The young New York dealer Zach Feuer was cautious — he’d taken a smallish booth at the back of the fair at a lower cost this year — but perhaps not quite as optimistic early in the day. He had a small solo show of a handful of pieces by Dasha Shishkin; a large painting was on reserve for $25,000, but he hadn’t had any sales. Until Florida and New York collector Nancy Singer dropped by the booth, that is, while this reporter happened to be hovering. Singer sprang on one of Shishkin’s small pieces, priced around $5,000–8,000, and wasn’t shy about it, exclaiming, “She’s a wonderful artist!”

Another Florida collector, Dennis Scholl, says if he’s not jumping on any purchases, it’s nothing out of the ordinary. “We’ve always used the fairs more as research and development.” (He and his wife, Debra, regularly commission pieces for their exhibition space in Miami.) “Dealers are thinking about who their individual clients are and bringing work that reflects what those clients are interested in,” Scholl said of the fair. “Some balance has come back to things. This is more reflective of the art world I’ve known for the past 30 years.”

Zurich and London gallery Hauser & Wirth certainly brought what their clients were interested in. Namely, a solo show of sculptor Hans Josephson. All but about three of the 15 or so works in the booth were sold or on reserve by mid-afternoon, at prices ranging from $20,000 to $210,000. They’d also sold from their back room a new Paul McCarthy sculpture in fiberglass dipped in nickel coating, from his “Humble” series. The work, from an edition of 3, went to a European collector for $200,000.

Next door, New York dealer Sean Kelly was heartened by the lively crowds. Surrounded by works by gallery artists like Callum Innes, Frank Thiel, and Antony Gormley, he said they’d made eight sales in four hours. So much for the market being dead.

There may be something of a herd mentality behind collectors taking the plunge and purchasing artworks these days. “It’s like the first five minutes of the high-school dance,” art adviser Stefano Basilico observed of the mood early in the day. “People are thinking, ‘I’m not going to commit to you — what if that other girl’s available?’”

But by the end of the say, some people seemed to have chosen partners, to keep with Basilico’s metaphor. A thrilled Feuer reported that he’d sold that large Dasha Shishkin (for under the ticket price, he admitted), and redoubtable Berlin dealer Gerd Harry Lybke of Eigen+Art had sold the largest painting from his solo show of new works by Matthias Weischer for $185,000, as well as two small paintings for $35,000 each, and a few drawings. What were his expectations coming into the fair? “I expected I would sell out my booth in three days time,” he barked with confidence. “This market demands high quality, and good artists.”

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