Summer is usually a time of shakeups in the job market, with people coming and going and workplaces making adjustments before the end of the fiscal year. In 2024, amid market uncertainty and a significant slowdown compared to the pandemic period, big galleries are following the larger market and rethinking and resizing their teams at different levels ahead of the fall season.
Last week, three senior directors departed from Pace, one of the most prominent galleries in the world. Gary Waterston, now-former vice president of global sales and operations, left the gallery just six months after his appointment in the new position. His departure, according to what has been shared with the media, was driven by his decision to remain in London, which eventually conflicted with his ability to effectively work alongside the leadership in New York. The gallery confirmed that they parted away with Weston “through a mutual and amicable decision.” While director at Gagosian, Waterson oversaw the gallery’s expansion to its Britannia Street and Grosvenor Hill locations and then transitioned to become managing director for Europe in 2011. In 2020, Waterson left Gagosian for Atlantic Contemporary, LLC, an art world financial services startup. He has also worked as a private advisor to artists and foundations.
The gallery also lost Sarah Levine, executive vice president of global sales, though her departure wasn’t mutual. “As all businesses do, we regularly evaluate our priorities, which occasionally necessitates staffing changes—including making new hires as well as identifying redundant roles,” a Pace spokesperson told ARTnews. They added that the layoff ensured the gallery could continue to deliver the results for which it is known. Levine joined the gallery last summer and was based in the New York offices. She’d previously worked as global director of marketing and communications at Lehmann Maupin and associate director of brand and assistant director at FITZ & CO.; at Pace, she was involved in strategy across the gallery’s communications, curatorial and artist management initiatives.
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Mark Beasley, a curatorial director, left the same week—also as part of Pace’s staffing changes. Beasley joined Pace to oversee Pace Live in September of 2019 when the project launched after serving as the curator of media and performance art at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. No news from the gallery was released upon his departure, and it’s unclear whether the experimental program will survive the departure of its curator. Observer reached out to the gallery but received no response.
From conversations we had in the summer months, many professionals in the art industry have lost their jobs or confessed to looking for new opportunities, particularly in the gallery sector. This comes amid a rise in gallery closures, and many other galleries are struggling with financial difficulties after recent investments in relocations and expansions that no longer align with a market that has significantly slowed down after the post-pandemic boom. Notably, David Zwirner recently finalized the reorganization of its digital team, which led to a significant downsizing of 3 percent of its entire workforce. Most of the employees let go were hired during the pandemic as part of the gallery’s investments in its online presence.
Auction houses are not faring much better. Last month, Sotheby’s made headlines with a significant round of layoffs, cutting a total of around 200 employees or roughly 10 percent of the auction house’s workforce across global offices but especially the London offices. This decision was justified as a broader restructuring effort aimed at adapting to current market conditions and improving operational efficiency. In June, The Art Newspaper reported that Christie’s was planning a similar round of cuts, though as of now, the auction house hasn’t publicly announced any large-scale layoffs, even given a significant drop in earnings for the first half of 2024, totaling $2.1 billion—a 22 percent drop from the same period in 2023.
“Resilience is the key word to characterize Christie’s results for the first half of the year,” the auction house wrote in a statement. “In a challenging macroeconomic environment, we have maintained or improved on all the other key metrics by which we measure our performance.”
