Frieze London's First Day: $11 Million at Hauser & Wirth

Hauser & Wirth sold more than 20 works for over $11 million by the end of Frieze London's first day on Wednesday. The haul spanned a 1607–8 Jan Brueghel the Elder at Frieze Masters to a 2026 Avery Singer painting. The fair, in Regent's Park, opened its VIP preview with Andrew Garfield, Monica Barbaro, Tilda Swinton, Bianca Jagger and Raf Simons in the crowd.

"I like everything about London," Simons, Prada's Belgium-based co-creative director and a longtime art collector, told ARTnews. "Especially its people."

By Daniel Okafor

The evening before, Damian Lewis surveyed the big canvases at Thaddaeus Ropac's Georg Baselitz opening. Serpentine artistic director Hans Ulrich Obrist studied a Turner-inspired Rirkrit Tiravanija seascape at Pilar Corrias. The city showed well, even if some collectors skipped it for Paris, where Art Basel opens next week.

A caveat before the numbers. Fair sales are self-reported by galleries and overall data stays private, so the market's health is anyone's guess. What follows is what dealers said moved.

What sold on day one?

Hauser & Wirth sold most of its booth by noon despite being relegated to the back of the tent, where mega-galleries now sit so smaller dealers get the entrance. Two Francis Picabia paintings went: an untitled 1940s work for €1.1 million and Transparence, visage de femme (1928–29) for six figures.

"There's been tremendous energy here this morning," partner Zoe Sperling told ARTnews. "One of the things we're really seeing is the interest from historic collectors that were maybe once more interested in traditional works and are now looking at contemporary works to complement their collections." She noted "a lot of American and Asian collectors."

The day's Hauser & Wirth prices:

• Avery Singer, Solver (v.3) (2026) — $800,000
• George Condo, Figure Composition (2026) — $600,000
• Lee Bul, Perdu—Silhouette VII (2026) — $290,000
• Christina Kimeze, Game on (crane's cut) (2026) — $195,000

At Frieze Masters, Brueghel's Still Life of Flowers in a Stoneware Vase (1607–8) fetched around £5 million (about $6.58 million). "It's one of the most important works we've ever been involved with," gallery president Iwan Wirth told ARTnews. "The painting, made in the 17th century, stands as an exemplar of the kind of genius that contemporary artists look to in their own practice."

Who else posted numbers?

David Zwirner moved 13 works for $4.55 million. Michaël Borremans led at $1.5 million, followed by Dana Schutz at $900,000, Lisa Yuskavage at $450,000, Sasha Gordon at $400,000 and Portia Zvavahera at $300,000. The Gordon went to an unnamed European museum. "Frieze London is still bringing people in, and it's not just local collectors," said James Green, associate partner and head of Zwirner's London gallery.

White Cube, hanging Ilana Savdie sketches on an experimental metal frame, recorded $1.55 million. Savdie's The Great Compromise (2026) sold for $175,000 and Conspiracy of the Barons (2026) for $165,000. "The history of a place like this [London] is really hard to ignore," Savdie told ARTnews.

Other reported results:

• Lehmann Maupin: 10-plus works, including McArthur Binion's dna:sketch (2024) for $150,000
• Perrotin: Izomi Kato solo booth sold up to $250,000 per work; an Alma Allen sculpture went for $60,000
• Xavier Hufkens: 16-plus pieces, topped by a Richard Serra work on paper at $750,000
• Edel Assanti: two Thornton Dial paintings, $160,000–$230,000
• Pace: most of its Marina Perez Simão paintings, priced up to $250,000, gone by 3 p.m.

Pace CEO Marc Glimcher stressed the age spread. "We had a lot of older collectors buy works today, someone in their 70s and a very young collector in their 20s," he said. One fair, two generations, same receipts.

Thaddaeus Ropac nearly sold out next door, helped by Leoncillo Leonardi (1915–68), the Italian sculptor long revered at home and little known elsewhere, whom Ropac began representing in June. Top prices: Martha Jungwirth's Untitled (Berggasse 19) at €560,000, Antony Gormley's Aside (2025) at £500,000, Adrian Ghenie's Untitled (2026) at €380,000.

What are collectors actually buying?

Tunisian collector Selim Bouafsoun, based in Dubai, spent across the price spectrum: Tamo Jugeli's Swan in Lake (2026) from Bukia Vakhania for $40,000, Jonathan Okoronkwo's Wilderness Be the Anthem Rydee (2026) from Emalin for €20,000, and Jacob Littlejohn's Over the Rills, the Crags, and the Hills (2025) from Karma for $8,000. Belgian collector Alain Servais bought Ella Fleck's Training Material (2026) from LA's Ehrlich Steinberg for £14,000 ($18,500).

At Frieze Masters, Robilant sold a Michelangelo Pistoletto mirror for €45,000 ($59,300) and two Lucio Fontana ceramics, Bullfight at €125,000 ($164,900) and Concetto Spaziale at €250,000 ($329,700). "We have all seen the renewed interest in Old Masters as the pendulum swings from speculative to secure," gallery director Michele di Robilant told ARTnews. "Clients are certainly finding their feet again at the top end. There is light at the end of the tunnel."

Did the younger galleries benefit?

Yes, and some visibly. Amsterdam's Diez Gallery sold Jessica Wilson's video installation Sweet Nothing (2025–26) to the Centraal Museum in Utrecht for more than €20,000. "Last Frieze London for me was a very bad one, and since then, the gallery has been doing its best year in terms of finances and new collections," dealer Diego Diez told ARTnews.

Gabriella Price of Heidi gallery moved her business from Berlin to London this year to "pursue fresh opportunities." Adam D. Miller of LA's The Pit sold two thirds of his Bella Foster solo booth. "We want to develop more, particularly with European and UK institutions," he said. At Frieze Masters, Andrew Edlin placed a 1990s Beverly Buchanan work, whose art is in the Venice Biennale, with an unnamed museum board president for $65,000–$125,000.

Sadie Coles, who runs her eponymous London gallery, credited geography: "It is helped by its proximity to Art Basel Paris, as many international collectors and museums are coming first to London and then go on to Paris. Two very different birds with one stone."

Whether the momentum holds past the VIP day is the real test. With Art Basel Paris opening next week, London's sales figures will soon have a rival set of self-reported numbers to answer.