JOHANNESBURG—The second Joburg Art Fair, a showcase of contemporary African art that ran April 3–5, was ushered in with the usual pre-fair media buzz, with one of the event’s sponsors promising an “an electromagnetic experience.” Unfortunately, the curious metaphor had unintended resonance in a fair marked by its generally low-voltage sales.

One conversation, overheard on the April 2 opening night, came to define the restrained buying mood. “It has to stop now,” a business executive from SASOL, the South African petrochemical conglomerate, instructed his company’s art buyer in Afrikaans. It was unacceptable for executives laying off staff and forfeiting bonuses to see new art acquisitions flaunted at their workplace, he said.

While buying wasn’t entirely muted — London’s October Gallery sold (by telephone) a large-scale aluminum-and-copper-wire-textile drapery by Ghanaian sculptor El Anatsui for $650,000 to a royal buyer from Abu Dhabi — many of the 26 participating galleries reported sluggish sales.

“Compared to last year, where the work sold itself, this year we are having to do a lot more work on the ground, a lot more chitchat and hard selling,” said returning exhibitor Brenton Maart, whose KZNSA Gallery champions artists from the regional eastern seaboard city of Durban. Among the many works that went unsold at his booth was Andries Botha’s Empty Spaces, a monochromatic installation incorporating a photographic tapestry and 51 resin sculptures, which the artist had previously exhibited at the Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno in Las Palmas, Canary Islands, in 2008. Maart was unable to place the work, priced at $83,000, with the “mainly South African” buyers who visited his booth.

For first-time exhibitor Henri Vergon, whose offerings included a photograph by Malian photographer Malick Sidibé ($9,500) and a totemic wood sculpture by Willem Boshoff ($11,000), business was “extremely slow.” By Saturday afternoon, the second full day of trading, the South African dealer’s only major sale had been a work by Mozambican sculptor Gonçalo Mabunda, a metal chair made from recycled weapons, priced at $12,000.

“All the sales I made here were to overseas buyers,” said Vergon, who earlier in the day had asked a South African visitor to leave his booth after he made a racist remark about Mabunda’s work and its pricing. “It is disappointing to see how South Africans are reluctant to even look at African art,” Vergon added. In recent years, Mabunda’s chairs have found increased favor, including in the design world. An example was included in the show "Second Lives: Remixing the Ordinary," presented by the Museum of Arts and Design in New York last year.

Bisi Silva, a prominent West African art critic and a driving force behind the Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos, an independent visual art organization from Nigeria, echoed Vergon’s sentiments. “It is a very South African art fair,” remarked Silva, whose offerings of photographs and sculptures invited few sales. Commenting on the negligible turnout of African buyers from oil-rich countries like Angola and Nigeria, Silva said the fair’s organizers would have to do more outreach if the show was to outgrow its current status as a “very local” event and fulfill its pan-African ambition.

Of the 18 South African galleries exhibiting, only two have a presence internationally: Long a fixture at Art Basel, Goodman Gallery debuted at the Armory Show this year, alongside main rival Michael Stevenson. The two galleries reported vastly contrasting sales results at Joburg. Stevenson’s offerings, which included works by Nigerian Odili Donald Odita and Ethiopia-born Julie Mehretu, failed to find buyers. Goodman's Liza Essers, however, had better news. “We have certainly had a good fair,” she told ARTINFO. “I think people are more cautious, definitely, and they want quality work.” While a large canvas of Gavin Turk as Che Guevara went unsold, an untitled charcoal-and-pencil drawing of peonies by William Kentridge fetched $136,000.