Old Masters Worldwide: Markets, movements and museums, 1789–1939

Abstract

As is shown by the numerous sources cited in Old Masters Worldwide, the study of the art market has been in the ascendant over the past twenty years, although that study originated – in effect, if not in clarity of purpose – in the late nineteenth century, with such works as George Redford’s Art Sales: A history of sales of pictures and other works of art (London, 1888). In addition to numerous articles, edited collections and monographic studies, the level of interest in the art market is evident from the establishment in 2017 of a dedicated online journal, Journal for Art Market Studies (https://fokum-jams.org). Some of the reasons for this surge in attention are easy to explain: of central importance to many of the essays in Old Masters Worldwide is the ready availability of dealers’ archives, such as those of Agnew’s (in the National Gallery, London) and Duveen, Goupil and Knoedler (in the Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles). Not only are those archives available to researchers, they have also largely been digitized and placed on open access. This archival material is invaluable in shedding new light on the methods of some of the most influential and successful dealers and therefore on the evolution of the market.