The Role of Art & Antique Dealers An Added Value
Collectors’ backgrounds were varied, with 60% in professional occupations that were unrelated to the art market most commonly finance, medicine, law, real estate and education. There were around 35% in professions that related in some way to the art market including dealers, auction houses executives, museum curators, artists, arts administrators and art historians. The remaining 5% were retired or not currently working. Incomes also varied, with the most common annual current income (for 40% of respondents) between $100,000 and $250,000, while only 2% earned greater than $1 million.
6.2 Spending on Art and Antiques
On average, the typical reported expenditure per year on art and antiques was around $68,000, however, this average figure gives a somewhat distorted guide to the majority of spending by collectors as it is skewed upwards by a small number of very high spenders (up to a maximum of $2.5 million). Because of the skewness in the data, the median or middle spend for the group is a more representative measure of typical spending, which was $10,000 per annum.15 Spending of over $50,000 per annum was reported by 17% of respondents and of those, 10% regularly spent over $100,000.
Using median spend by respondents, it is possible to estimate that collectors typically spend between 5% and 10% of their income per year on art and antiques. It is important to note, however, that purchases of art are often based on net wealth rather than current income, particularly for high net worth individuals. There may be many respondents who reported incomes towards the lower end for example that have significant net wealth in cash, property and other assets, and these may be used to purchase art.16
The average number of works bought per year was 18 items, but again this was skewed by a small number of collectors who collected over 100 works in a year in small collectible sectors. The median number of works per year for respondents was six.
6.3 Motivations for Collecting
When asked to name their key motivation for collecting, the overwhelming majority of respondents (80%) cited reasons related to aesthetic or decorative concerns or simply a passion for art and antiques. Only 11% reported financial concerns as their main motivation, with the remaining 9% specifying family-related issues such as inheriting collections.
15
The median is a measure of central tendency used in skewed distributions. The median expenditure is simply the level of spending separating the higher half of a sample from the lower half, and is found by arranging all respondents’ reported expenditure from lowest value to highest and picking the middle one. The median can differ from the average as the distribution of spending may not be evenly spread around the average. If the median is less than the average, it indicates that the average is being pulled upwards by a small proportion of higher values.
16 This also explains the few respondents who reported spending on art in excess of current incomes. 50 Historical & Future Perspectives
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