S otheby's will offer property from the collection of Jacques Grange, the French interior designer renowned for his refined and eclectic taste, at an auction in Paris on 21 November. One of the preeminent interior designers, Jacques Grange has designed the residences of major figures within and outside France, including Princess Caroline of Hanover, Pierre Bergé and Yves Saint Laurent, Paloma Picasso, Sofia and Francis Coppola, Terry and Jean de Gunzburg and Ronald Lauder.
The sale comprises a mix of modern and contemporary art, 20th century design, photographs, antiques, 19th century drawings and Symbolist works, assembled with erudition, sensitivity and a light touch. The collection features works by leading artists such as Damien Hirst, Jean-Michel Frank, Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne, Hector Guimard, Fernand Léger, Donald Judd, Alberto and Diego Giacometti, Yves Tanguy, Alexandre Noll, Archibald Knox, Victor Brauner, Hiroshi Sugimoto, Paul Klee, Armand-Albert Rateau, Max Ernst, Eileen Gray, David Hockney, Joseph Hoffman, Henri Matisse, Joan Miro and Alexander Calder.
Housed in the Palais-Royal apartment that was once home to the novelist Colette, the collection has been continually renewed, enriched and re-thought. Each piece bespeaks the perfect taste and liberalism with which it was chosen, their arrangement in the apartment executed with a unique eye. A passionate and cosmopolitan collector, Grange built his collection much like a travel diary, where every item of furniture, object, photograph, painting and sculpture is imbued with cultural references and evokes a memory, a discovery or an encounter.
The provenance of many pieces is prestigious, with André Breton, Paul Eluard, Eugenia Errazuriz, René Crevel, Pierre Matisse, André Breton, Maurice Thorez, Marie-Laure de Noailles and Yves Saint Laurent amongst the impressive roster of names.
Cécile Verdier, Worldwide Co-Head of Sotheby's Design department and Vice-President of Sotheby's France, said: "It's a huge pleasure to unveil Jacques Grange's personal collection to the public. Discovering his private world makes clear in an instant why the world's greatest collectors clamour to call on him: his interior is a joyous ode to colour and harmony, and as a collector himself, he reveals an unrivalled gift for living with art."
Highlights from the collection will be exhibited at Sotheby’s later in the year:
Hong Kong: 29 September–3 October
London: 5–8 October
New York: 6–9 November
