Confidence is returning to the contemporary art market, but confidence and a durable recovery are not interchangeable. ArtTactic’s latest survey offers grounds for believing that conditions have improved, while also showing why the improvement should not be treated as a verdict on the entire trade. With New York’s major auctions, the inaugural Frieze Abu Dhabi and Art Collaboration Kyoto ahead in November 2026, the question is whether stronger sentiment will be supported by business beyond the market’s most expensive works.

The September edition of ArtTactic’s Contemporary Art Market Confidence Report puts its overall indicator at 56, compared with 43 in March 2026. On its scale from zero to 100, that represents a move from mild pessimism to mild optimism. This is only the third positive reading in more than four years. Yet 60% of respondents expect sales to remain unchanged over the six months following the September survey. Taken together, those findings suggest expectations of consolidation rather than a rapidly accelerating expansion.

The report provides a structured measure of attitudes in a trade where feelings can be easier to describe than to quantify. Conducted twice a year, it asks collectors, advisers, auction-house professionals and other participants for positive, negative or neutral assessments of the art market and the wider US and European economies. ArtTactic converts those responses into scores. Its value lies in bringing different participants’ judgments into a common framework; its limitation is that an assessment of confidence is not itself a measure of completed sales.

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The historical record supplies the strongest reason for restraint. The indicator reached 75 in February 2022 before falling to 42 that July. In January 2025, it stood at 54, only to drop to 30 six months later. Neither episode proves that the latest improvement will fail. Both demonstrate, however, that a positive reading can be temporary. The useful comparison is therefore not simply whether September looks better than March, but whether the reasons for that improvement are more dependable than those supporting earlier rebounds.

Anders Petterson, ArtTactic’s founder and chief executive, argues that they are. He distinguishes the current improvement, which he links to recovering sales, from the expectations surrounding Donald Trump’s return to the White House. In January 2025, 39% of respondents anticipated economic policies that would help the art market. Petterson attributes the subsequent loss of confidence to tariffs and the uncertainty they created. His case is that observable trading improvement offers a firmer foundation than optimism about policies that had yet to materialise.

That argument deserves weight without being mistaken for proof of lasting growth. Petterson interprets the widespread expectation of unchanged sales as suggesting stability rather than deterioration. In a market registering only modest overall optimism, maintaining activity could indeed be a constructive outcome. But the same responses also limit the bullish interpretation: most respondents were not forecasting rising sales over the six months following the September survey. The survey supports the proposition that conditions feel more secure more clearly than it supports the prospect of substantial further gains.

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The division between selling channels makes the picture more complicated. Auction-market confidence climbed to 78 from 69 in March, while primary-market confidence increased to 51 from 45. Petterson says the auction recovery remains focused on works priced above $1m, with the likely benefits concentrated among galleries and artists at the upper end. He is less certain about whether, and how quickly, confidence might extend to those selling at lower prices. Strong auction results and a much more hesitant primary market can therefore coexist without contradiction.

American adviser Adam Green offers a complementary, more price-sensitive perspective on the difference between selling channels. Ahead of Frieze week, he described clients moving away from dealers selling new works because prices remained unappealingly high. Auction houses and private resellers, in his assessment, can offer purchases at levels more consistent with fair market value. This does not refute Petterson’s account of recovering sales. It raises a different question: whether stronger activity in one channel partly reflects buyers changing where they purchase, rather than a recovery benefiting sellers generally.

Green nevertheless believes the recovery is extending somewhat, while cautioning that its breadth may not become apparent until the end of the year. His position and Petterson’s are less a disagreement over whether conditions have improved than a difference in emphasis over what that improvement establishes. Petterson stresses the firmer basis for confidence; Green draws attention to pricing and the uneven distribution of demand. Together, their assessments argue against treating either buoyant auctions or subdued gallery sentiment as a sufficient description of the whole market.

The forthcoming auctions and fairs will provide opportunities to assess how these expectations align with trading. The relevant questions extend beyond whether prominent works sell well: whether strength reaches lower-priced art, whether primary-market pricing attracts buyers, and whether the anticipated stability persists. ArtTactic has documented a meaningful improvement in sentiment, not settled those questions. Previous reversals justify caution, while Petterson’s distinction between policy hopes and sales recovery gives the latest reading substance. The evidence supports neither dismissing the improvement nor declaring the market’s difficulties resolved.