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Following a brief flurry of midday browsers, the Chippendale mahogany bureau, the carved giltwood mirror and the fine porcelain figurines at Lenox Court Antiques have settled into a graceful repose.
But the elegant serenity of this treasure-filled shop on Lexington Avenue belies the spiraling frenzy of today's art and antique markets. With combined sales last year approaching $5 billion, the world's two largest auction houses -- Sotheby's and Christie's -- are torching the feverish art scene.
Particularly heated is the secondary, or old masters, market. The past 10 years have seen auction houses shift from their origins as wholesale outlets supplying dealers to savvy retailers serving the general public. In the process, they've cornered much of the explosive demand created by foreign investors and people who have made it big in the stock market and in real estate in the 1980s.
Now, the city's thousands of antique and art dealers are responding by organizing joint exhibits and reaching out more to the public. Although they vilify the auction houses for making art just another highly marketable commodity, they seek to boost their promotional efforts.
This past fall, for instance, the National Antique & Art Dealers Association of America helped stage the first annual International Antique Dealers Show at the Seventh Regiment Armory on Park Avenue. The International Show, which drew 84 exhibitors, and more than half a dozen other antique shows have recently sprouted up around the city.
Likewise, the Art Dealers Association of America sponsored its first annual group exhibition last winter at the Park Avenue Armory, after much...