[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Dominique-Levy-Brett-Gorvy-and-Amalia-Dayan_Courtesy-of-Levy-Gorvy-Dayan-by-Alexei-Hay-.png?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tL\u00e9vy Gorvy Dayan is rolling out a new way to sell high-value art, though gallery cofounder Brett Gorvy is quick to lower the temperature on the idea. The gallery\u2019s new platform, LGD Hammer, isn\u2019t meant to remake the market. \u201cWe aren\u2019t inventing a new paradigm, but it\u00a0is<\/em>\u00a0a development,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \n\tThe platform, he said is informed by recent changed in the market. Private sales have slowed. Collectors want time to look, think, and negotiate. Deals stretch out. \u201cThere\u2019s no urgency,\u201d Gorvy said. Even strong works can sit while buyers circle.<\/p>\n \n\tAuctions still do the opposite. They create a moment: you either show up and bid, or you don\u2019t. That pressure matters more right now because the market has spent the past couple of years resetting. Auction houses have leaned on lower estimates to get works moving, and the results have been solid. Strong sell-through rates and a run of clean sales have pulled sellers back toward competition.<\/p>\n \n\tNow, LGD Hammer wants to bring that pressure into a gallery setting. Instead of sending a work into a packed evening sale, the gallery will offer one painting at a set time to a smaller group of buyers. Dominique L\u00e9vy, a cofounder of the New York\u2013based gallery, will serve as auctioneer, drawing on her years at Christie\u2019s to run the sale.<\/p>\n \n\tThe first work up is Willem de Kooning\u2019s\u00a0Milkmaid<\/em>\u00a0(1984), carrying an estimate of $10 million to $15 million. The choice says a lot about where the market is, since collectors have drifted back to artists with long track records and deep institutional support. De Kooning fits that bill, Gorvy said, and his market has held up across multiple regions, with steady demand from Asia. The price range matters too, since works in the $10 million\u2013$20 million band are still moving.<\/p>\n \n\tThe work will be presented more like an exhibition than a lot in a sale. Milkmaid<\/em> will be on view in a stand-alone presentation at the gallery\u2019s Upper East Side space, but only by appointment from May 2 through the sale on May 16.\u00a0\u201cWe\u2019re not in 2021, when people were buying things unseen,\u201d Gorvy said.<\/p>\n \n\tThe sale itself will take place on May 16, with bidding conducted by phone while participants follow along online, watching both the L\u00e9vy and the de Kooning in real time. Bidders, of course, will remain anonymous.<\/p>\n \n\tGorvy was careful not to frame the platform as a direct response to platforms like Fair Warning, which also offers one work for bidding at a time. LGD Hammer is built around the slower experience of seeing a work in a gallery, Gorvy said, with context and time to consider it, before the pressure of bidding sets in.<\/p>\n \n\tBuyers, for their part, are more careful than they were a few years ago. They want to see the work in person, and they want context. They want to feel comfortable with the number. But they still respond to competition, which is one thing LGD Hammer is hoping to tap.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/market\/levy-gorvy-dayan-new-lgd-hammer-sales-platform-1234783638\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Dominique-Levy-Brett-Gorvy-and-Amalia-Dayan_Courtesy-of-Levy-Gorvy-Dayan-by-Alexei-Hay-.png?w=1024″] L\u00e9vy Gorvy Dayan is rolling out a new way to sell high-value art, though gallery cofounder Brett Gorvy is quick to lower the temperature on the idea. The gallery\u2019s new platform, LGD Hammer, isn\u2019t meant to remake the market. \u201cWe aren\u2019t inventing a new paradigm, but it\u00a0is\u00a0a development,\u201d he said. The platform, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-1914722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1914722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1914722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1914722\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1914722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1914722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1914722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}