How Data, Imagination, and Perseverance Revolutionized the Art Market

How Data, magina-tion, and Perseverance Revolutionized the Art Market

The Story of artnet® Hans Neuendorf interviewed by Andrew Goldstein

It's impossible to talk about the evolution of the art business into a global industry without understanding the role played by artnet. Founded in 1989 as a database of art prices— a groundbreaking innovation in a marketplace long defined by obscurantism and information asymmetry — artnet was the first art business to go online; its news
platform, artnet Magazine, became the second-ever online publication (after Slate); its gallery network served as many galleries' first online presence; and its auction platform, artnet Auctions, led the way for legacy auction houses to enter the digital era. With its emphasis on transparency and efficiency, artnet did much to create the conditions for the headlong modernization of the art market. And it never would have happened if not for the stubborn, quixotic, and deeply idealistic vision of artnet's founder, Hans Neuendorf.
In starting artnet, Neuendorf overcame an unceasing parade of crises and challenges, keeping the company going by selling artworks to fund operations and maintaining a con-viction— he might call it naiveté — that success was always right around the corner.
Andrew Goldstein
artnet News Editor-in-Chief