Art Storage Takes Off as Galleries and Collectors Hunker Down

Bloomberg takes a look at the art storage business, cataloguing the growth of three different facilities. As the story’s headline suggests, Bloomberg sees this as evidence of the decline of the art market. But it also may portend a shift in the way dealers and collectors approach their art works:

In the past month, three more dealers have traded storefronts for storerooms at Cirker Hayes, which charges annual rents of $100 per square foot. And two private collectors pulled their multimillion-dollar artworks from consignment at local galleries they feared were financially unstable and chose to store them instead, his partner Peter Lewis said.

In another sign of the times, a European bank that was shutting down its New York operations leased a room to store 75 paintings, Guttman said. [ . . . ]

Almost a year ago, Guttman and Lewis acquired Hayes Storage on East 61st Street, and in June they acquired Cirker’s Warehouse on West 55th Street to create Cirker Hayes. Together, the facilities provide storage space of 200,000 square feet. The partners, who spent $80 million on the two acquisitions, plan to spend more than $6 million to upgrade the facilities with the latest technology and luxury trappings, such as climate control and a wine cellar.

Wary Art Dealers, Collectors Swap Galleries for Cheap Storage (Bloomberg)