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Tier M4 Moat — Three-Axis Intelligence

Three signals, one work

Provenance, reception, and market in a single view — with the relationships between them. Magnus shows price. Artsy shows ownership. Smartify shows context. Provenio shows all three, and tells you which axis moved first.

“The market caught up to the critics 24 months later. Here’s the data — three columns, one timeline, one work.”

Axis 01

Provenance

Custody chain — where the work has lived. Studios, galleries, collectors, institutions. The signal that ownership has shifted into canonical hands.

Axis 02

Reception

Critical phase — discovery, rise, canonization, reassessment. Reception phase changes are typically the leading indicator for the other two axes.

Axis 03

Market

Public sale record — venue, lot, hammer, vs. estimate. The lagging axis. Most platforms stop here; Provenio uses it to validate the other two.

MCP Tool Available

get_three_axis_view(artwork_id, include_insights?)

Returns provenance entries, reception phase changes, market lots, and cross-axis insights for any artwork in the Provenio KG. Powered by the same 81K-node graph that drives every other Provenio tool.

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Three works mapped from the Provenio KG. Provenance and reception entries are sourced from artwork and claim nodes; market entries include both lot-level results and clearly-labelled artist-level surrogates where a given lot is not directly traced.

El Anatsui

Earth's Skin(2007)

Peak market

$1.90M · Sotheby's New York 2020

01Provenance

Custody chain — studio → galleries → institutions.

  1. 1990

    Studio production (Nsukka)

    Artist studio

  2. 1995

  3. 2007

    Major installation at 52nd Venice Biennale

    Palazzo Fortuny, Venice

    Special award; Western critical breakthrough

  4. 2008

    Shown at Royal Academy of Arts

    Royal Academy, London

  5. 2010

    Acquired into permanent collection (related body)

    Metropolitan Museum of Art

  6. 2015

    Acquired into permanent collection

    Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)

    Signal of canonical institutional recognition

  7. 2020

  8. 2023

02Reception

Critical phase — discovery → rise → canonization.

  1. 1990

    Discovery

    Nsukka group / regional African discourse

    “Read primarily through a regional African-art lens.”

  2. 1995

  3. 2007

    Rise

    International critics — Venice Biennale rehabilitation

    “Repositioned from regional African art to global contemporary discourse.”

  4. 2008

  5. 2010

  6. 2015

    Canonization

    MoMA acquisition + Venice Golden Lion (Lifetime Achievement)

  7. 2020

  8. 2023

    Reassessment

    Decolonial scholarship — material politics re-read

03Market

Public sale record — venue, lot, hammer price.

  1. 1990

  2. 1995

    Pre-market

    —

    Pre-secondary-market era

  3. 2007

    $65k

    Sotheby's London

    Early secondary appearance (artist-level)

  4. 2008

  5. 2010

  6. 2015

    $980kvs est $700k

    Bonhams

    Africa Now sale (artist-level)

  7. 2020

    $1.90Mvs est $1.50M

    Sotheby's New York

    Contemporary evening (artist-level)

  8. 2023

Cross-axis insights

  • Inflection

    Venice 2007 (Reception: discovery → rise) precedes a ~15× artist-level market move within 8 years (2007 $65k → 2015 $980k).

  • Correlation

    Reception phase shift to canonization (MoMA 2015 + Venice Golden Lion 2015) coincides with the first $1M artist-level result the same year — a market response within months, not years.

  • Risk

    Most market figures are artist-level surrogates, not hammer prices for this exact work. Use as a reception-driven trend signal, not a lot-level estimate.

Njideka Akunyili Crosby

The Beautyful Ones(2012)

Peak market

$3.40M · Christie's New York 2017

01Provenance

Custody chain — studio → galleries → institutions.

  1. 2012

    Studio production (Los Angeles)

    Artist studio

  2. 2013

    First commercial gallery solo

    Victoria Miro, London

  3. 2015

    Featured in solo museum show

    Santa Barbara Museum of Art

    First major US institutional solo

  4. 2016

    Joined gallery roster

    David Zwirner

  5. 2017

  6. 2018

    Solo presentation

    Whitney Museum of American Art

  7. 2021

    LACMA solo — 'I Live, I Live'

    Los Angeles County Museum of Art

  8. 2022

  9. 2024

    Tate (Counterparts)

    Tate, London

02Reception

Critical phase — discovery → rise → canonization.

  1. 2012

  2. 2013

    Discovery

    Frieze, Artforum debut coverage

  3. 2015

    Rise

    Critical mass — SBMA solo + MacArthur 'Genius' (2017)

  4. 2016

  5. 2017

  6. 2018

    Canonization

    Whitney solo — institutional canonization

    “Establishes the Nigerian-American hybrid figuration as a museum-grade subject.”

  7. 2021

  8. 2022

  9. 2024

    Reassessment

    Tate — re-read in transnational figuration discourse

03Market

Public sale record — venue, lot, hammer price.

  1. 2012

  2. 2013

    $30k

    Primary (Victoria Miro)

    Gallery list price

  3. 2015

  4. 2016

    $900kvs est $250k

    Sotheby's New York

    First major secondary

  5. 2017

    $3.40Mvs est $1.50M

    Christie's New York

    'The Beautyful Ones' (record)

  6. 2018

  7. 2021

  8. 2022

    $2.70Mvs est $2.00M

    Christie's Hong Kong

    Evening sale (related work)

  9. 2024

Cross-axis insights

  • Inflection

    Whitney acquisition signals (2015 critical mass → 2018 canonization) lead the market by 24 months: gallery price $30k (2013) → $3.4M secondary (2017) is a ~113× move pre-Whitney solo.

  • Correlation

    Auction premium-to-estimate consistently >2× during the Rise phase (2016 $900k vs $250k high; 2017 $3.4M vs $1.5M high), then compresses post-canonization.

  • Risk

    Phase 'canonization' is anchored by Whitney 2018 — but if reception flips to 'reassessment' (Tate 2024 register), expect estimate-discipline returns, not new records.

Park Seo-bo

Écriture (描法) series

Peak market

$1.90M · Sotheby's Hong Kong 2018

01Provenance

Custody chain — studio → galleries → institutions.

  1. 1970

    Series initiated (early Écriture, pencil-on-hanji)

    Artist studio, Seoul

  2. 1973

    First gallery presentation

    Gallery Hyundai, Seoul

  3. 1975

  4. 2000

    Late Écriture (color phase) shown

    Hakgojae Gallery, Seoul

  5. 2010

  6. 2014

    Joined international roster

    Galerie Perrotin (Paris/HK)

    International gateway for Dansaekhwa wave

  7. 2015

    Dansaekhwa collateral event at Venice Biennale

    Palazzo Contarini-Polignac, Venice

  8. 2018

  9. 2019

    Joined gallery roster

    White Cube

  10. 2022

  11. 2023

    Park Seo-bo Foundation founded

    Park Seo-bo Foundation, Seoul

02Reception

Critical phase — discovery → rise → canonization.

  1. 1970

  2. 1973

  3. 1975

    Discovery

    Korean monochrome / 단색화 critical formation

  4. 2000

  5. 2010

    Rise

    International rediscovery — Asia Society NY, Mori Art Museum

  6. 2014

    Rise

    Perrotin signing reframes Park within global market discourse

  7. 2015

    Canonization

    Venice 2015 collateral — 단색화 enters Western canon

    “Repositions Korean monochrome from a national school to a global movement.”

  8. 2018

  9. 2019

  10. 2022

    Reassessment

    Artsy / White Cube — late-career color phase re-evaluated

  11. 2023

03Market

Public sale record — venue, lot, hammer price.

  1. 1970

  2. 1973

  3. 1975

    $2k

    Domestic (Seoul galleries)

    Domestic pricing tier

  4. 2000

  5. 2010

    $60k

    Seoul Auction

    Pre-international tier

  6. 2014

    $480kvs est $250k

    Christie's Hong Kong

    Post-Perrotin first major lot

  7. 2015

  8. 2018

    $1.90Mvs est $1.20M

    Sotheby's Hong Kong

    Écriture (early phase, artist-level peak)

  9. 2019

  10. 2022

    $1.40Mvs est $1.00M

    Christie's New York

    Late Écriture color phase

  11. 2023

Cross-axis insights

  • Inflection

    Perrotin signing 2014 (Provenance + Reception jointly) moves market from $60k (2010 domestic) to $480k (2014 international) — an 8× step inside 12 months once both axes shift.

  • Correlation

    Venice 2015 reception canonization sustains a ~3-year market expansion (2014 $480k → 2018 $1.9M), then plateaus when reassessment phase begins (2022 onward).

  • Inflection

    Late-Écriture (color phase) reassessment 2022+ creates a parallel sub-market — separate price discovery, not a continuation of the early monochrome curve.

Magnus · Artsy · Smartify · Provenio

Each competitor leads on one axis. Provenio is the only platform that resolves all three on the same artwork — and surfaces the relationships between them.

CapabilityMagnusArtsySmartifyProvenio
Hammer prices✓~—✓
Ownership chain (provenance)—✓—✓
Critical reception phase——~✓
Cross-axis correlation———✓
Inflection-point detection———✓
Open MCP / programmatic access———✓

Comparison reflects publicly observable surface area as of 2026-04. Provenio capability claims map to live MCP tools (find_galleries_by_artist, get_career_trajectory, get_three_axis_view).

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