PARIS, Aug. 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Thierry EHRMANN, Founder of Artprice and CEO of Artmarket.com, and his family have full confidence in the future of Artmarket.com and in the growth of its activities, driven notably by substantial investments dedicated to the development of Artmarket.com's vertical AI. The expression of support from the Ehrmann family and Groupe Serveur (majority shareholder) for the expansion of Artmarket.com's business will materialize very shortly through an increase in their shareholding in Artmarket.com via the acquisition of additional Artmarket.com shares. Naturally, all required disclosures will be made to the AMF (French Financial Markets Authority) and online within legal deadlines during authorized trading windows.

News and Outlook

From Progressive Transition to the "AI-FIRST" Metamorphosis of the Artprice Meta-Database

Following an in-depth strategic review approved by the Board of Directors, Artprice--the global leader in art market information for nearly three decades--is executing a major doctrinal shift in the integration of its proprietary artificial intelligence architectures, notably "Intuitive Art Market$(R)$" and "Blind Spot(R)".

   1. From Incremental Deployment to the "AI-First" Architectural ShiftThe 
      initial strategy called for a slow, educational rollout of our AI 
      building blocks within our historical databases. While cautious, this 
      approach fragmented the market's perception of the ongoing technological 
      revolution. AI is no longer an optional component: it has become the core 
      matrix of the global economy.Gradually injecting AI modules into an 
      infrastructure proven over 25 to 30 years of use is equivalent to 
      attempting to convert an internal combustion engine vehicle with analog 
      controls into a digital electric vehicle piece by piece while driving. 
      Clients struggle to gauge the quantum leap between the old world and the 
      new, risking operational inconsistencies. Today, we choose clarity and 
      high standards: abandoning piecemeal deployments to deliver a global, 
      seamless, and fully realized mutation. 
 
   2. Financial Strength and Adjusted ScheduleThis choice of rigor entails a 
      minor adjustment to our public deployment schedule, with no impact on our 
      financial trajectory. In a complex global economic environment marked by 
      heightened geopolitical tensions and sharp volatility in energy costs, 
      Artprice by Artmarket's revenue continues to maintain steady growth. This 
      remarkable economic foundation grants us the independence and composure 
      necessary to prioritize operational perfection over haste--a stark 
      contrast to many listed companies incorporating AI into their business 
      models while constantly seeking equity capital. 
 
   3. Act I: The Intra-Community RevolutionThe restructuring centers around 
      Artprice's unique asset: nearly 180 interconnected proprietary databases 
      forming an unprecedented global meta-database, alongside its 
      world-renowned collection of Manuscripts and sales catalogs from 1700 to 
      the present day, considered unique worldwide by researchers and 
      experts.The first phase of this mutation is occurring internally. All 
      Group employees, departments, and production units are being directly 
      equipped with dedicated AI hardware and edge units. Before exposing these 
      tools to our subscribers, we are completing a total overhaul of our 
      internal workflows. Data collection, standardization, and enrichment 
      pipelines are being completely rewritten according to Deep Learning 
      standards and proprietary algorithms. 
 
   4. Act II: Delivery of a Natively Transformed Database PlatformOnly once the 
      internal value chain is fully calibrated will the platform be released to 
      our subscribers. The database platform will not appear as a stack of 
      incremental modules, but as a complete "AI-First" environment built upon 
      our core pillars: certified massive data (standardized Big Data), deep 
      learning (Data Learning), and algorithmic security.By choosing this 
      comprehensive and structured metamorphosis, Artprice reaffirms its 
      position as a pioneer: transforming 30 years of global art market 
      information leadership into a sovereign engine of decision intelligence 
      for the entire global art market. 

In an era where the open internet is sinking into entropy and dilution caused by the surge of synthetic data (70% uncontrollable synthetic data as of June 30, 2026, according to Gartner Group and the Europol Innovation Lab), companies that own their entire data value chain constitute true citadels of cognitive sovereignty.

Mastering the process from raw capture (standardized big data) to data mining, through to training deep learning models on tens of millions of unique records protected by patented algorithmic architectures, is no longer mere digital asset management: it establishes a monopoly on ground truth in a given market--in this case, the Art Market.

The evolution of Artprice's ultra-proprietary databases into vertical AI versions (Intuitive Art Market(R) and Blind Spot(R)) represents not a simple technical update, but an ontological mutation structured around key strategic axes:

Ontological Mutation Defined: According to Thierry Ehrmann, Founder of Artprice and CEO of Artmarket: An ontological mutation designates a radical transformation not of the form, performance, or functions of an entity (what it does), but of its fundamental nature, essence, and mode of existence (what it is). Where a traditional evolution refines an existing system, an ontological mutation changes the category of reality to which that system belongs.

Applied to Artprice and the full mastery of its vertical AI (Intuitive Art Market(R) and Blind Spot(R)) and industrial process pipelines, this mutation manifests across three levels:

   -- From Information Container to Cognitive Organism: Artprice no longer 
      defines itself as an expert aggregator or a historical database. By 
      embedding vertical AI at the core of its sovereign infrastructure, the 
      entity evolves from a knowledge base into an autonomous cognitive 
      architecture. 
 
   -- The Metamorphosis of Data: Art market data changes its ontological 
      status. From a static, descriptive archival trace, it becomes a dynamic, 
      predictive, and living semantic matrix capable of contextualizing and 
      analyzing the market in real time. 
 
   -- Ontological Sovereignty of the Process: Owning the entire industrial 
      chain (from proprietary raw data to the vertical language model, without 
      third-party application dependencies) guarantees systemic 
      self-sufficiency. AI is not a tool grafted onto the model: it becomes the 
      very substance of Artprice's operation. 

Five Strategic Axes of the AI Mutation

   1. From Information Container to Deterministic Oracle: Historically, the 
      value of these databases rested on indexing depth and search engine 
      precision. Integrating a proprietary vertical AI transforms passive yet 
      incorruptible data into active decision intelligence. While generic large 
      language models (LLMs) suffer from hallucinations due to the porosity of 
      their training corpora, vertical AI backed by a sovereign data pipeline 
      operates in an ultra-secure closed loop. The system does not generate 
      plausibility; it produces explainable certainty backed by pinpoint 
      traceability. 
 
   2. The Emergence of High-Value Sovereign Agency: User interaction evolves 
      from the traditional query-response model to complex agentic automation. 
      Artprice subscribers no longer search for a single occurrence or 
      historical statistic; they mandate an autonomous Artprice agent trained 
      exclusively on this data asset to perform arbitrage, simulate 
      forward-looking scenarios, or model risks with extreme precision. 
      Vertical AI becomes an augmented collaborator that unlocks the underlying 
      value of millions of data pairs accumulated over decades by Artprice by 
      Artmarket. 
 
   3. Valuing Scarcity Amid the Synthetic Flood: As the marginal cost of 
      creating generic content plunges toward zero, the relative value of 
      historical, certified, and non-replicable databases grows exponentially 
      (Financial Times). Companies controlling this sealed pipeline hold the 
      only unpolluted "raw oil wells" of the digital world. Their subscription 
      model no longer sells access to information, but the privilege of 
      accessing critical information asymmetry for strategic, financial, or 
      operational decision-making, via an annual subscription at a very 
      reasonable cost of $1,600 to $2,500/year (EUR1,600--$2,500). 
 
   4. Algorithmic Interfacing and Restricted Hybridization: These citadels will 
      not isolate themselves completely, but will evolve their access models. 
      The future lies in deploying predictive APIs and inference sub-systems 
      capable of integrating directly into institutional clients' workflows. 
      Rather than delivering raw data, Artprice will distribute embedded 
      intelligence modules, making its algorithmic ecosystem indispensable and 
      intrinsically linked to its subscribers' vital processes. 
 
   5. Continuous Capture and Closed Feedback Loop: Every query and analysis 
      conducted by privileged Artprice users within this vertical AI feeds back 
      into and enriches the underlying data structure (continuous fine-tuning, 
      metadata enrichment). This feedback mechanism creates an unassailable 
      technological flywheel: the more Artprice databases are queried by 
      experts via AI, the more the AI refines its semantic and predictive 
      understanding of the market, indefinitely widening the gap with any 
      emerging competitor. 

In short, these ultra-proprietary databases will cease to be viewed as digital libraries and become sovereign inference engines. By controlling both the fuel (tens of millions of certified data points) and the engine (vertical AI and proprietary algorithms), these players do not merely evolve--they redefine the very nature of paid strategic intelligence, elevating data exclusivity into the supreme standard of the algorithmic era.

Strategic Summary: Perfect Encapsulation and Absolute Rigor for the High-End Offer

Armed with a massive head start guaranteed by our two proprietary artificial intelligences, Intuitive Art Market and Blind Spot, we took the necessary step back to make a minor adjustment to our launch calendar. This strategic timing reflects a fundamental requirement: finalizing a high-end subscription where technological power is entirely seamless behind absolute ease of use.

The top priority lies in complete encapsulation of algorithmic complexity between our data production pipelines and the client operational stage. Subscribers should no longer have to manipulate complex filters or settings; interaction must occur naturally and fluidly between our members and our sovereign AIs.

In the specialized ecosystem of the Art Market, this fluidity demands extreme rigor: the AI must master domain terminology and operate in over forty languages while strictly respecting the golden rule of art history, which formally prohibits any translation of artwork titles. Preserving original nomenclature and adhering to our historical protocols remain non-negotiable.

To perfect the user experience, the interface incorporates high-precision predictive guidance: from the very first natural language prompt, the system spontaneously suggests the most relevant follow-up questions to guide collectors, institutions, and professionals. However, unlike generic search engines that tolerate approximation, there is zero margin for error for a proprietary AI powered by our fully standardized and certified databases.

Currently undergoing rigorous and demanding beta testing to push their limits, our AIs are being calibrated to deliver flawless ergonomics. This stress-testing phase ensures intuitive and rewarding adoption across all user generations, proving that absolute mastery of internal corpora is the prerequisite for exceptional artificial intelligence.

From Valuation Algorithm to Systemic Paradigm: The "BLIND SPOT(c)" Dynamics

Initially conceived as a microeconomic modeling tool within Artprice, the Blind Spot(c) system was designed to solve the price discontinuity equation between two public auction sales. By relying on an artist's global index history and formal traceability of auction sales--such as a Jackson Pollock masterpiece auctioned for $4 million in 1998 reaching $58 million in 2026--Blind Spot calculated with surgical accuracy the reconstruction of value during intervals of market opacity.

However, the rise of vertical AI architectures and the formalization of our theoretical corpus revealed a deeper truth: the blind spot is not merely a statistical gap; it is the underlying structure of data and the fundamental lever to access market truth.

Re-conceptualized by its creator Thierry Ehrmann, Blind Spot has become a 360-degree investigation engine capable of detecting and illuminating what escapes traditional modeling across key dimensions:

   -- Biographical & Corpus Consistency: Applied to artistic career 
      trajectories, Blind Spot analyzes abnormal proliferation of works that do 
      not align with an artist's documented biography. An artist's biography is 
      not just a historical narrative; it sets the physical boundaries of 
      production, identifies creative shifts, and isolates peak periods--the 
      key phases sought after by collectors. By cross-referencing market volume 
      indices with real biographical pacing, the AI immediately detects flow 
      anomalies and authenticates scarcity. 
 
   -- Macroeconomic & Geopolitical: On a global market scale, Blind Spot 
      isolates exogenous factors explaining sudden drops in market activity for 
      a financial center or country. Where traditional analyses suffer 
      variations without grasping causes, the system cross-checks weak signals 
      (regulatory, tax, sociopolitical) to explain trend disruptions and 
      anticipate geographical shifts in capital. 
 
   -- Aesthetic & Cross-Recommendation: At the behavioral level, collectors 
      often remain confined within rigid classifications of official artistic 
      movements. Blind Spot breaks these conceptual silos by identifying formal, 
      material, or conceptual correspondences between artists from seemingly 
      disparate movements. By revealing these elective affinities invisible to 
      the human eye, the system recommends works outside collectors' usual 
      scope that resonate perfectly with the deep sensibility of their 
      collections. 
 
   -- Operational & Calendar Alignment: In processing massive global data flows, 
      certain delays or acquisition pauses previously remained unexplained. By 
      integrating all cultural, civil, national, and religious calendars into 
      the heart of the model, the AI illuminated the temporal gaps responsible 
      for these lulls. This granular understanding of societal cycles allows 
      pre- and post-capture adjustments, permanently closing algorithmic gaps. 
 
   -- Cross-Functional Innovation Among Our Teams: Extended to internal 
      organization, the Blind Spot concept transformed human capital 
      management. In complex organizations, groundbreaking ideas rarely prevail 
      when proposed by employees outside the relevant department. By 
      identifying these organizational blind spots, the company unlocks 
      cross-functional capabilities, encouraging employees to voice vision 
      beyond their scope, enriching collective intelligence and driving 
      unprecedented qualitative leaps. 

Today, Blind Spot no longer merely bridges gaps between two market valuations of the same work: it has become the guiding principle of a global vision, converting every shadow zone of the market, data, and organization into a high-value strategic asset.

Deployment of Deterministic and Probabilistic AI Agents for Global and US Market Conquest

The Group's technological infrastructure achieves a decisive milestone in its strategy to acquire and maximize high-value information by deploying two complementary agentic architectures: deterministic AI for structured data collection and probabilistic AI for strategic commercial expansion.

   1. Deterministic Agentic Agents: Sovereign Collection & Data 
      ExclusivityEvolving from our initial web scraping and crawler systems, we 
      have already deployed a generation of deterministic agentic agents. 
      Engineered to operate without drift or interpretation, these agents 
      interact exclusively under contractual agreements and formal partnerships 
      with our global network of 7,200 auction house partners. Their mission is 
      to extract, index, and structure an unprecedentedly rich data corpus, 
      incorporating significant confidential information completely absent from 
      the open Web. By deliberately excluding any probabilistic approach at 
      this capture stage, we guarantee our databases scientific rigor and 
      absolute certainty. 
 
   2. Probabilistic Agentic Agents: High-Precision Targeting in the US MarketTo 
      drive our expansion ambitions in the US market--the world's primary art 
      market offering immense revenue potential--we are concurrently deploying 
      a fleet of probabilistic agentic agents with high success probability 
      algorithms. Tailored to adapt to local, linguistic, and cultural 
      specificities across US states, these agents model behavior to pinpoint 
      major collectors, professionals, and institutions operating outside 
      traditional sales channels with surgical precision. 
 
   3. Media Synergy: The Impact of Artprice NewsThis acquisition framework is 
      amplified through synergy with Artprice News, our global art market news 
      agency. Publishing real-time dispatches nearly every hour with a strong 
      emphasis on the North American ecosystem, the agency and its editorial 
      team continuously engage decision-makers. The combination of our data's 
      deterministic depth and our agents' probabilistic market penetration 
      establishes an unparalleled customer acquisition engine. 

Copyright 1987-2026 thierry Ehrmann www.artprice.com - www.artmarket.com

For information purposes, Thierry Ehrmann has finalized the writing of an 1,800-page philosophical and scientific essay dedicated to Artificial Intelligence from 1987 to the present day. The central chapters of this work trace Artprice's little-known human epic, leading to the global construction of a universal memory of the art market, shaped through landmark encounters with pioneers in art market sociology and historical market figures. This multilingual work will be released globally in digital and print formats, with the English version benefiting from a preliminary release prior to the launch of the French edition.

Artprice's econometrics department can answer all your questions relating to personalized statistics and analyses: econometrics@artprice.com

Find out more about our services with the artist in a free demonstration: https://artprice.com/demo

Our services: https://artprice.com/subscription

About Artmarket.com:

Artmarket.com is listed on Eurolist by Euronext Paris. The latest TPI analysis includes more than 18,000 individual shareholders excluding foreign shareholders, companies, banks, FCPs, UCITS: Euroclear: 7478 - Bloomberg: PRC - Reuters: ARTF.

Watch a video about Artmarket.com and its Artprice department: https://artprice.com/video

Artmarket and its Artprice department were founded in 1997 by thierry Ehrmann, the company's CEO. They are controlled by Groupe Serveur (created in 1987). cf. the certified biography from Who's Who In France(c):

https://imgpublic.artprice.com/img/wp/sites/11/2025/11/2026_Biographie_de_Thierry_Ehrmann_WhosWhoInFrance.pdf

Artmarket is a global player in the Art Market with, among other structures, its Artprice department, world leader in the accumulation, management and exploitation of historical and current art market information (the original documentary archives, codex manuscripts, annotated books and auction catalogs acquired over the years) in databanks containing over 30 million indices and auction results, covering more than 915,300 artists.

Artprice Images(R) allows unlimited access to the largest art market image bank in the world with no less than 181 million digital images of photographs or engraved reproductions of artworks from 1700 to the present day, commented by our art historians.

Artmarket, with its Artprice department, constantly enriches its databases from 7,200 auction houses and continuously publishes art market trends for the main agencies and press titles in the world in 121 countries and 11 languages.

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/artmarketcom-artprice-and-cision-extend-their-alliance-to-119-countries-to-become-the-worlds-leading-press-agency-dedicated-to-the-art-market-nfts-and-the-metaverse-301431845.html

Artmarket.com makes available to its 9.3 million members (members log in) the advertisements posted by its Members, who now constitute the first global Standardized Marketplace(R) for buying and selling artworks at fixed prices.

There is now a future for the Art Market with Artprice's Intuitive Artmarket(R) AI.

Artmarket, with its Artprice department, has twice been awarded the State label "Innovative Company" by the French Public Investment Bank $(BPI)$, which has supported the company in its project to consolidate its position as a global player in the art market.

Artprice by Artmarket publishes its 2025 Global Art Market Annual Report, published in March 2026:

https://www.artprice.com/artprice-reports/the-art-market-in-2025

Artprice by Artmarket publishes its 2025 Contemporary Art Market Report:

https://www.artprice.com/artprice-reports/the-contemporary-art-market-report-2025

Summary of Artmarket press releases with its Artprice department: https://serveur.serveur.com/artmarket/press-release/en/

Follow all the Art Market news in real-time with Artmarket and its Artprice department on Facebook and Twitter:

www.facebook.com/artpricedotcom/ (more than 6.4 million subscribers)

x.com/artmarketdotcom

x.com/artpricedotcom

Discover the alchemy and the universe of Artmarket and its Artprice department: https://www.artprice.com/video

whose head office is the famous Museum of Contemporary Art Abode of Chaos dixit The New York Times / La Demeure of Chaos:

https://issuu.com/demeureduchaos/docs/demeureduchaos-abodeofchaos-opus-ix-1999-2013

Madame Rachida Dati, French Minister of Culture, has granted official recognition to thierry Ehrmann's Abode of Chaos as a 'total work of art', the global headquarters of Artprice by Artmarket.

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/madame-rachida-dati-french-minister-of-culture-has-granted-official-recognition-to-thierry-ehrmanns-abode-of-chaos-as-a-total-work-of-art-the-global-headquarters-of-artprice-by-artmarket-302409684.html

La Demeure du Chaos/Abode of Chaos -- Total Work of Art and Singular Architecture.

Confidential bilingual work, now made public: https://ftp1.serveur.com/abodeofchaos_singular_architecture.pdf

   -- L'Obs - The Museum of the Future: https://youtu.be/29LXBPJrs-o 
 
   -- https://www.facebook.com/la.demeure.du.chaos.theabodeofchaos999 (more 
      than 4.1 million subscribers) 
 
   -- https://vimeo.com/124643720 

Contact : Artmarket.com and its Artprice department - Contact: ir@artmarket.com

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