Saint Laurent’s art treasures go on the block

Hundreds of art treasures amassed over half a century by Yves Saint Laurent and his lifelong companion Pierre Berge, go under the hammer today in a spectacular farewell to the couture giant.

After Saint Laurent’s death last June aged 71, Berge chose to part with the 732 pieces, collected across the world to grace the couple’s apartments and country retreats, from Paris’s Left Bank to sun-kissed Marrakech.

One of the world’s great private collections, it takes in masterpieces by Picasso, Mondrian and Matisse, old masters, Art Deco gems, bronzes, enamels and antiques, including two Chinese relics whose planned sale has angered Beijing.

Coined the “sale of the century”, the three-day auction is expected to fetch up to €300 million, setting a new record for a private collection and giving a welcome boost to a depressed global art market.

Museum buyers, dealers, collectors, and wealthy art lovers from around the world have snapped up all 1,200 seats at Paris’s Grand Palais, where the works went on show on Saturday in a stage-set recreating the couple’s ornate interiors.

Sign of Saint Laurent’s iconic status in France, more than 20,000 people queued up to five hours in wintry weather for a once-in-a-lifetime chance to view the eclectic collection, and catch a glimpse into the designer’s life.

Berge, a 79-year-old business tycoon and patron of the arts, said in an interview ahead of the sale that the collected artworks “reflect exactly who Yves was, and who I am.”

“But the day Yves Saint Laurent died, I decided this collection had run its course,” he said. “It was something we created together. Selling it was the only possible solution.”

Berge added in the auction catalogue that he hopes “everything that we have loved with so much passion finds a home with other collectors.”

Christie’s, which is organising the sale with Berge’s own auction house, sees the event as “a milestone in the history of great auctions”, comparable to a 1987 sale of the Duchess of Windsor’s jewels.

Leaving no stone unturned, Christie’s toured star pieces to New York, London and Brussels, while some 600 high-end buyers were offered private viewings inside Saint Laurent’s apartment.

Eight auctioneers will be working in shifts at the Grand Palais, with 100 telephone lines installed for buyers.

Proceeds will be split between a fund for medical research and the fight against Aids, and a Berge/Saint Laurent Foundation honouring the designer’s work.

The sale is devoted to impressionist and modern art, including a Cubist-period Picasso estimated at €25 to €30 million, and an early 20th century Brancusi sculpture never seen in public.

The wooden sculpture titled Portrait of Madame LR and estimated at €15-20 million, was first acquired by Leger in exchange for one of his own works.

A youthful Degas painting of an Italian landscape, which hung beside Berge’s bed for 20 years and for which he claims a “special affection”, is the first item in the sale, which kicks off at 7 p.m.

Works by Giacometti, Klee, Duchamp, and a Mondrian that once belonged to film director Otto Preminger, also figure alongside paintings by Cezanne, Manet and Gauguin.

Tomorrow will focus on old masters, 19th-century art and Art Deco, including a brown leather Dragons armchair by Irish designer Eileen Gray, estimated at up to €3 million.

The auction ends Wednesday with sculptures, archaeological pieces, ceramics, Islamic and Asian art – including the disputed Chinese animal bronzes.

AFP