Opera Gallery Group chief paints rosy picture of global art market's future

Gilles Dyan, founder and chairman of the Opera Gallery Group, a global network of 15 galleries that specialize in the works of modern and contemporary artists / Courtesy of Opera Gallery

'Evolving art market to draw both classical and digital-savvy collectors': Gilles Dyan

By Park Han-sol

Describing himself as "an art-loving entrepreneur with a global vision," Gilles Dyan, Opera Gallery Group's founder and chairman, remains optimistic about the future of the international art market, despite the current uncertainties surrounding the economy.

"I think the art market around the world has especially evolved a lot in 2021 and 2022. You see many more people, collectors and investors who are looking to enter the market, as art is being [more widely] recognized as an asset class ― like stocks and gold," Dyan said during his recent meeting with the press at the Opera Gallery Seoul in Gangnam District.

Founded in 1994 in Singapore and Paris, the Opera Gallery Group has expanded into a global network of 15 galleries spanning Europe, Asia, North America and the Middle East that specialize in modern and contemporary art.

It opened its Seoul outpost back in 2007, belonging to the early generation of international galleries that have established a permanent space in Korea.

Dyan noted that the behavior of collectors has changed in a number of ways since the COVID-19 pandemic ― particularly witnessed by the growth of online purchases following the shutdown of brick-and-mortar galleries.

"In 2021, major auction houses made a turnover of 18 billion dollars solely with the online business ― a huge figure, indeed," he said.

The Opera Gallery, which was forced to close 13 of its 15 outposts worldwide overnight at the onset of the pandemic, had to experiment with new forms of B2C transactions as well through its online viewing rooms and WhatsApp communication with customers.

The Opera Gallery Seoul in Gangnam District / Courtesy of Opera Gallery

Such a web-focused expansion of the market ― coupled with increased opportunities for different types of investment ― has also led to an influx of digital-savvy millennial art collectors, not just in Korea but around the world, according to the chairman.

"In addition to direct investment, where you buy a painting from a gallery, there are now companies that offer services in fractional ownership of art, where multiple people can invest in a single work and claim they own shares of a Pablo Picasso or a Jean-Michel Basquiat," he explained, adding that this model will gradually rise to form an important part of the "tertiary market."

The emergence of non-fungible tokens (NFT) last year has also revolutionized the art world.

While noting that these cryptographic assets offer the potential for abuse and sometimes, unsubstantiated hype ― "works of an artist, who came out of nowhere, suddenly fetching thousands and millions of dollars," he said, referring to cases like the historic $69.3 million sale of Beeple's NFT in March last year ― Dyan nevertheless predicts the market to experience significant growth in the near future, but with real, existing artists from galleries.

The NFT art market up until now has essentially been for collectors solely focused on crypto assets themselves, he argued. But once the market opens up to traditional galleries presenting NFTs of existing contemporary artists, this will, in turn, attract classical collectors as well, he said.

"I imagine that the NFT market is going to be on a meteoric rise in the next 10 years and can account for at least 10 percent of the global art market thanks to the rise of the metaverse and such. That's my vision," the chairman added.

Installation view of Korean artist Kim Hee-kyung's solo exhibition, "Variations for the Wavelengths of Life," held at the Opera Gallery Seoul from Sept. 15 to 30 / Courtesy of Opera Gallery

Armed with confidence in the growth of the international art market, the Opera Gallery chairman unveiled his ambitious plan to open three more locations next year in Madrid, Dubai and Palm Beach, Florida.

The gallery, with a focus on showcasing rising creators worldwide alongside masters of Impressionism, postwar modern and contemporary art, will also continue to discover and highlight Korean artists within and outside of its Seoul outpost.

It has previously hosted solo exhibitions in Dubai and New York of Cho Sung-hee, who has worked with multihued "hanji" (Korean paper made from the bark of mulberry trees) collages to summon memories from her childhood imbued with a traditional Korean sensibility. Chun Kwang-young, whose monumental installations are made up of thousands of triangular-shaped mulberry paper parcels, was previously featured at the gallery as well.

The Opera Gallery is scheduled to showcase abroad another hanji creator, Kim Hee-kyung, in the near future. Around 30 of her striking pieces, which seem to sit somewhere between paintings and sculptures, were presented at the Seoul branch at the exhibition, "Variations for the Wavelengths of Life," in September.