The gallery facing online auctions: coexisting with digital salerooms

01A secondary market in accelerated transformation

The online auction market experienced structural growth that the 2020 pandemic brutally accelerated. When physical salerooms closed their doors, the entire auction market migrated online within weeks. Christie's launched online-only sales generating results exceeding initial estimates. Sotheby's developed its mobile application to enable real-time bidding from a phone. Phillips created hybrid sale formats blending in-room and online bidding.

This acceleration was not a temporary anomaly. It revealed a deep trend: a generation of collectors, accustomed to buying online in every domain of their lives, naturally transposed this habit to the art market. The forty-year-old collector who buys clothes, travel and technology online sees no fundamental reason why art purchasing should escape this logic. Auction houses understood this message and invested heavily in their digital infrastructure, creating increasingly sophisticated online buying experiences with high-resolution photography, detailed condition reports, transparent estimates and live bidding tracking tools.

Online auction operators also conquered market segments that traditional houses neglected. Sales of lots with low unit value, between 500 and 5,000 euros, became the preferred territory of online platforms, which can handle these transactions at operational costs well below those of a saleroom event. This segment corresponds precisely to the price range in which many galleries operate for their early- and mid-career artists, creating direct competition on the gallery's own terrain.

02Effects on the gallery's primary market

The impact of online auctions on the primary market is not direct but it is real. The first effect is transparency. Online auction hammer prices are public, searchable on databases such as market data platforms, Artprice and Mutual Art. A collector considering purchasing a work in a gallery can now compare the asking price with recent auction results for the same artist. This transparency compels the dealer to justify prices, explain the difference between primary and secondary markets, and demonstrate the added value of buying from a gallery as opposed to buying at auction.

The second effect concerns the speed of work circulation. Online auctions facilitate rapid resale, which can destabilise the market for a young artist. A collector who purchased a work in a gallery two years ago and puts it up for online auction creates a market signal that other collectors interpret, often negatively. The dealer must manage this problem by selecting collectors, establishing first-refusal clauses in sales contracts and actively communicating with artists about market strategy. Certain galleries, such as Hauser and Wirth or David Zwirner, have established explicit policies aimed at discouraging rapid auction resale by refusing to sell new works to collectors who have consigned pieces at auction within a period deemed too short.

The third effect is indirect competition. Online auctions offer collectors immediate access to a far larger catalogue of works than any gallery can provide. A collector weighing a painting offered in a gallery against a comparable painting available at online auction for a potentially lower price may be tempted by the auction option. The dealer must respond to this competition not on price but on added value: the advisory relationship, the guarantee of authenticity, the monitoring of the artist's career, the guidance in building a coherent collection.

03The gallery's structural advantages

Against online auctions, the gallery retains structural advantages that the dealer must highlight relentlessly. The first advantage is curation. The dealer selects the works presented, contextualises them within a coherent artistic programme and accompanies them with a critical discourse offering the collector interpretive keys. An auction sale, online or in-room, is a heterogeneous catalogue where works are juxtaposed without curatorial logic. The collector seeking guidance, expert insight and personalised advice will find it only in a gallery.

The second advantage is access to the primary market. Galleries are the entry point for recent works by the artists they represent. The collector who wants to acquire an artist's latest production must go through the gallery. Online auctions offer only the secondary market, meaning works already sold once. For artists whose demand exceeds supply, access to the primary market through the gallery is a privilege that auctions cannot provide.

The third advantage is the long-term relationship. The dealer supports collectors over time, advises them, invites them to events and offers them a right of first view on new works. This human relationship, founded on trust and mutual knowledge, is an intangible asset that online auction platforms, despite their recommendation algorithms, cannot replicate. A gallery's loyal collector is not an anonymous client bidding behind a screen: they are a partner whose tastes, budget, ambitions and constraints the dealer knows.

04Strategies for intelligent coexistence

The most productive posture for the dealer is neither denial nor confrontation, but strategic coexistence. Several strategies allow one to benefit from the existence of online auctions without suffering their negative effects.

The first strategy is active monitoring. The dealer must track auction results for their artists, online and in-room, with the same attention they devote to gallery sales. An auction result below the low estimate is an alert signal calling for a response: communication with collectors, possible price adjustment in the gallery, discussion with the artist about market strategy. A result above the high estimate is an opportunity for positive communication that strengthens existing collectors' confidence.

The second strategy involves using online auctions as a reference tool. When a collector hesitates, the dealer can cite auction results to demonstrate the solidity of their artist's market. An artist whose works regularly sell above estimates at auction offers a value guarantee the dealer can deploy in commercial arguments.

The third strategy is differentiation through service. The dealer must make the gallery buying experience so superior to the auction buying experience that price comparison becomes secondary. The studio visit, the meeting with the artist, the placement advice, the detailed condition report, the payment facilities, the after-sales follow-up: these services create a value proposition that auction platforms cannot match.

05The special case of collector resale

Collector resale at online auction is a delicate subject the dealer must approach pragmatically. A collector reselling a work purchased from a gallery is not necessarily a speculator. They may need liquidity, may have changed tastes, may want to make room for new acquisitions. The dealer who responds to resale with sanctions, striking the collector from their list, adopts a posture that is counter-productive in the long run.

The best approach is to offer the collector a resale service through the gallery, thus avoiding the auction route. The dealer has a network of collectors interested in the artist and can place the work discreetly, without the publicity of an auction signalling to the market that an owner wishes to part with the work. This private-sale resale service is a powerful loyalty argument: the collector knows that by buying from a gallery, they have a discreet and rewarding exit solution.

06Adapting digital presence

The dealer wishing to coexist effectively with online auctions must strengthen their own digital presence. A quality website, an active social media presence, an online shop for editions and available works, virtual viewing rooms: these tools allow the dealer to capture collector attention where collectors actually are, namely online. The dealer who refuses digital does not compete with online auctions: they simply render themselves invisible to the collectors who frequent them.

Building a qualified collector database, fed by online and in-gallery interactions, allows the dealer to target communications and propose the right works to the right collectors at the right time. This digital relational approach, extending online the human relationship built in the gallery, is the most effective antidote to the disintermediation that online auctions represent.

For Artedusa partner galleries, the platform offers precisely this qualified digital presence enabling positioning against online auctions. By presenting works in a curated environment, with mediation texts, detailed artist information and a secure purchasing process, Artedusa provides galleries with a digital showcase combining the quality of the gallery experience and the accessibility of the online platform.