Ruarc Peffers apologises for being late. He's been at the Aspire Art Auctions storage space, struggling to accommodate a Wim Botha sculpture and its pedestal (Lot 32; R250,000-R350,000) and a 1.7m Pieter Hugo print (Lot 78; R180,000-R240,000). Peffers has been in and around the art auction world for a while now. First at Stephan Welz & Co/Sotheby's, and then at Strauss & Co where he was senior art specialist and auctioneer.As a courtside witness to the 21st-century South African art market boom, Peffers - together with former colleagues Mary-Jane Darroll, Emma Bedford and Jacqui Carney - recently struck out to form Aspire, the newest auction house on the block, whose first live auction takes place at the end of the month.story_article_left1In a time of economic uncertainty you might think it unwise to try to claim a slice of the secondary art market, but as a recent Strauss & Co auction in Cape Town proved (82.5% of works sold for a total of almost R60-million), the art market has its own economic dynamic.If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs, buy art, because as Peffers points out: "An astute collector who buys work of very good quality, the vast majority of them have done very well out of their art.They've quite often paid a lot for the work but it's always done well ... generally speaking if you buy top quality art it is highly likely you will get a comparable return."For decades the South African secondary market was dominated by the towering figure of Stephan Welz, Peffers's former boss and mentor, who died on Christmas Day last year.While Welz may have offered work to suit the demands and tastes of his predominantly white, wealthy market, his personal predilections undeniably had an impact on the ability of artists to increase their primary prices on the back of secondary market sales.Post-war oil paintings command the highest prices for South African art, as evidenced by the current record for a South African art work - R34.4-million paid in 2011 at Bonham's in London for Irma Stern's Arab Priest .However as stocks of older work decrease and tastes change, the local market is ripe to fall in line with international trends towards contemporary work.Peffers, who studied fine art at Michaelis in the company of contemporary artists such as Dan Halter (Lot 60; R30,000 - R50,000) and Ed Young (Lot 45; R300,000 - R500,000), is committed to promoting contemporary art and says that he and his partners "all believe that South Africa and Africa have produced some of the best art in the world today"."It's completely on par with any other country that's produced art, and I would like to see art from this continent represented in the same setting, and with the same perception of quality and importance that you get when you go and look at the Old Masters in European museums or American art in American museums, because I don't think there's any discrepancy in quality. Sadly in this country, because museums have been left in the lurch, the onus has fallen onto business and corporate to fill the void."full_story_image_hright1There has also been a perception within the art world of auction houses as predatory - making large sums on the back of the creative work of artists without having to compensate them for their efforts.Peffers acknowledges this but says he hopes that he and his partners can dismantle that negative perception and "also kind of show that the benefit of the secondary market is that it gives confidence to the market generally ... and gives you confidence that things will hold their value and you're not throwing your money down a hole ... As an artist it's good to know that the work will continue to sell and trade."To this end Aspire aims to institute a policy of droit de suite, which ensures a percentage of secondary sales accrue to artists.story_article_right2If you've ever been to watch a live auction you'd be forgiven for thinking that the crowd and the numbers reflect the gross social inequalities of the country - art is for rich people who have jaw-droppingly large amounts of money, and it's not necessarily discernible who beyond this group benefits from these events.With universities burning and anger at the divide between rich and poor escalating on a daily basis, is a fine art auction with million-rand price tags not just another slap in the face for the majority of the country?"The social injustices in this country are massive and profound and they need to be rectified from an economic, inclusivity and educational point of view," Peffers says."On the other hand, art has to be one of the best ways of examining that. Maybe it's a bit idealistic of me but I do think there's potential for the arts to narrow the gap between the haves and the have-nots and make things more community oriented, and to bring the realisation that we share a culture and we share a land and there are so many things we have in common."He also hopes that Aspire will help to "diversify and make the market more inclusive so that we can also have the involvement of new emerging classes and younger people buying art, so that it's not just the domain of the old and the wealthy".full_story_image_vright2Backed by Brian Joffe and Adrian Gore - the CEOs of Bidvest and Discovery respectively, and both art collectors - Peffers has spent the better part of the year going about acquiring work for the company's inaugural auction.Browsing through the impressively produced catalogue, it's clear that the company is committed to quality over quantity.The 121 lots on offer include established market leaders like Pierneef (Lot; 16, R80,0000 - R1.2-million), Irma Stern (Lot 63; R7-million - R10-million), Preller (Lot 11; R5-million- R8-million), and Walter Battiss (Lot 40; R500,000- R700,000).Popular contemporary artists are also represented - Kentridge (Lot 58; R1.8-million - R2.4-million), Diane Victor (Lot 38; R100,000 - R150,000), Robert Hodgins (Lot 65; R300,000 - R500,000) - and there are more recent youngsters: Zander Blom (Lot 79; R80,000 - R120,000), Athi-Patra Ruga (Lot 41; R300,000 - R500,000 and Michael MacGarry (Lot 85; R90,000 - R120,000.)Those numbers might cause many of us to exhale audibly but as Peffers points out, Aspire is "not in the business of inflating prices, but we are in the business of developing the industry and the market"."So with this sale there's a lot of really significant works, because we were lucky that between the four of us we were able to attract significant collectors with major works who wanted to give us their works because they believed that we were the best vessel through which to sell them. Generally speaking the sentiment that you get what you pay for is true, and if you want good art it costs money."And then of course it all comes down to the actual auction, which will take place at The Park on 7 at Hyde Park on October 31.story_article_left3"What's nice about auctions, which I think is less so in other parts of the industry, is that there's a certain theatricality about it," Peffers says."You basically spend six months building up to the crescendo which is this evening, but the success hinges on how well you've done the sequential steps on the way ... the quality of an auctioneer to a large extent is to know who you're dealing with when you're taking bids. The better you know the market and the crowd, the better you are at being able to engage with them and achieve the best results."Auctions are open to the public, and in light of the paucity of museums in South Africa, auction previews offer a good opportunity to see some of the best art that the country has to offer before it disappears into mansions and behind high walls, perhaps never to be seen again or only to be brought to light at another auction years from now.• The first Aspire auction of historic, modern and contemporary art takes place on Monday October 31 at 8pm at Park on 7, Hyde Park Corner, Johannesburg. Viewings are on Friday October 28 from 10am - 5pm, Saturday October 29 from 10am - 5pm and Sunday October 30 from 10am - 4pm. For more information visit Aspireart.net...