Eye of the Collector, a boutique art fair that was due to hold its fifth edition in London in June, has been “put on pause” due to “changing collector demographics, market dynamics and rising costs”, says its founder Nazy Vassegh.

“There’s a new world order, the economic landscape is massively changing worldwide and that impacts all of us,” she says, adding that rising costs have become prohibitive. “Everything has gone up: event costs, insurance, shipping, staff costs.”

Vassegh, who is also an experienced art adviser and was formerly the chief executive of London’s Masterpiece art fair, says she hopes to make a comeback in the UK capital but thinks the next few months “will be really critical”. She notes that “London has always proved its resilience as a great city”, but doing business in the city, especially for overseas galleries, “has become significantly more complicated and more expensive in recent years, and this coincides with many collectors choosing to spend time elsewhere”. The fallout from Brexit and the abolition of the “non-dom” tax regime have threatened to crush the British art market, according to trade bodies.

Eye of the Collector was launched in 2020 as a “next generation art fair alternative” but was forced to hold its first edition online due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It was one of the first art world events to be hosted in the UK when restrictions on gatherings lifted in September 2021.

For three successful editions the fair was held at Two Temple Place, a Gothic Revival mansion on the Thames; last year it moved to the Grade II-listed Garrison Chapel at the Chelsea Barracks. In both locations, Eye of the Collector strived to offer a different experience for collectors, doing away with the booths and aisles of traditional art fairs and inviting dealers to exhibit art and design as if in a domestic setting. “We have never called ourselves a fair, we operate a very different business model,” Vassegh points out.

The number of participating dealers has also been relatively small, ranging from between 18 to 25 over the past four years. Last year, there was a greater emphasis on international art, with galleries from Europe, the Middle East and Asia joining for the first time. However, in recent months dealers around the world have been increasingly vocal about the profitability of doing art fairs in general. Vassegh says her exhibitor fees have “gone up roughly in line with inflation each year”.

The cut off for gallery submissions for the June event was due next month, and “quite a few” had already signed up, Vassegh says. “Although we have incurred a number of costs to date, and our terms stipulate that the deposit is non-refundable, we will pay back all monies paid to us by our exhibitors,” she adds.

Corporate sponsorship has been another challenge to income. Despite visitor figures growing steadily over the past four years, going from 2,000 in 2021 to 4,250 last year, Vassegh says sponsors often look for bigger numbers—an anomaly for an event such as hers. “We don’t actively promote ticket sales to get tens of thousands of people coming through our doors, because we have taken place in significant architectural buildings that we have had to respect and control numbers in,” she says. “When I was at Masterpiece, we were always increasing our visitor numbers. That was a goal that we had, and that appealed to our headline sponsor at the time.”

Even with as many as 40,000 visitors, Masterpiece was forced to close in 2023 alongside the summer Olympia Art & Antiques Fair over the fallout of Brexit and rising costs. They are among several high-profile casualties in the global art fair scene over the past two years. A Hong Kong edition of Photofairs, due to take place this month, was cancelled by its organisers Creo, citing “logistical constraints”. Elsewhere, the India Art Fair in New Delhi has walked back plans to open in Mumbai next year due to another existing fair in the city, Art Mumbai, commanding the loyalty of potential exhibitors. At the same time, new, often more locally focused fairs are launching in cities around the world including in Houston, Paris and Los Angeles.

Vassegh notes how Eye of the Collector was among the first to offer a more boutique experience—“we did bring something new to the market,” she says. And sales were not insignificant, too. The most expensive picture sold at the fair fetched £325,000 and the most expensive design piece came in at £128,000, while more than 130 works were made specially for the event and unveiled at the fair. “For the last two editions, we’ve managed to have an equal share of male and female artists, so we’ve always tried to think about what is relevant,” Vassegh adds.

Though the next few months will prove critical, Vassegh says there may be an opportunity to expand abroad. “If we can get the funding in place, I would like to look internationally, but it would be in addition to London,” she says. “I am sure London will fight back, which is why I see this as a pause to reassess and rethink.”