E-Photo
Issue #144  5/9/2008
 
Artcurial Auction Features Rare Autochromes and Hundreds of Other Photographs in Its May 27th Paris Sale

Besides a fine selection of 19th and 20th-century photographs, Artcurial | Briest-Poulain-F. Tajan will auction off an exceptional group of 30 autochrome plates on Tuesday, May 27 at 2:15 pm at Artcurial, Hotel Dassault, 7-9 Rond-Point des Champs-Elysées, 75008, Paris, France. A printed catalogue is available for these sales and can be ordered through Artcurial. The preview will be held May 23-26 from 11 am to 7 pm.

The featured autochrome group comes from a French private collection. Some of the highlights of this autochrome collection include: three very rare plates by Leon Gimbel, who donated nearly his entire body of work to the Société Française de Photographie. The three plates are: Feathers of Peacock, circa 1910, 15 X 9,80 cm (1,000-1,200 euro), Stained Glass, circa 1920, 9 X 12 cm (2,000-3,000 euro), and Christmas lights of Samaritaine, circa 1925, 9 X 12 cm (2,000-3,000 euro), which shows Gimbel's technical prowess by photographing the city's new neon gas lighting.

Several other important but anonymous autochromes include: Femme à l'éventail (Woman with Fan), circa 1910-1914, 12 x 9 cm; Le repos du guerrier (Repose of a Soldier), circa 1910-1914, 13 x 18 cm; Nature morte au champagne (Still life of Champagne) and Nature morte aux cigares (Still Life with Cigars), circa 1910-1914, 13 x 18 cm ; Orchidées (Orchids), 1914, 18 x 13 cm. All are estimated at 800-1,000 euro each.

Artcurial has had more focus on the autochrome than any other auction house, with previous sales in 2005, 2006 and 2007 that featured major images in this medium. It holds the current world auction record for an autochrome at 31,800 euro for a Portrait of Claude Monet at Giverny by Etienne Clémentel (estimated prior to the sale at 5 000-7 000 euro).

There are also 50 lots of 19th-century photography in this sale. One key 19th-century lot features an important waxed paper negative attributed to Louis Rémy Robert (1811-1882) or Victor Regnault (1810-1878). The negative shows the banks of the Seine as seen from the manufacturing facilities of Sevres, circa 1851 (43.5 X 54.5 cm). This surprisingly large negative is estimated at 17,000-19,000 euro.

Twentieth-century photographs in the auction include humanistic photography by Henri Cartier Bresson, Robert Doisneau, Edouard Boubat, Willy Ronis and others.

A more complete list of photographers in the sale include: Anderson, Ackerman, Arbus, Almasy, Arnold, Atget, Bissons Freres, Beato, Bischof, Brake, Baldus, Blanc & Demilly, Bischof, Brake, Boubat, Burri, Bovis, Breitenbach, Baltz, Beard, Brehme, Bilordeaux, Briquet, Barta, Blok & Broekmans, Burrows, Brassaî, Blanquart-Evrard, Cuvelier, Cuccioni, Carr, Clifford, Charnay, Cartier-Bresson,Clergue, Capa, Clark, Colomb, Cohen, Clemmer, De Clercq, Deveria, Disderi, Davanne, Doyle, Doisneau, Druet, De Dienes, Davidson, Dederko, Erwitt, Famin, Freire, Figueroa, Fenton, Gimbel, Geoffray, Gastaldi, Groover, Giacomelli, Guerrero, Gutierrez-Korda, Gibson, Gorman, Henschel & Benque, Hajek-Halke, Heidersberger, Hanfstaengl, Harriet-Louise, Hujar, Jacques, Kotzsch, Karelin, Klein, Kertesz, Krull, Kertesz, Karekes, Koppitz, Kessels, Lehnert & Landrock, Lapow, Larrain, Le Boyer, Litran, Lebely, Lemaire, Liberman, Larsonn, Levin, Marville, McPherson, Muzet, Missonne, Makarius, Mannikko, Michel, Maar, Miller, Mulnier, Man Ray, Maxwell-Lyte, Nadar, Nixon, Normand, Perez-Bravo, Pecsi, Phillips, Quinet, Roman, Rousset, Robert, Riefenstahl, Rodger, Ronis, Renger-Patzch, Salzmann, Simelli, Salgado, Sudek, Steiner, Silvester, Szert, Schiller, Stern, Sturges, Steichen, Teynard, Tabard, Unwerth, Von Gloeden, Van-Lintweegee, Woodman and Zickmantel.

The catalogue for the auction is also online at: http://www.artcurial.com/en/ . Just go to the left section on the calendar and click on the photography auction. For catalogue information or to contact the expert for the sale, email Grégory Leroy at gleroy@artcurial.com or call +33 (0) 6 25 94 29 12, or call the general auction number at +33 (0)1 42 99 20 20. When calling from the U.S. add 011 in front and eliminate the (0).