High-quality art that lives online is an exploding, and accessible, sector of the art market. Instagram is by far the most popular (and addictive) tool to research what’s happening—you have insider and backstage access to museums, galleries, and artists’ studios, and there’s no easier way of connecting to them than via the app’s messenger function.
The market’s leading digital tool, Artsy, boasts images of nearly one million artworks on their database, making art fairs, auctions, and galleries accessible to anyone, anytime, and their tools easy to search by cause (they host many nonprofit benefit auctions) or descriptive (color, price, medium). Meanwhile, traditional auction houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s have been keeping up by making their private sales available online as well.
Other sites to bookmark include Artspace, which offer artworks, limited-edition books and design objects; Saatchi Art and RiseArt that both give artists an opportunity to sell directly, and offers users a personal curator, an ability to follow artists, and, at Rise Art, an option to rent before buying; and the more fantastical Deviant Art trading manga, comics, and fan art.
If you want to go fully digital, Daata Editions commissions video, sound, poetry and web-specific works from such contemporary artists as Ed Fornieles, Keren Cytter, Casey Jane Ellison, Jacolby Satterwhite, Tracey Emin. Editions start at $100, and are presented on a new and native platform that roughly acts as iTunes for art.
Sedition also offers digital works to display on your tablet, desktop, or home screen. Using a Netflix-style subscription model, Sedition offers members 12 artworks a month to experience on a digital screen from artists as Shepard Fairey, Wim Wenders, Mat Collishaw, and, omnipotent Tracey Emin for $15 per month. Works can also be purchased and added to your permanent collection.
Image captions:
George Osodi, De money (Obuasi Chief), 2009. TAFETA. Courtesy of Artsy.net
Camille Henrot. Extinction on the Table for Parkett 97, 2015. Courtesy of Artspace
Daata-Editions.com/art landing page