Imagine walking into an auction house, determined to bring home a historic treasure of art. The coin you want sparks a heated bidding war, but you win even as the price hits all-time highs. Then, still flush with victory, you get the call: a museum has decided it wants your latest trophy, and by law it can snatch it from you by matching your winning bid.
This is exactly what happens to a collector after the “The Great Centuries» sale on June 18, at Osenat in Versailles. After a rare terracotta sculpture by a 17th century French artist Francois Anguier sold for 2.6 million euros ($2.85 million), the louver in Paris decided he wanted the artwork. To the alleged chagrin of the collector, the institution exercised its right under French heritage laws to cancel the auction result.
“This means that a museum does not intervene during the sale, but when the auction is over, it “preempts, that is, it buys the piece at the final price,” said a door. -word of the Louvre. art diary.
The work dates from before 1767, and is preparatory work for a funerary monument, the artist created for Jacques de Souvre, a French military officer who was a member of the Knights of Malta. It had not been seen at auction since 1872, after a first sale in 1763.
Francois Anguier, Funerary monument of Jacques de Souvre (before 1667). Collection of the Louvre Museum, Paris.
“I have never got my hands on a 17th century terracotta model of this importance modeled by a French sculptor,” sculpture appraiser Alexandre Lacroix, of the company Lacroix Jeannestsaid The Gazette Drouot. “Until the 18th century, the French preferred wax or wood to present models to their patrons, and it was not until the 1730s that terracotta sculptures appeared in the Salon de l’Académie. If we also consider the extreme fragility of the material, it is easy to understand why the first French terracottas are so rare. Although preserved at the time by sculptors or patrons, they have now almost all disappeared.
According to the magazine, there are only two other models of terracotta funerary monuments known from the time, one by Gilles Guerin and a second Anguier, still in the hands of his descendants.
The Osenat sale marks an auction record for the artist, who only made two lots appear on the market, in 2010 and 1992, according to the Artnet Price Database. Both have been purchased. This time around, the auction house was expecting fireworks, with a pre-sale estimate of 2-3 million euros ($2.2-3.3 million).
The final marble version, originally created for the Church of Saint John Lateran in Paris, was dismantled during the French Revolution. The main part of it now resides in the Louvre. By hanging the model recently put up for auction, the museum will finally be able to bring the two works together.
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