Is the art market ready for Generation Z?

The wave of young people hungry for art could be the key to changing the current model of buying and selling. We analyze the reasons why.

According to a study by the firm Digitas, 60% of teenagers between 10 and 14 years old have a “substantial influence” on their parents’ final decision on which car to buy. That is, an outrage. Of people and influence. Well, even so, the market is not taking them into account enough. And if we are already talking about what to hang on the walls of the home, there is a niche that no one is knowing how to fill. But let’s go back to the data, which is what always gives rigor and is nice to see.

It is undeniable that Generation Z, which comprises young people between the ages of 7 and 24, more or less, is the most multicultural and with the most diversification of interests in History. According to Bloomberg, they make up almost 32% of the total population of the 7.7 billion people in the world in 2019. And not only that, but they are 40% of all consumers, which, if added to their “indirect potential” (the parents, so that we understand each other) amounts to an amount of 3 billion dollars per year . The antonym of change, so that we understand each other. And, to finish, freely translating, the study comes to say that they are stealing the toast from the millennials… but that nobody, we repeat, is paying the slightest attention to them.

Okay, that said, let’s get back to the point. In Melanie Gerlis’ report Forget millennials —the art market should be looking at Gen Z , which would be “Forget millennials — the art market should be looking at Gen Z” (I call it that for short), the author expresses a reality: you can’t tell this generation to buy something or what they should buy, because they “will figure it out.” They are natives of social media, they know perfectly well how brands target them and they don’t trust the first thing they read. In addition, they need to see. And this, in art, means that the model has changed. And that we need to modernize.

Justin Lee/Flickr

Old auction houses, large collections and even modest galleries have a serious problem. Tim Schneider says so in an opinion column he called The Gray Market: although “the reality is that most galleries today cannot afford to plan for their clients 10 or 20 years in advance” because “they are too focused on paying next month’s rent or saving the next art fair,” the truth is that “the most prosperous members of the GenerationZion are the only ones who really matter.” The journalist clarifies that, if the model does not change, the only sellers will be the big art companies. So the model would not change, it would only widen the gap.

But Gerlis and Schneider, who wrote his column based on the former's article, differ in their conclusions.

Schneider concludes that the eyes, especially from a business point of view, should be fixed on that mass of pre-adolescents, pubescents, ephebes and young people who are still attending university. But not because they are more or less rebellious (Generation X rejected corporatism and the Baby Boomers created the counterculture and we should see them now, the greatest exponents of neoliberalism, as you can see), but because this generation will surely follow a similar path to the previous ones. With many differences, of course, but similar in the basics, which is art and its business model, if it continues to be based on large fortunes and high prices. In short: three quarters of what it always was.

But Gerlis had already distanced himself and introduced a couple of key factors into the equation that would make this generation a kind of before and after: the new set of tastes and technological advances.

The Generation Z is not fooled by the Internet, but is proactive on it. And demanding. Just like the negative response to influencers and vloggers (another under-exploited niche in terms of young art), Generation Z does not operate under the rules imposed on it. As is the case with the current art market. Thus, and we finish with a fact, which has been missing, the latest Hiscox Online Art Trade Report reveals that 87% of 706 buyers demand transparency, clear prices and ease. Doesn't sound too much like a betting house, does it?