Art Basel Is Shaping Up to Be a Roll of the Dice

When the Swiss edition of Art Basel opens to VIPs on June 17 (public days are the 19th through the 22nd), Pace gallery’s booth will feature a 6-foot-tall Picasso priced “in excess of” $30 million.

Oftentimes, with a work this expensive (and even far less expensive), galleries do their utmost to secure a buyer well before the fair opens, soliciting offers in a phenomenon known as pre-selling. The fair opens, the collector shows up, and the work is officially sold then.

But a week before…