The longest bull run in a century of art-market history ended on a dramatic note with a sale of 56 works by Damien Hirst, Beautiful Inside My Head Forever, at Sotheby’s in London on September 15th 2008. All but two pieces sold, fetching more than £70m, a record for a sale by a single artist. It was a last victory. As the auctioneer called out bids, in New York one of the oldest banks on Wall Street, Lehman Brothers, filed for bankruptcy.

    The world art market had already been losing momentum for a while after rising bewilderingly since 2003. At its peak in 2007 it was worth some $65 billion, reckons Clare McAndrew, founder of Arts Economics, a research firm—double the figure five years earlier. Since then it may have come down to $50 billion. But the market generates interest far beyond its size because it brings together great wealth, enormous egos, greed, passion and controversy in a way matched by few other industries.

    In the weeks and months that followed Mr. Hirst’s sale, spending of any sort became deeply unfashionable. In the art world that meant collectors stayed away from galleries and salerooms. Sales of contemporary art fell by two-thirds, and in the most overheated sector, they were down by nearly 90% in the year to November 2008. Within weeks the world’s two biggest auction houses, Sotheby’s and Christie’s, had to pay out nearly $200m in guarantees to clients who had placed works for sale with them.

    The current downturn in the art market is the worst since the Japanese stopped buying Impressionists at the end of 1989. This time experts reckon that prices are about 40% down on their peak on average, though some have been far more fluctuant. But Edward Dolman, Christie’s chief executive, says: “I’m pretty confident we’re at the bottom.”

    What makes this slump different from the last, he says, is that there are still buyers in the market. Almost everyone who was interviewed for this special report said that the biggest problem at the moment is not a lack of demand but a lack of good work to sell. The three Ds—death, debt and divorce—still deliver works of art to the market. But anyone who does not have to sell is keeping away, waiting for confidence to return.

答案精析：根据题干中的Damien Hirst和a last victory可定位至原文首段第三句。本题在问被称之为“最后的胜利”的原因是什么，需要结合整段的意思做推断。首段前两句指出拍卖会以戏剧性的方式结束了一个世纪以来艺术市场历史上最长的牛市，随后提到了拍卖会成交额的数量之大。该段最后一句又说到，当拍卖师叫价时，纽约华尔街最古老的银行之一雷曼兄弟申请了破产（金融危机的开端），原文第三段也详细说明了艺术品市场衰落的情况。由此可推断，这次拍卖会是艺术品市场走向衰退前的一次高峰，而这次高峰之后就发生了金融危机，所以该拍卖会是在世界金融危机之前成功举办的，故正确答案为D。

错项排除：原文并没有对拍卖会是否“见证了一连串的胜利”进行描述，A项属于无中生有，故排除。B项中的auctioneer和two pieces是原词复现作为干扰，但首段最后一句说的是当拍卖师叫价时，并非拍卖师以高价买下了那两件作品，而且该段第二句也说到，那两件作品是没有拍卖成功的，B项与原文不符，故排除。C项中Beautiful Inside My Head Forever指的是拍卖会的主题，并非达米恩·赫斯特的作品，C项曲解文意，故排除。

长难句分析：The longest bull run in a century of art-market history ended on a dramatic note with a sale of 56 works by Damien Hirst, Beautiful Inside My Head Forever, at Sotheby’s in London on September 15th 2008.

本句主干为The longest bull run…ended…，主谓结构，意为“最长的牛市结束了”。 in a century of art-market history作后置定语，修饰bull run，用于解释其范围。on a dramatic note和with a sale of…分别作方式状语和伴随状语，同修饰谓语ended。Beautiful Inside My Head Forever是a sale的同位语，指拍卖会的名称。

句意为：2008年9月15日，在伦敦苏富比拍卖行举行的“美丽永驻我心”拍卖会上，随着达米恩·赫斯特的56件作品的出售，艺术市场百年历史上最长的牛市以戏剧性的方式结束了。