9 November/10 November 2019 ★ FTWeekend 19
Collecting
Switzerland’s Kunstmuseum Bern, the
unexpected beneficiary of the works of
art found in the homes of Cornelius
Gurlitt in 2012, has agreed the sale of a
painting by Edouard Manet for $4m to
the National Museum of Western Art,
Tokyo (NMWA). Gurlitt was the son of
a Nazi-eradealer, Hildebrand Gurlitt,
and the discovery of about 1,500 works
of art was revealed to the public just
before Cornelius died in 2014.
The Kunstmuseum is at pains to
point out that Manet’s “Marine,
temps d’orage” (1873) has been given
the green light by the German
government’s Gurlitt Provenance
Research Project, meaning that it is
neither Nazi-confiscated nor was
bought under duress. The work had
been owned by Japanese businessman
Kojiro Matsukata (1865-1950), who
lived in Europe in the early 20th
century and bought the painting from
Paul Rosenberg in 1922.
When Matsukata returned to Japan,
he left hundreds of paintings in the
care of a representative in France.
Sometime between 1940 and 1942, this
representative soldthe Manet, which
went via the Belgian dealer Raphaël
Gérard (also known to deal in looted
works) to Hildebrand Gurlitt in 1944.
Matsukata’s remaining works were
returned to Japan in 1959 and became
the founding collection of the Tokyo
The view
from NYC
The Art Market Swiss museum sells Gurlitt|
painting; French prime minister turns Hong Kong
gallerist; confidence fragile ahead of New York
season; children to bid at auction. ByMelanie Gerlis
David Hockney’s
‘Sur la Terrasse’
(1971) has an
upper estimate
of $45m at
Christie’sblood, Arthur says: his mother is a
sculptor and sister a painter. Opening
the gallery feels like an “organic
evolution”, while working with his
father also comes naturally: “We are
very close,” he says.
He insists his plans are long-term, so
says he is not deterred by the current
unrest in Hong Kong, where he has
lived for 10 years. “There is a specific
energy and spirit here, something that
this moment of crisis won’t take away.”
Their opening show will be of
Chinese-French artist Zao Wou-Ki(1920-2013), who was a family friend.
Dominique de Villepin, who has
already published books on Zao,will
write an essay on collecting for the
show’s catalogue.Art market mood is fragile ahead of
next week’s important auction season
in New York. The latest ArtTactic
Confidence Indicator, which surveys a
select group of market insiders every
six months, shows a fall of 29 per cent
since May 2019, having already fallen
24 per cent between January andSeptember 2018. The global political
and economic environment remains
the coreconcern, with art market
players keeping a close eye on the
trade war between the US and China.
However, the majority (60 per cent)
of experts covered by the survey
expect the market to stabilise at
its currently lower levels rather than
fall further.
Evening sale estimates for
Impressionist and Modern works are
$148.3m-$219.2m at Christie’s on
November 11 ($239.5m hammer total
last year, plus $281.5m from the
Ebsworth collection sale) and
$186.8m–$265.8m at Sotheby’s on
November 12 (compared with $271.5m
total last year).
For contemporary works, Christie’s
is expecting$270.3m-$397.8m on
November 13 ($311.9m total last year),
while Sotheby’s forecasts $213.7m–
$300.3m for November 14 ($310.3m
last year). Phillips fields a combined
20th-century and contemporary sale
also on November 14 with an estimate
of $92.2m-$131.5m ($76m total last
year). The highest valuation of the
week is attached to David Hockney’s
sun-soaked “Sur la Terrasse” (1971)
which has an upper estimate of $45m
at Christie’s.It’s never too soon to get the art-buying
bug. The Cultivist, a membership club
for art enthusiasts, is running an
auction for children at Phillips auction
house in London this Saturday. Rather
than bid on a Monet or Mondrian, the
youngsters will make their own
masterpieces that will then go under
the hammer of Phillips specialist
Louise Simpson. Daisy Peat, co-
founder of The Cultivist, which
launched its Mini Cultivist programme
last year, assures me that the junior
bidders won’t fight it out with real
money but will be given a stack of
“Mini Cultivist dollars”.
The event is designed to provide
some family fun at the weekend but
Peat, whose four-year-old son will join
the fray, says there also is an
educational element.
Parents are encouraged to get
involved but could also use their
welcome kid-free time to browse a
preview exhibition of Modern and
contemporary Lebanese art and
design, on view at Phillips ahead of
a charity sale on November 16.museum. Earlier this year the painting
came on loan to the NMWA as part of
its 60th-anniversary celebrations.
That the Swiss museum is selling at
all is a delicate issue, as its executives
maintain that the institution does not
want to derive any financial benefit
from its problematic bequest. Nina
Zimmer, director of the Kunstmuseum
Bern, describes the Manet sale as “an
exception” and, in a statement, her
museum says the painting’s $4m
valuation equates to the costs to date
of handling the Gurlitt works, including
mounting two exhibitions.
Any “possible surplus” will support
ongoing provenance research:the Bern
museum as until the end of 2022 toh
assess what can be accepted. So far, the
project has given the green light to only
28 of about 1,000 works that needed
research. Zimmer says that “under 20”
have been confirmed as Nazi-looted,
and restituted where possible.Dominique de Villepin, former prime
minister of France, is co-founding a
gallery in Hong Kong with his son,
Arthur de Villepin.The gallery will
open in March in a three-storey
building on Hollywood Road, home to
many of the region’solder galleries.
Arthur will run the space while his
father will oversee strategy rom Paris.f
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