T his April, Sotheby’s is proud to present The Jean & Terry de Gunzburg Collection: Design Masters, a landmark auction featuring a selection of works from one of the most seminal and dynamic private collections of design ever assembled. For more than four decades, Jean and Terry de Gunzburg have collected 20th century art and design, the result of a shared endeavor guided by instinct, curiosity, and a profound sensitivity to form. Shaped largely within their New York home—which they describe as “New York on the outside, Paris on the inside”—the collection reflects a way of living in which objects were not merely acquired, but discovered: a dynamic mix of artists and designers whose works introduced new visual languages of line, color, texture and ornament, arranged by their friend, the renowned decorator Jacques Grange.

The collection traces a lineage of radical creativity, from the refinement of Art Deco to the expressive freedom of postwar organic modernism, showcasing the artists and designers who reshaped the language of form in their respective eras. The offering displays a strong concentration of works by French artists and designers, reflecting Jean and Terry’s enduring affinity for Parisian modernity and the intellectual rigor of French decorative arts. Leading the sale are iconic works by Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne, Jean Royère, Alberto Giacometti, Jean-Michel Frank, Alexandre Noll, André Groult, Eugène Printz, Paul Dupré-Lafon, Pierre Chareau, Marc du Plantier, Jean Dunand, Émile-Jacques Ruhlmann, and Armand-Albert Rateau, among others. Together, these masters chart the evolution of modern design as both sculpture and environment. Each work was selected not in isolation, but as part of a larger dialogue that unfolds throughout the de Gunzburg’s homes and their collection.

Among the top highlights is an extraordinary ensemble of fifteen mirrors by Claude Lalanne, commissioned for the Salon de Musique of Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé’s Paris residence—one of the most iconic interiors of the 20th century. This landmark commission stands as a masterwork within Claude Lalanne’s oeuvre and a defining achievement in the history of design. Executed entirely by hand over the course of a decade, the mirrors represent Lalanne’s earliest and most ambitious exploration of the mirror as a sculptural form. Claude Lalanne’s commission for Yves Saint Laurent began with the design of two mirrors. Over the following decade, it expanded to include thirteen additional examples, ultimately forming a fully realized environmental installation and establishing a motif that she would revisit throughout the rest of her career.