LONDON— The Dow swung wildly again today; nevertheless, if the mantra at Frieze was “It's not as bad as we thought it would be,” the same held for Zoo, a fair for younger and emerging artists and galleries, now in its fifth edition, which opened to VIPs today at the Royal Academy. (The fair opens to the public tomorrow and runs through Monday.) The day began with the inauspicious news that megacollector Charles Saatchi had been kept waiting outside for some 20 minutes at noon, at the start of the ultra-exclusive sponsors’ preview, possibly because he hadn’t been recognized. But it ended with bustling crowds, and a number of reported sales. 

Dealers offered conflicting views about the sponsors’ preview. Some found it sparsely attended; others said they’d seen a lot of collectors come by. Anita Zabludowicz, a London-based collector who runs the private exhibition space 176 and is a major supporter of emerging artists, and of Zoo, could be spotted scurrying excitedly from booth to booth with her husband, Poju. Artist Yinka Shonibare was also seen, as were American collectors Susan and Michael Hort. By 2:30 p.m., when another batch of visitors were permitted in, things visibly picked up.

Said Joel Beck of New York gallery Roebling Hall, “Last year was mayhem” — it was so crowded, in fact, that the fair had to make many collectors wait outside due to fire code — “this year people won't be afraid not to buy right away.”

Finola Jones, owner of Dublin gallery Mother’s Tankstation, said, “If something comes out of this doom and gloom, it’s that we'll look at art again.” She was using her booth to promote the challenging work of David Sherry, who spent much of the day doing his performance Just popped out, back in 2 hours, for which he sits in a chair for long stretches wearing, on his forehead, a Post-it note with precisely that message. Jones had sold a few of Sherry’s whimsical drawings, arrayed on the wall behind the seated artist, for under £1,000 ($1,730) apiece.

Jerome O Drisceoil, proprietor of Dublin gallery Green on Red, said he was pleasantly surprised by how things were turning out. “Lots of people are looking, and some are buying,” he said. He had sold a painting on newspaper by young Irish artist Niamh McCann for €1,800 ($2,420). “Normally at the outset [of a fair] you get a sense, and my sense is that there will be selling here.”

Faye Fleming, of Geneva gallery Arquebuse, said she had been worried before the fair opened, but once things began, “I didn't sense a difference from last year.” She sold several works by British artist Tim Braden, who was shortlisted for the fair’s John Jones Art on Paper Award (Clunie Reid, who is being shown by London gallery MOT International, won the award). One of Braden's paintings on board, showing figures in a room and a still life of teakettles, went to a Dutch collector for £6,000.  

Works that seemed eerily suited to the zeitgeist of fear and uncertainty were doing particularly well. At London gallery Ancient & Modern, a print by young artist Ruth Ewan, from an edition of 20, simply depicted the words “Unrecorded Future Tell Us What Broods There” — the phrase comes from a 1927 cycle by poet Gustav Spiller titled Poems of Human Service. The gallery had had strong interest in two full sets of 20 prints, all of which are printed with Spiller's words, at £5,000 each. (A set of pins by Ewan, bearing slogans like “I'm against racism” and “Anti-Nazi League,” sold to Amanda Coulson, director of the Basel- and New York–based Volta fair, during Zoo's first hours.) “It's been busier than we'd expected; we're a bit overwhelmed,” said co-director Rob Tufnell.

Similarly literary and expressive of our unpredictable times was the booth of London gallery Paradise Row, which is curated around the theme of T.S. Eliot's epic masterpiece The Wasteland (1922). The booth will change each day of the fair, in accordance with the five sections of Eliot's bleak poem, and for the first day it featured a floor made to look like cracked lava (made by gallery directors Nick Hackworth and Patrick Gibson after a 1922 design by painter and author Wyndham Lewis) as well as paintings depicting comic-book-like scenes of violence by Russian artist Gosha Ostretsov. Three of these sold during the preview, for £13,000 each, to a British collector.  

The upcoming American election could not have been far from fairgoer's minds, given that one of the most iconic works in the show was a large painting of Barack Obama’s face (the image was clipped from the Wall Street Journal), by Spanish artist Jose Maria Cano, in the booth of London gallery Riflemaker. The work, priced at £35,000, attracted a lot of attention; not surprisingly, by the end of the sponsors’ preview, there were two reserves on it.  

As for Americans themselves, Scott Zieher of New York gallery Zieher Smith said he hadn’t seen many around, “But that's okay, because we come to London to meet Europeans.” Now in its second year at Zoo, Zieher Smith had brought a solo show of Brooklyn-based artist Wes Lang, whose mixed-media works deal with American themes and include American flags and the sorts of bare-breasted women you might see on a tattoo. Lang has never shown in London before, but by the preview’s end, Zieher had parted with several works by the artist, priced at both the low and high ends of his $1,000–10,000 range. The buyers were Belgian, French, and mainly British collectors. “Even some riskier pieces sold,” said Zieher. “So I now feel optimistic.”

Given all the speculation on the subject of American collectors, it was refreshing to run into a particularly enthusiastic one, the New York–based Steve Shane. Shane said he had just bought a sculpture from “a Stockholm gallery” at Zoo, though he didn't disclose anything further, except to say that the uncertain times weren’t keeping him from collecting. “I'm buying more art!” he said, before adding, “If you are a true art lover, why would you cancel your trip? I would come here even if I weren't buying.”

To hear many of the dealers at Frieze, and now Zoo, tell it, there are other such collectors out there — ones who are buying for pure enjoyment, or for the sense of discovery, and have not yet let financial woes deter them. Near the exit to Zoo, at the booth of Los Angeles gallery The Happy Lion, was a new neon work, in an edition of 3, by Alejandro Diaz, depicting the words “Happiness is Expensive.” All three sold, for “more than $4,000, less than $6,000,” according to gallery director Justin Izbinski. Happiness may indeed be expensive, but there’s still a market for it.

Sarah Douglas is Staff Writer at Art+Auction. She blogs at "The Appraisal."