A Paris Apartment (49 page)

Chapitre LXXVIII

PROPERTY FROM THE MADAME DE FLORIAN COLLECTION

Important Continental Furniture, Fine & Decorative Art

MARTHE DE FLORIAN: An Appreciation

Her apartment was shuttered for seventy years, since before World War II and indeed before this auctioneer and many of our bidders were born.

Last spring, when I stepped inside the former 9e flat of Marthe de Florian, I was taken aback by the sheer magnitude and beauty of the pieces before me. Every major period from George II and Louis XVI onward was represented, not a category of Continental furniture or fine art overlooked. It was and remains the single largest and most valuable group of assets belonging to one family that I have seen.

All these months later, I still find myself wondering if I really did see the apartment and its exquisite pieces, all of them entirely fresh to market. My first glance around the home revealed a pink and gilded fairy world, the spoils and their stories all the more bewitching as I delved deeper. Our team encountered an unending supply of treasures, all given life by the diaries left behind, photographic excerpts of which can be found in this catalogue.

Her name might not be familiar to bidders, but the apartment’s former occupant and author of the journals, Madame de Florian, was a Parisian courtesan who died in 1935. In her tenure as one of the most famous
demimondaines
of the Belle Époque she entertained the likes of statesman Georges Clemenceau, Count Robert de Montesquiou, and portraitist Giovanni Boldini, who has a very important piece in this auction.

Madame de Florian willed the home’s contents to her granddaughter, Elisabetta Quatremer. When the Nazis descended upon Paris in 1940, Madame Quatremer locked the apartment, fled the city, and never returned, though she continued paying rent on the flat for the next seventy years.

Madame Quatremer died earlier this year in Sarlat, and it was the woman raised as her sister who contacted Sotheby’s to conduct the sale of the Madame de Florian Collection. We are incredibly honored to oversee this auction. I’ve gone to great lengths to capture the magic of the lots, and I hope Madame de Florian would be proud.

Some of my most cherished pieces include a pair of painted ostrich eggs, a Napoleon III giltwood looking glass and console originally from a palace in Cairo, and a set of two George III mahogany serpentine commodes in condition so excellent they should really be considered new. That is, if they weren’t more than two hundred years old.

Though I should not pick a favorite, I will, and therefore must admit it is the portrait of Madame de Florian painted by Giovanni Boldini. Any moderately well-versed collector understands the significance of a Boldini in its own right, but this work is important for reasons beyond the person who created it. Not only is it the first time this painting has been on the market, a heady-enough claim, but it is also the first time the art world has known of its existence.

Let that sink in for a moment. A Giovanni Boldini: he, the greatest portraitist of the Belle Époque, and a piece unknown to the world, unknown to those who are paid to know everything when it comes to this.

Beyond the Boldini, the quality of the collection defies description, each lot a piece that seduces, each asset untouched since before the Second World War. Prepare to be charmed and dazzled by the oak and giltwood and silver, but mostly by Marthe de Florian herself. Though don’t let yourself fall too far under her spell, as competition abounds. You don’t want to be caught daydreaming when the final hammer is thrown.

April Vogt

Senior Vice President

French & Continental Furniture

EPILOGUE

April held the book in her hands: three thousand lots, six pounds of finely glossed paper, one woman’s estate. The Madame de Florian Collection was finally ready for the auction floor.

Because of the size, they’d broken the auction into sixteen sessions held over one week’s time. In the days leading up to opening night, dealers and collectors from around the world descended on Paris to participate in the private views, VIP dinners, and all the ancillary schmoozing required for an event of this size. Heavyweights mingled as the big-breasted client-service specialists tottered around in their red-soled heels.

Opening night was the most important, featuring the biggest of the big-ticket items. The first few properties set the tone for the rest of the auctions. They had to create a buzz loud enough to bring more players to the table. So while there were three thousand lots, the success of the entire auction hinged on the first, the most important, the Boldini. The estimate in the catalog was one million euros. To consider it a success Marthe de Florian had to go for at least one-point-two.

April fretted in one of the VIP skyboxes as she watched Olivier do his sound check. Various worker bees crept along the floor using rulers to properly space the distance between chairs. The people manning the phone banks checked dial tones and cords, sometimes crawling beneath desks in tuxedos and ball gowns to inspect faulty connections. Soon the doors would open and one thousand people would filter in.

Unable to sit, April paced by the front windows, fussing with the curtains as she went. Behind her sat Peter. Beside Peter sat Troy, thumbing through the catalog, frowning at the high prices. Really? Fifty thousand euros for an old chair? It produces no revenue, no EBITDA! As if earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization meant anything. His models would’ve had Marthe’s entire apartment fully depreciated, and therefore worthless. She’d quell that deal mind of his yet.

Two rows back sat Birdie, and beside her a woman April considered the most Important Person of all the Very ones in attendance, at least in terms of the auction. It was Agnès Vannier, accompanied by her velvet blanket, home health aides, and a fiendish half-smile.

April was anxious for the bidding to start. Through the windows she watched the press swarm below. Eventually representatives herded the reporters to the standing-room-only section and cordoned them off with a red rope. Bidders started to fill the room.

Once seated, the bidders flicked through the catalog. From her perch April studied the crowd, with particular focus on those in the front seats, the ones most likely to spring for the high-ticket items. She knew to look for that nervous, squirmy energy bidders exhibited moments before lifting a paddle. A lot of people were fidgeting in that room, not only those in the premium seats.

At seven o’clock Olivier took the podium. He could not see her through the double-paned glass, but April gave a thumbs-up nonetheless, though the action was really more for her than it was for him.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “Welcome to Sotheby’s, and to this evening’s sale of the Madame de Florian Collection. I think you’ll find this collection as remarkable as we have. A few reminders before we begin.”

The crowd’s twitchiness intensified as Olivier read the bidding rules as well as the conditions of the sale. Finally (finally!) after the taxes-commissions-premiums rigmarole, he gestured toward Marthe, who sat propped up on the rotating stage, bathed in light and shining in her pink-dressed glory. If only she could’ve seen the cameras, felt the fervor, heard the eruption of cheers. Not even the grandest show at the Folies could’ve compared.

“Lot one,” Olivier called out and banged the gavel.

Then he started. Marthe de Florian was on her way.

“At five hundred thousand euros?” he said. “Do I hear five hundred thousand euros? Who will bid in at half a million?”

The room remained still. April’s heart scrambled up into her throat. She held her breath while glaring at the former fidgeters, willing them to bid in.

“Five hundred thousand euros,” Olivier said again. “Do I hear five hundred thousand?”

Something creaked behind her. April turned around to see Luc Thébault slip through the door. He planted himself beside Madame Vannier. April smiled. She hadn’t been sure he would make it.

“Half a million here,” Olivier said as a paddle went up. April exhaled in relief and felt Luc nodding behind her. “Six hundred thousand euros? Do I hear six hundred thousand?”

The excitement started then. All the parties and receptions and even those topheavy women did what they were supposed to. They created hysteria. Paddles shot up.

“Seven hundred fifty thousand euros. Here.”

“Eight hundred thousand. Here.”

“Nine hundred. Here.”

“One million. Here.”

They hit the estimate. April exhaled again and closed her eyes. This, a painting not even the French government would take.

Tonight you are the most famous woman in all of Paris, Marthe. Enjoy it.

The numbers continued to climb. One-point-one million euros. A paddle went up for one-point-two million, the magic number at which April considered the sale a success. Perhaps Marthe’s newfound fame might last longer than one night.

Olivier’s mouth moved faster. Paddles shot up with more frequency. People dialed into the phone banks, the operators scrambling to keep up. The crowd rumbled with excitement.

When the number jumped above one-point-five-million April clapped. She looked over to find Troy on his feet, standing beside her cheering as though he were at a sporting event and not watching fine art.

The number hit two million euros. April yelped, her pulse racing, her brain light. She turned to Madame Vannier, who sat in a wheelchair smiling in satisfaction.

“At two-point-one million euro. Are we finished? Fair warning. Last chance at two-point-one million euro,” Olivier said. Then, as the entire room held its breath, “Sold! Two-point-one million euros. To bidder number three-three-four.”

April thought she might pass out. She truly thought she might.

The floor broke out in applause. People leapt to their feet and Marthe received a standing ovation lasting two minutes, three minutes, four minutes, more. April attended a Super Bowl once. The excitement and cheers did not come close to what was happening now. Two-point-one million euros, nearly three million U.S. dollars.

“You did it!” Troy said and wrapped April in a hug. “Damn, that was exciting! You did it!”

“No. It wasn’t me.” April stepped back. “It was Marthe, all Marthe. And this is just the start. There are thousands more lots. I can’t believe it. I really can’t believe it.”

At the podium Olivier called out for lot number two. Legs weak, April slumped into her seat. Troy whooped one more time and sat beside her. He kissed her cheek.

“Brilliant work, babe,” he said. “Brilliant.”

The remaining properties continued on at the same rapid clip, the excitement escalating and reverberating through the walls and into the skyboxes. Paddles popped up like fireworks. The price board flickered. Numbers and currencies scattered down the board as April made notes, her mouth open in shock. By the end of the night 150 assets had been sold. Though the prices, as expected, never matched the Boldini, they were all elevated by Marthe’s portrait, and maybe also a little by the journal entries interspersed throughout the book.

In the end April did not have to write “Passed” on a single item. The collection was 100 percent sold. The best April had ever done in a single night was 91 percent. But tonight it was 100 percent .

When the final gavel of the night hit the podium, April sprang from her chair. Hugs were exchanged all around. She didn’t have the data in front of her, but April knew this would be the most successful auction her small department had ever done. Though perhaps Sotheby’s would not consider it small anymore.

“Madame Vannier,” April said, when she finally managed to catch her breath, when all hugs and kisses were distributed and most of the skybox emptied. “These numbers, they are unprecedented!”

“It was very exciting,” she agreed. “I did not expect to have such fun.”

“Well, I’m glad you could come,” April said as two men helped Madame Vannier up from her wheelchair.

Upon standing Madame Vannier smoothed the skirt of her iridescent navy gown and then fiddled with the sapphire-and-diamond earrings pulling down her lobes. She smiled, her face suddenly a decade, two decades younger. Her white hair glittered beneath the chandelier.

“I must confess,” she said. “It was rather exhilarating. I can see why you have such enthusiasm for your work. It’s nice to know my father’s paintings weren’t so worthless, so out of style. I think he would’ve been pleased.”

“‘Worthless’? Not a chance! Based on the purchase price, few artists are worth more. Your father, he set records tonight. He set a record for his own works. This I know.”

Madame Vannier blinked. Hard. Her eyes turned wet as April’s gut clenched. She knew better than to personalize the item, to make the seller regret putting it on the floor.

“Your father”—April started, the words gummed up in her mouth—“it’s obviously a bit late, but you know we could’ve arranged for you to keep it? You did not have to sell the painting. There are plenty of other items, as you can see. I’m concerned this wasn’t made clear.”

She was not supposed to say that, or anything like it. Had Peter still been in the room he would’ve tried to push her through the plate-glass window.

“No, Madame Vogt,” Agnès said with a chuckle. “I did not want that particular painting. It was the money I was after. I needed the money.”

April glanced over at Luc, the man forever her Parisian barometer, and noted the smile he was very carefully trying to keep off his face. The woman wanted money, but April couldn’t point out the obvious, namely that the auction would generate more than Madame Vannier could spend in the balance of her lifetime.

“I know what you are thinking,” Madame Vannier said and laughed again. “That I am too old to need all this money, non? I will die soon. What a waste!”