The art world came out in force for the VIP opening of Art Basel Miami Beach on Wednesday morning, with long lines in the lobby of the Miami Beach Convention Center and scores of artworks selling in the first few hours.
Early birds at the biggest contemporary art fair in the United States included Florida collectors Craig Robins, Mera and Don Rubell, Norman Braman, and Beth Rudin DeWoody. Artist JR and his entourage chatted in front of a large sculpture of an upside-down white eagle by Maurizio Cattelan at Gagosian. Gawkers milled around a bulbous crimson Jeff Koons sculpture at David Zwirner, priced at $10 million, and crowds descended on the fair’s new digital-art section, Zero 10, where Beeple offered robotic dogs with the heads of tech titans Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos, as well as Pablo Picasso, Andy Warhol, and the artist himself.
Jeff Koons’s Venus at David Zwirner at Art Basel Miami Beach 2025. Photo by Katya Kazakina.
The fair, now in its 23rd edition, has 283 galleries from 43 countries, including 48 first-time participants, some of whom were invited after a number of prominent exhibitors pulled out. The main Galleries sector has been struggling, with players big and small closing in recent months, and many more are hanging on by a thread.
The big question heading into this week was whether the art trade has turned the corner after a three-year contraction, following the success of the recent $2.2 billion auctions in New York and strong fairs in Europe in October. Was Leonard Lauder’s collection a gilded one-off or a sign of a long-awaited broader market resurgence?
Maurizio Cattelan’s Bones (2025), made of Carrara marble, at Gagosian during Art Basel Miami Beach 2025. Photo by Katya Kazakina
“We are off to a very strong start,” Larry Gagosian said in a statement. “I’m happy to see that the momentum from the November auction season in New York is carrying over into the art fairs.”
Seven-Figure Deals
Hauser and Wirth reported six sales exceeding $1 million, led by a $3.9 million painting from 2011 by George Condo, who announced his departure from the gallery last month. White Cube sold a sculpture by Richard Hunt, whose solo exhibition opened at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami this week, for $1 million, and a Willem de Kooning work on paper for $3 million. Gladstone placed a Robert Rauschenberg “Copperhead” work for $1.5 million. Pace‘s sales included a $1.1 million Sam Gilliam canvas from 2020 and a $400,000 Lynda Benglis from 1979.
“There is no fair in the U.S. that rivals Art Basel Miami,” Lehmann Maupin co-founder David Maupin said. “Every year it’s one of our most productive and rewarding events on the art world calendar. We’ve placed over 15 works so far, which is a good indication of a healthier market heading into 2026.”
His gallery’s sales included two new paintings by McArthur Binion from his “DNA:Study” series, for a total of $500,000, and a new glass-beaded painting by Liza Lou, titled Hyperbaton, which went to collectors based in California for between $200,000 and $250,000. The gallery also sold three works by the Korean artist Do Ho Suh, including a large-scale work from his “ScaledBehaviour” series.
Installation view of Berry Campbell’s booth at Art Basel Miami Beach 2025. Image courtesy Berry Campbell.
Berry Campbell, which focuses on rediscovering 20th-century female artists, sold six works, including Mercedes Matter’s Untitled (Still Life), circa 1978, for $175,000, Mary Abbott‘s Hill’s Dancers (1948) for $275,000, two paintings by Elaine de Kooning for $75,000 each, an Untitled (1971) painting by Betty Parsons for $65,000, and Yvonne Thomas’s Caribbean Shore (1959) for $375,000.
Andrew Schoelkopf, whose eponymous Tribeca gallery specializes in American Modernism, said that his area has been less volatile than the contemporary realm in recent years. By the end of the preview day, he had sold works by Thomas Hart Benton (in the range of $400,000 to $500,000), Marsden Hartley ($200,000 to $300,000), Andrew Wyeth ($400,000 to $500,000), and Ed Clark ($300,000 to $400,000).
“I think people are happy to see us,” said Miami collector Dennis Scholl, who bought a drawing by Emily Kraus at Luhring Augustine.
Installation view of Justine Hill’s The Travelers (2022) in the Meridians section of Art Basel Miami Beach 2025. Image courtesy the artist and Dimin
Art Basel’s decision this year to open its Meridians sector, which is dedicated to large-scale work, to dealers without booths proved to be a wise choice.
New York gallerist Robert Dimin is debuting there with a 12-panel painting installation by Justine Hill thatis titled The Travelers (2022). “I took the opportunity to apply and they let me in,” Dimin said. “They liked the proposal. So we rolled the dice.”
‘A Good Day’ for Digital Offerings
The energy was wild in the new Zero 10 section for digital art. By 3 p.m., about 65 percent of the work there had sold, according to digital art promoter Benny Gross, who helped organize the initiative.
Beeple’s 10 dogs, each an edition of two, had sold out at $100,000 a pop.
“This is awesome,” Beeple, aka Mike Winkelmann, said of the crowded section and robust sales. “It seems like it’s holding its own.”
Installation view of Lehmann Maupin’s booth at Art Basel Miami Beach 2025. Left to right, artworks by Lari Pittman and Do Ho Suh. Image courtesy Lehmann Maupin Gallery.
Nearby, artist Mike Kozlowski presented five algorithmically created wall-hung works and sculptures that were priced at $25,000 and $35,000. All sold within a few hours. “It’s been a good day,” he said.
In the sector’s gift shop, a digital print by Emily Xie was priced at $1,300 and came with an NFT in an edition of 80. The piece launched online today and sold out in 20 seconds.
One of Art Basel’s goals with Zero 10 is to lure potential buyers from the tech industry into the art world. It “is the first substantive move in that direction,” Art Basel CEO Noah Horowitz said. “You are going to see a lot of new people coming around to Art Basel as a result of this.”
His conversations with the fair’s exhibitors inevitably come down to the challenge of building “bridges to new collecting communities,” he said, and “continuously bringing new audiences in front of them and their artists.”
Jack Pierson, Something Hopeful (2025) at Regen Projects. Photo by Eileen Kinsella
After a long bear market, optimism is in the air. “There’s more hope in the art world again,” said Lisa Anastos, a collector based in New York and Palm Beach.
As if trying to will this into reality, a 2025 text artwork by Jack Pierson on the wall of Regen Projects‘ booth reads: “something hopeful.” But a degree of caution is still present, and the Pierson work, priced at $200,000, was unsold by the end of the day.