Our friends at Pi-eX have shared their charts for the New York Evening sales and we're happy to add a little narration for the AMMpro subscribers. Above the paywall, it's worth remarking that the pre-sale volume (excluding works with estimate upon request which is an increasing category) is down this year over 2017 but within a range that has remained fairly steady since 2015.

In other words, for all of the talk of "recovery" in the art market over the last year and a half, the Contemporary category has actually been restrained and substantially lower than the period from 2012 to 2015.

This is especially important when we turn to the issue of guarantees.