Thursday, April 14, 2005

DC Collectors

We just closed our most successful photography exhibition ever, featuring 50 years of photography by Lida Moser. The exhibition received extensive press coverage (here and in New York), both in the mainstream media, online and on television.

And yet, it shows (again) the puzzling side of DC area "collectors." Most sales were made to New York (several pieces), Los Angeles (most expensive piece), Miami and Great Britain (multiples). In spite of all the press and really good numbers of people who came to see the exhibition, only three DC collectors (if we exclude Holly, our gallery attendant, who purchased a piece) acquired work. And the other two collectors told us that it was the "first time that they had actually bought photography from a DC area gallery."

This continues a trend (for us) that sees a rather sizeable number of our art sales going to New York and West Coast collectors, while the DC "collector" market remains hard to identify in the numbers that our area's wealth and numbers should support.

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