BLUM (Los Angeles, New York, Tokyo) for USD 45,000, and a painting by Robert Peterson sold to a prominent US museum by GAVLAK (Palm Beach, Los Angeles) for between USD 60,000 and 80,000.

The revamped Meridians sector dedicated to monumental projects – curated this year by Yasmil Raymond – also caught collectors’ attention. Piero Atchugarry (Miami) sold a sculpture from Guillermo Garcia Cruz’s multipart installation Divergent Structure (2024), which aimed to bring the concept of the digital glitch into the physical realm, for USD 110,000 to a prominent Panamanian collection. Two editions of Alice Aycock’s monumental metal tornado Goya (2024), presented by Berlin’s Galerie Thomas Schulte, also found American buyers for an undisclosed price.

Multiple galleries in Nova, the sector for works created in the last 3 years, and Positions, the sector dedicated to solo presentations of emerging artists, reported selling out their entire booths. East Coast institutions and their trustees acquired all of California-based artist Marlon Mullen’s paintings from Adams and Ollman (Portland), each with a price ranging from USD 20,000 to 30,000. Rolf Art (Buenos Aires) also sold everything at their booth, which featured more than 20 works by Argentinian Peruvian artist Julieta Tarraubella. Her Secret Life of Flowers | Garden (2024), an installation of 20 video-sculptures, sold for USD 126,000 to a Miami hotel. Charles Moffett (New York) sold four sculptures by Kim Dacres in the range of USD 7,000 to 35,000, including one museum acquisition, as well as four pieces by Melissa Joseph for prices ranging from USD 10,000 to 20,000 each.

Presenting in Positions for the first time at Art Basel Miami Beach, the Argentinian gallery PIEDRAS (Buenos Aires) sold works from Jimena Croceri’s ‘Impossible Jewel’ series (2024) for USD 8,000 to 10,000. Nazarian / Curcio’s (Los Angeles) presentation of Ken Gun Min, a Seoul-born, Los Angeles-based painter, in Nova also performed well: The gallery sold five works to private collectors for prices ranging from USD 20,000 to 48,500. The newcomer Catinca Tabacaru (Bucharest) had an impressive first year, selling nine sculptures by Zimbabwean artist Terrence Musekiwa for prices ranging from USD 6,000 to 25,000.

In the Survey sector, focused on galleries with presentations of historical relevance, Ryan Lee (New York) sold three works by Harlem-born gestural abstractionist Herbert Gentry from the 1960s. An oil painting went for USD 145,000 to an institution and two gouaches sold for USD 18,000 and USD 22,000 to private collectors. Meanwhile, Richard Saltoun Gallery (London, Rome, New York) sold a suite of works by Austrian artist Greta Schödl, who is known for her significant contributions to visual poetry, for between USD 5,000 and 25,000 to a private collection in the US.