The relationship between the art and luxury market is reshaping strategies, identities, and priorities of major international auctions, with effects yet to be fully measured.
How the balance between art and luxury is shifting
For now, art remains the economic pillar of the main auction houses. In 2025, Christie’s sold works for 3.7 billion dollars, accounting for almost 60 percent of total revenues. Sotheby’s earned 4.3 billion dollars from art sales, also about 60 percent of the total.
The smallest of the trio, Phillips, reported consolidated revenues growing to 927 million dollars, of which 290 million came from watches. This indicates that art still represents around 60 percent of the business, although high-end categories are accelerating.
What the numbers say about global sales
According to the research company ArtTactic, in 2025, sales of modern and contemporary art at the three major houses decreased by 35 percent, dropping to 7.04 billion dollars compared to the peak of 10.8 billion recorded in 2022. This decline highlights a weaker cyclical phase for traditional auctions.
The luxury segment, on the other hand, shows an opposite dynamic. Also in 2025, public sales of high-end goods at auctions reached 1.84 billion dollars, with an 18 percent year-on-year increase. Moreover, the collectible car sector is emerging as one of the main drivers of this expansion.
Why cars have become a driver of luxury at auctions
In Paris, just last month, the car division of Christie’s Gooding – established after the acquisition in 2024 of the auction house Gooding & Company – earned over 50 million euros with about 90 car lots. Car sales marked a 14 percent increase compared to 2024, surpassing 234 million dollars, a historical record for the company.
Similarly, RM Sotheby’s, the structure entirely dedicated to collectible cars, surpassed the 1 billion dollar sales threshold for the first time in 2025. Overall, these figures show how car collecting is consolidating its weight among high-end offerings.
Which luxury categories are growing the fastest?
Cars represent only a part of the boom. At Christie’s, in 2025, sales of bags, watches, cars, and jewelry increased by about 30 percent, making up almost a quarter of total revenue. This acceleration highlights how traditional collectors and new buyers are looking beyond just art.
At Sotheby’s, the picture is even more radical: today, luxury accounts for a third of revenues, triple compared to 2019. Private sales in this segment increased by 350 percent year-on-year, and, especially thanks to these, the house surpassed 2 billion dollars in consolidated revenues in the high-end sector for three consecutive years.
How is luxury changing the identity of auctions?
If the current trajectory continues, the very identity of the major houses could change profoundly. The transformation of Sotheby’s into a full-fledged luxury operator is already underway. During the Collectors’ Week in Abu Dhabi in December, the company reconfigured two restaurants at the St. Regis Hotel on Saadiyat Island into a space resembling the ground floor of a high-end department store.
On display were bags, watches, and diamonds for private sale, while the “Sotheby’s Bespoke” service offered custom jewelry to top clients. However, during the five auctions organized for the occasion, no art lots were brought to the floor. Faced with particularly voracious demand for high-end products in the Middle East, the house seems determined to focus resources and creativity on this market segment.
Does diversification challenge the essence of the model?
Not everyone, however, believes this change equates to a redefinition. The former CEO of Christie’s, Guillaume Cerutti, argues that the faster growth of luxury compared to the art section does not threaten the historical identity of auction houses. Jewelry and vintage cars, he recalls, have been part of their DNA for decades.
Cerutti cites, for example, the 2011 sale dedicated to Elizabeth Taylor‘s jewelry, which became part of the “legend” of Christie’s. According to him, regardless of the category, the structure remains unchanged: an auctioneer, an object with documented provenance, bidders in the room, on the phone, or online, and a dynamic of competitive bidding.
How do former Sotheby’s executives react?
The former president and CEO of Sotheby’s, Tad Smith, appears more cautious. In a recent email, he noted that an auction house is not defined solely by the revenue mix. However, if capital, talent, and internal narrative were to shift first towards luxury and only then towards art, then the company would not just be restructured but “reset and rebuilt.”
This reading suggests that a progressive shift in priorities could deeply alter the internal culture. In contrast to Cerutti’s vision, Smith sees the risk that excessive expansion in the high-end sector could transform the original mission of auction houses, which were born as reference points for the circulation of high-level works.
From art marketplace to luxury platform?
Market expert Magnus Resch, a professor of art management at Yale University, describes Sotheby’s strategy as a true “structural transformation.” With the integration of categories, leading retail addresses, and potential initiatives in the hospitality sector, the house is evolving from a trading place for artworks to a full-service luxury platform.
Resch highlights a shift from an object-centered logic to one centered on clients. When a billionaire can purchase a Mark Rothko painting, a penthouse, a diamond, and a vintage Ferrari in the same context, the institution ceases to be just a place of sale and becomes a sort of personal concierge for the high-end.
Why has the Middle East become a key laboratory?
According to the Chalhoub group, active in luxury and based in Dubai, the regional market for high-end goods is worth about 13 billion dollars. During the Collectors’ Week in Abu Dhabi alone, Sotheby’s achieved sales of 133 million dollars, confirming the area as one of the most dynamic hubs.
Mark Westgarth, a professor of art market history at the University of Leeds, is not surprised that the house is chasing the liquidity present in the Gulf. However, even if luxury were to surpass art in value, he does not foresee a sudden break with the past. In his view, the two dimensions have been intertwined for a long time.
Are luxury and art really separate worlds?
For Westgarth, art at the highest levels has always functioned as a luxury good, a vehicle of status and social distinction. Consequently, the sharp contrast between the art market and the high-end goods market is less pronounced than one might think. Moreover, the expert doubts that the current expansion of luxury can continue indefinitely.
Taste, he recalls, is by nature mutable. What appears desirable today risks seeming vulgar or outdated in ten years. We are in a specific cultural moment, but this does not mean that the high-end sector is destined to replace the art market as we know it permanently.
Is luxury also a strategy for entering new markets?
Westgarth hypothesizes that the high-end sector functions as a strategic outpost. As Sotheby’s and Christie’s expand in the area – the latter opened an office in Saudi Arabia in 2024 – high-end goods offer an easier access channel in contexts where the artistic ecosystem is still in its infancy.
Building a stable art market takes decades and cannot be transplanted from outside. According to the professor, long-term cultural foundations, institutions, public and private collections, and widespread aesthetic education are needed. In this framework, luxury serves as an immediate lever, while building a robust artistic system remains a long-term goal.
Do auction houses see luxury as an ally or a rival?
During the Collectors’ Week in Abu Dhabi, the sale of a 31.68-carat diamond for 8.8 million dollars provided Charles Stewart, CEO of Sotheby’s, the opportunity to openly address the issue. On that occasion, he told ARTnews that he considers it possible that one day high-end sales could surpass art sales.
His position diverges from the cautious line of other industry executives, often opposed to this hypothesis. However, Stewart insisted on the complementary nature of the two worlds, reiterating that the legacy, DNA, and identity of the house remain anchored to artistic production, while the potential markets in the fields of cars, watches, spirits, and real estate are much larger than that of artworks.
What is Christie’s view on the high-end shift?
The new head of the high-end sector at Christie’s, Kimberly Miller, echoed Stewart’s reasoning. In her view, categories such as jewelry, watches, and fine wines have been part of the house’s identity since the 18th century. In 1795, for example, Christie’s organized a major auction of jewelry belonging to Madame du Barry.
Miller argues that the high-end sector integrates and does not compete with the company’s vocation as an artistic institution. Identity, she recalls, has never depended solely on the weight of individual categories but on the principles of deep knowledge and responsible management of works. Whether it’s a bottle of Pétrus 1961 or a “Color Field” painting by Rothko, the glue is a shared passion for quality and authenticity.
How are new buyers changing?
First-time buyers play a decisive role in this reconfiguration. In 2025, 38 percent of new clients at Christie’s made their first purchase in a high-end category and not in the strictly artistic field. Many of these transactions took place online, leveraging increasingly sophisticated digital platforms.
Sotheby’s did not provide an equivalent isolated figure, but in its 2025 financial report, it indicated that 35 percent of new bidders, considering both art and high-end goods, were newcomers. In part, these users are attracted by the house’s website, which offers pre-owned items both at auction and with an “instant purchase” formula.
What role do digital platforms play in the luxury market?
On the Sotheby’s portal, one can find real estate, vintage cars, dinosaur fossils, collectible bags, jewelry, fine wines, and even game-worn soccer jerseys. This model closely resembles online commerce platforms, with the difference that each item is embedded in a narrative of provenance and rarity.
For Tad Smith, this phenomenon is reshaping the composition of the clientele. Art collectors are often high-end consumers, but the reverse is not true: the majority of luxury goods clients do not automatically become major collectors. Focusing on the high-end thus broadens the user base, makes the house more marketing-oriented than purely sales-oriented, and ultimately influences the internal culture.
Can luxury become a bridge to art?
Cerutti observes that high-end sales, along with contemporary ones, now constitute the main entry point for new clients at Christie’s. However, the goal is not just to attract them but to encourage them to explore other categories, particularly the artistic sector, which is historically more complex and selective.
Many high-end transactions occur online, contributing to “demystifying” auctions. This process makes exhibitions and live sales more accessible, which can be intimidating for an inexperienced audience. In the long run, the digital channel and high-end categories could thus also fuel collecting of artworks in the strict sense.
Is the symbolic centrality of the art market at risk?
Given the strong dependence of the three major houses on their cultural authority in the artistic field, the question remains whether a revenue model driven by the high-end sector could diminish this perception. Cerutti dismisses the hypothesis: in his view, a greater incidence of luxury does not weaken cultural authority but strengthens the role of the houses as nodes between art, expertise, heritage, and global wealth.
Tad Smith also agrees that the houses have no interest in abandoning their position in the cultural debate. However, he considers it essential to grow prudently in the high-end segment to preserve the symbolic reputation built over decades of major sales of historical and contemporary works.
What are the potential pitfalls of the high-end shift?
Jo Vickery, former head of the Russian department at Sotheby’s, takes a more cautious line. While acknowledging that the shift towards luxury can be highly profitable in the short term, he raises a crucial question: at what strategic and cultural cost?
Overall, the growing intertwining of art and high-end appears destined to continue, but its final outcome remains open. The upcoming auction seasons will tell whether the luxury sector will establish itself as the prevailing engine or if the art market will be able to reaffirm its centrality, in a renewed balance between economic value and symbolic prestige.
As expert in digital marketing, Amelia began working in the fintech sector in 2014 after writing her thesis on Bitcoin technology. Previously author for several international crypto-related magazines and CMO at Eidoo. She is now the co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Cryptonomist and Econique.
She is also a marketing teacher at Digital Coach in Milan and she published a book about NFTs for the Italian publishing house Mondadori, while she is also helping artists and company to entering in the sector. As advisor, Amelia is also involved in metaverse-related project such as The Nemesis and OVER.
