Helen Deng

THE fever for contemporary Chinese artworks is cooling as the global economy slumps, figures from the 2009 Hurun Art List show.

The list was published late last month in Beijing to rank China’s top 50 living artists by the total volume of sales of their work at public auctions in the year 2008.

Top guns’ sales down 24%

Compared with the year 2007, the total sales for the top 50 artists was down almost 24 percent at US$410 million. Total sales for the top 100 artists dropped 20 percent taking US$165 million, according to the list.

“This year’s list shows that overall, the demand for contemporary art softened in a year when — with the dramatic exception of Damian Hirst’s solo auction at Sotheby’s in September 2008 — international sales were down across the board,” said Rupert Hoogewerf, Hurun’s Shanghai-based publisher.

According to the report, the average price for the top 100 artworks was 11.24 million yuan (US$1.64 million), down 20 percent from a year earlier.