With art auctions booming in South Korea, auctioneers are increasingly a crucial factor in boosting sales at such events.

“Auctioneers play a key role in setting market prices during art auctions,” Kim Hyun-hee, an experienced auctioneer for Seoul Auction, said in an interview with The Korea Herald.

“They need extensive understanding and knowledge of art to induce participants to compete for the best prices,” she said.

Kim, who studied history in college and art history in graduate school, started her career as an auctioneer at the nation’s largest auction firm in 2005. 

“It was exciting to see how art was traded in the market and how prices were formed through competition. For me, art used to be just objects to appreciate,” she recalled.

Kim is currently one of the top auctioneers in Korea, but she struggled as a rookie.

Back in 2005, when she conducted an auction for a landscape drawing, the price unexpectedly jumped as competition grew fierce. She made mistakes in calling out the prices and she remembers feeling flustered.

“Fortunately, the participants noticed that I was a rookie auctioneer and gave warm applause every time I made a mistake or stumbled,” she said. “It was quite scary, but that experience made me sharpen my skills to become a professional.”

Kim said a good auctioneer should not only conduct an auction but should also take part in the preparation of the art collection for the event.

“In order to confidently sell art, you should have full understanding and knowledge of the works,” she said.

This is crucial as an auctioneer can make a difference in the amount that an artwork is sold for.

Kim recalled when she sold an art piece called “Moon Night” by Kim Whan-ki, a world famous Korean abstract artist.

Although the work was not familiar to many at the auction, she noticed the hidden value of the abstract painting, which expressed the artist’s loneliness and sadness. It was assumed to have been made during the Korean War.

“I thought he must have felt lonely and wanted to go to his hometown while looking at the moon. The two boats floating on the sea also seemed to portray his longing to go to his hometown,” she said.

By describing the art piece in this way, the painting ended up being sold at 230 million won ($199,000) from its initial biding price of 120 million won.

By Shin Ji-hye
(shinjh@heraldcorp.com)