Why is this Art Deco necklace from the next Christie's Paris sale panicking collectors?
It's the law of supply and demand. Driven by an ever-increasing price, the jewels of René Boivin or Suzanne Belperron very often take pride of place at the top of the bill at Parisian sales. This was without taking into account the long investigative work carried out by Christie's Paris and its director of the jewelery department, Violaine d'Astorg, to surprise and offer ever rarer sets.
Under his hammer on June 21, for a sale that will again be held in all digital, we will obviously find a highlight of French jewelry, but this one will have a very special flavor in his eyes. And she is not the only one because many were passionate about admitting to being moved by this necklace by Jean Fouquet that she recently presented in preview in Geneva.
Safe value
There are two reasons for this. There is the look and the very history of this jewel of course, but also the mystery that surrounds it because no one had seen it since its last exhibition at the Decorative Arts in the 1980s and the cover of the Bible of Art Deco, the reference work written at the same time by Sylvie Raulet. Since then, this rare finery has played the role of sleeping beauty, nestled in the secrecy of a private collection. All jewelry lovers knew her and regularly admired her on the cover of the flagship book, but no one had seen her for more than thirty years. Until his big comeback in the light of Christie's Paris.
But it is just as much its author as its atypical visual signature that gives this piece all its value. "There are so many things to tell about this jewel," enthuses Violaine d'Astorg. "You have to start with what you see: first this mechanical spiral in silver, then these interlocking cylinders before the gaze rests on this spectacular 90-carat aquamarine placed on a contrast of gold and lacquer. Everything is there, we have the matte, the polished and this industrial aspect which made the salt of Art Deco. It is the pure synthesis of the aesthetic manifesto advocated at the time by Jean Fouquet, member and spearhead of the Union of Modern Artists.
They are the ones who shaped this period which continues to fascinate today with its radical avant-garde. This piece therefore implicitly recounts the rejection of one era, the outline of another and the criticisms that these jewels did not fail to arouse then. But what does it matter for Jean Fouquet because only the clarity of the subject matters then. “I will never repeat it enough, a jewel must be composed of a mass visible from afar”, he hammered then, rejecting the embellishment for a perfect harmony between pure materials. Today estimated at a low of 350,000 euros, this necklace, the standard of his vision, is in serious danger of breaking a record at the close of the sale. And perhaps finally exceed the million and the price of 921,500 dollars reached in 2017 in New York by an Art Deco bracelet, signed by his father Georges Fouquet and the famous poster designer and designer Cassandre.
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