What Collectors Really Want from Galleries, According to Artsy’s Casey Lesser

Late last month, Artsy released its Art Market Trends 2025, a report analyzing the art market that offers another view of the business alongside the UBS/Art Basel report, still widely regarded as the authority. Since then, Artsy’s majority shareholder has acquired rival art data firm Artnet in a deal that “signals a decisive shift in strategy and priorities, as the art market—and the distribution of its data, information and products—continues to evolve.” It might not be an especially exciting time to sell art, but it certainly is a good one to produce data about selling it. We caught up with Artsy’s chief curator, Casey Lesser, to unpack her findings.

What are some of the key takeaways from the latest Art Market Trends report?

The report paints a nuanced picture of how the art market is evolving in 2025, particularly in the relationship between galleries and collectors. A few key themes stood out.

Online sales are becoming increasingly central: 43 percent of galleries said they plan to focus more on online sales, and over half are investing in digital content and social media strategies. That shift is driven in part by economic pressures—75 percent of galleries cited economic uncertainty as a major challenge—but it’s also a reflection of where collectors are. Among collectors under 37, online platforms are already a key space for discovery and purchases: 71 percent of them bought art online in 2024.

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Transparency is still a major sticking point: 69 percent of collectors said they’ve hesitated to buy art due to a lack of transparency, especially around pricing and provenance. Most galleries recognize this: 62 percent said transparency is very important to their collectors. Despite this, fewer than half display prices on all available works, and a majority didn’t take steps to improve transparency in the past year. From Artsy’s own data, we know that listings with visible prices are about six times more likely to sell.

Emerging artists are a shared priority: 72 percent of collectors said they’re drawn to emerging artists, often pointing to accessible pricing and the excitement of discovering new talent. That aligns with gallery priorities as well: 51 percent said emerging artists are most important to their business, not just for sales but also for building long-term relationships with collectors.

The authoritative model for this kind of report is the one produced by Dr. Clare McAndrew for Art Basel and UBS. What made Artsy want to create its own?

Artsy has been publishing data- and survey-driven reports focused on the art market for more than five years. In previous years, we released separate reports looking at galleries’ and collectors’ behaviors and trends. But over time, it became clear that the more meaningful opportunity was to bring those perspectives together, placing them in direct dialogue, as we have in this new Art Market Trends report.

Given Artsy’s position at the intersection of gallery sales and online collecting, we’re uniquely positioned to surface what’s shaping the art market—what’s driving purchases, where the friction points are and how both parties are changing and adapting. This year’s report highlighted the key topics affecting both galleries and collectors and, importantly, offered a view into how the market is operating now.

There is an emphasis on collectors here rather than galleries or auction houses. How did you find your collectors?

We conducted a survey of Artsy users and received responses from over 1,200 collectors across more than 60 countries.

Could you tell me a little bit about your methodology? How did you arrive at this data?

The report is informed by two concurrent surveys we ran between February and March 2025: one for galleries and one for collectors. We received responses from 384 galleries and 1,236 collectors, with participants from over 60 countries in each group. The collectors came from Artsy’s user base, and the gallery group included both Artsy partners and non-partners.

The surveys were structured around the same core themes—things like pricing, sales performance and artist categories—tailored to each audience. From there, we collated the data and compared responses across the two groups to surface points of alignment and tension.

The term “transparency” is a key one in your report. How do you define transparency in an art world context?

We define transparency as access to clear, consistent information and context around artworks—including pricing, provenance, availability and details about the artist and their work—whether that’s online or in person. In practice, that means displaying or sharing prices up front, offering artist bios, artwork descriptions and exhibition histories, and giving collectors the tools they need to make confident, informed decisions. It’s also about demystifying the process of buying art and creating a more welcoming environment.

Obviously, the art market is in a slump right now. How was that reflected in your findings?

It was evident in the responses to various questions we asked. For example, 75 percent of galleries identified economic uncertainty as one of their top challenges. On the collector side, 30 percent said they were buying more selectively, and just 7 percent reported purchasing more art in 2024 than the previous year.
There’s broad recognition that collector behavior is shifting—people are more price-conscious, and many are placing a premium on transparency and trust over speculation or hype. In response, galleries are recalibrating: putting more emphasis on digital outreach, creating engaging content and focusing on emerging artists as a way to connect with today’s collectors.

How should galleries orient themselves based on your findings? Do they need to do fewer fairs? More fairs, if that’s possible?

The data suggests that fairs are no longer a one-size-fits-all solution. While they remain valuable—particularly for relationship-building and visibility—only 39 percent of collectors said fairs were “somewhat important” to their buying journey, and 29 percent said they’re “not very important.”
What galleries need is a strategy that balances in-person events with strong digital outreach and engagement. That could mean investing in content, social media and online marketplaces to expand their reach, especially internationally.

Rather than focusing on doing more or fewer fairs, the question becomes how to approach them more strategically. Which fairs connect with their target audience? Can the in-person experience be extended through digital campaigns or follow-up content? The goal is to meet collectors where they are—and increasingly, that’s online.