4. Damien Hirst
Whether his work is brilliant or absurd may be a topic of debate, but there’s no doubt that Damien Hirst is not only England’s richest living artist but also one of the world’s most talked about. This year he made the most headlines for his unorthodox, direct-from-the-studio, against-all-recession-odds $200 million mega-sale “Beautiful Inside My Head Forever” at Sotheby’s, but the master self-promoter also kept the publicity wheels turning with proclamations about the art market, a lawsuit against a teenager, retail aspirations, purported victimhood, layoffs at his studio, a music video, and the travels of his $100 million diamond-encrusted skull. And now he’s back in the news, though his PR folks would not be pleased with the results. Hirst may be a bigger name than ever, but research shows that in the wake of his splashiest publicity stunt to date, his market is oversaturated and his prices are in steep decline.

5. Eli Broad
When the billionaire philanthropist and arts collector Eli Broad’s long-predicted art market correction finally came to bear this year, he swooped into the auction houses and made a few high-profile purchases. But that wasn’t the only way he made headlines in 2008, or cut against the grain. At the beginning of the year, Broad ruffled many an L.A. feather when he announced that he would not be donating his extensive collection to a museum but rather would manage and loan it through his foundation. The news came as a particular blow to the Los Angeles County Musem of Art (LACMA), which was on the brink of opening its $56 million Broad Contemporary Art Museum, where it hoped to display the expected donation. (Perhaps they were better off without it: According to the Guerrilla Girls, his collection is too white and too male.) Months later, Broad suggested a new venue for his art, a public museum in Beverly Hills where works could be displayed between loans. This came just as he was warning that museums, feeling the pinch of the growing global economic crisis, would have to cut spending and “become more populist” in terms of what they show. A few weeks later, Broad was again in the news, penning an editorial announcing a multimillion-dollar bailout offer for the cash-strapped Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA), which apparently needs more than populism to solve a severe funding crisis. A week or two later, there was a new offer to MOCA, from LACMA. Payback? But in the end, the museum went with Broad’s offer, ensuring he’s likely to remain in the news in 2009.