Commercial Galleries

Written by a former gallerist with an insider’s perspective, this book provides a timely overview of the commercial-gallery sector at a moment of rapid change and expansion within a booming market. More than any other participant within the art market, galleries are seen as opaque and mysterious actors with a Byzantine code of conduct. This book offers a fascinating view of the gallery ecosystem, presenting a systematic diagnosis of key challenges and opportunities facing the sector today. Henry Little establishes brand and identity as key concepts for understanding how commercial galleries create value for their artists, and explores how this has become more complex in the hybrid post-pandemic world of physical/digital. Focussing primarily on dealers active in the dominant art market centres - New York, London, Paris and Hong Kong – the book also discusses dealers whose main location falls outside of these centres, including Seoul, Los Angeles, Sao Paul and Cape Town, and covers Old Master dealers alongside galleries operating within the field of Modern and Contemporary art.