After reporting yesterday that Leon Black‘s publishing house Phaidon Press was in talks to purchase online art gallery Artspace, Bloomberg has published an article confirming the deal. Although the price paid by Phaidon for Artspace remains unknown, the article reports that, when Auctionata was in talks to acquire the gallery, Artspace had been valued at just under $5 million. The article also points out that this merger will give Phaidon Press and, by extension, Leon Black access to Artspace’s extensive mailing list of 150,000 active art collectors, increasing “[Phaidon’s] access to global art collectors who are also consumers of its art and design books and multimedia products”.

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An article on Bloomberg.com reports that collector and billionaire Leon Black is in talks to purchase Artspace through Phaidon Press, the publishing company he bought in 2012. Artspace has been in the news recently for its lower-than-expected sales figures, especially compared to its early success in fundraising. Previous reports indicated that the online auction site Auctionata was a prime contender to acquire Artspace but the Bloomberg article suggests that a deal between Black’s Phaidon Press and Artspace could be signed by the end of the week.  (more…)

Artspace, a start-up digital marketplace for contemporary art, is currently involved in acquisition talks with Auctionata, an online auction house. Although Artspace showed early promise by raising upwards of $12 million in funds, this past year has turned out surprisingly anemic sales figures: just $577,000 in total annual sales, according to a leaked chart. In addition, since Artspace creates income from commissions, the actual annual revenue for the site would presumably be only a fraction of this six-figure sales number. (more…)

Artspace has announced that is in the process of acquiring VIP Art, another online art sales site run by gallerists James and Jane Cohan.  The move broadens Artspace’s number of collectors to well over two hundred thousand, and its list of gallery collaborators to over 200.  “As we augment our gallery presence, we augment our insight into how best to serve galleries and collectors.”  Says Artspace founder Christopher Vroom.
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