Art and Design Market Report 

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Measuring the market for art and design producers using quantitative methods sourced from government data and statistics for a comprehensive understanding of these sectors. 

About

​Art markets are notoriously difficult to measure, not least because their primary actors, art dealers, remain reluctant to share information about their business activity. Furthermore, art markets function by prioritizing privileged information, which necessarily produces obscurity regarding reliable economic data. 
 
In order to address those limitations to acquiring data on the market, our team began examining alternative sources, particularly looking to US-government produced statistics in order to construct models. In 2019 our team received a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Research: Art Works grant in 2019 to study the US Art & Design Market. Drawing upon our earlier reports on the state of Colorado, the report defines the art and design market as the commercial exchange of ownership in art and design products, the products further subdivided into the disciplines of Fine Art (painting, graphics, drawing, sculpture); Applied Art (jewelry, furniture, ceramics, textiles, i.e. objects that are both beautiful and simultaneously serve a function); and Commercial Art (graphic design and commercial photography, which have the express intention of promoting the consumption of another economic product). 

Methodology 
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The methodology employed differs from other reports, for example the Global Art Market report produced by Art Economics, in that it primarily draws from data derived from US government sources for all 50 states and DC. The approach allows for the market to be studied from a supply study perspective, considering it from the standpoint of the producer. The ultimate intention of our reports is to give better understanding as to how much employment and how much income can art and design professions and industries generate.

Data Sources

​Our reports include both sectors of the art market distinguished as the primary art market and secondary art sarket, as well as the secondary market in applied arts, which covers antiques and auctions. The market, being largely composed of for-profit micro enterprises, often sole-proprietorship or simply self-employed individuals, poses many challenges to being studied systematically. These many small-scale actors of the market have no public disclosure obligations like the nonprofit sector nor much interest in doing so. The market thrives on opacity, and so, if surveyed about their economic activity, an art dealer might be unwilling to provide accurate data. Therefore, a research project such as this only became possible when the Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF) created the data service CVSuite. This data makes use of labor statistics, tax data, and other economic data organized by occupation and industry which is modeled by EMSI, which allow us to define those actors and entities that make up the market. 

The scope of reporting
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For our studies, we select the occupations within US as the actors of the art market. They are included with their Standard Occupational Classification System (SOC) code. As such the report covers curators, art directors, craft artists, fine artists, fashion, graphic and interior designers, photographers, jewelers, engravers or art dealers. Regarding the studied industries, we have selected those meeting the criteria of entities involved in the art market as noted by their North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code. Those include pottery, ceramics, glass and glassware manufacturing, ornamental and architectural metal work manufacturing, jewelry stores, commercial photography, independent artist writers and performers, among others.