Many members of the commercial art world have used the pandemic as a clarion call to their employers, demanding an overhaul of the pressure-cooker environments that take proliferated in the manufacture over the past two decades. But few gallerists have been willing to talk over the financials involved in becoming a gallerist.

Terminal month, Artnet News surveyed more than 300 art dealers about the economics of their operations: details on their salary ranges, responsibilities, demographics, and personal stories. What emerged from this information, which we collected anonymously, was a portrait of an manufacture beset with income inequality.

More than 100 respondents to the survey identified as gallery directors, the bulk of whom were making more than $100,000, with a few pinnacle earners reaching toward the millions. By comparison, those who identified as gallery assistants hit a ceiling of $35,000—about thirty percent less than what researchers from the Massachusetts Plant of Technology ascertain as a living wage in New York Land. Over a 40-hour week, the sum comes in nether $17 an 60 minutes.

People look at artworks during the preview of the 22nd edition of the Art Paris art fair at the Grand Palais in Paris, on September 9, 2020. Photo by Thomas Samson/AFP via Getty Images.

The preview of the 22nd edition of the Art Paris at the Grand Palais on September ix, 2020. Photo by Thomas Samson/AFP via Getty Images.

"I would never work at a gallery ever once again," said one source who has held various roles including gallery intern, assistant, registrar, director, and owner over the form of viii years.

This person said that while owning their own gallery meant "no limit" to the amount of hours they worked, existence employed at other galleries was hardly preferable, since it typically involved putting in over forty hours per week without benefits similar health insurance, paid overtime, or bonuses.

Such accounts are representative of responses to our survey, which came from 28 countries.Simply a minority of gallerists said that their employer provided overtime pay (13 percent) or  bonus (xxx pct). Benefits like maternity exit (37 percent) and family leave (26 percent) were as well rare.

And as smaller galleries get squeezed by oversize competitors like Gagosian, David Zwirner, and Pace, dealers notice themselves pouring more than money straight into their businesses.

"Small galleries don't really have budgets to hire total-time employees because we, as the gallery owners, are often unpaid ourselves for years and years," said Allegra LaViola, owner and director of New York gallery Sargent's Daughters. "Everything nosotros brand just goes straight back into the gallery, then information technology's kind of incommunicable to hire people at the level we would want to, until nosotros get a trivial bigger."

During the economic doldrums of the pandemic, some gallerists reported relying on credit menu debt and cost-cutting measures to go through the market's dip. Aslope widespread layoffs and furloughs, more than than a 5th of survey respondents said that they received pay cuts of twenty pct or more.

Over the past year, some arts workers accept flocked to social media accounts like @cancelartgalleries to publish bearding allegations of racism and sexism, demonstrating how a lack of diverseness in the commercial fine art earth may exist impacting the workplace. In their wake, big dealerships such equally David Zwirner and Footstep take promised substantive changes to diversity protocols and the retentiveness of employees of colour.

Scott Reeder, Unfair, 2015. Courtesy the artist and Kavi Gupta, Chicago.

Scott Reeder, Unfair, 2015. Courtesy the artist and Kavi Gupta, Chicago.

Our numbers indicate that in that location is quite a long way to get. Of the 288 respondents who identified their race in our survey, 85 percent identified every bit white. That ratio increased when looking at executive-level employees, of which almost 93 percent identified as white. (This information correlates to what we hear from professional person organizations in the industry. For example, the Art Dealers Clan of America has nearly 180 members; only three are Black-endemic galleries.)

Data from the survey also signified a wage gap between men and women in executive positions. The average salary for executives who identified every bit female was only shy of $eighty,000, while men reported pay that was 30 percent higher, at $110,000. There was not enough information to sufficiently analyze the disparity in salaries betwixt white and nonwhite dealers.

Despite these bracing figures, some dealers are coming out of the pandemic optimistic. Los Angeles gallery owner David De Boer thinks gallerists may feel emboldened to classify resources differently later a year spent saving money on art fairs and travel.

Working anywhere between 40 and 80 hours a week, De Boer said he tries to reinvest 100 percent of his proceeds dorsum into the gallery, relying on advisory work for additional income. He has one director on staff who he has promoted to equity partner; the manager receives an agreed-upon percentage of gallery profits that will increment as the concern grows.

"I desire him to exist 100 percent invested in what we're doing," De Boer said. "I call up that's a ameliorate mode for galleries to operate."

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