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The 19th Paris Biennial Antique Dealers' Fair attracted many visitors as usual but most professionals were not entirely satisfied about their sales.
Dealers are somewhat accustomed to the fact that it is not an easy task to sell art objects of top quality at will. For example, the Antwerp Blondeel-Deroyan gallery needed 18 months after the 18th Biennial to sell to the Metropolitan Museum of New York a major 15th Century tapestry, «Triumph of Fame » (which once belonged to Queen Isabel the Catholic of Spain) for some US $ 2 million.
Professionals admitted that the present world stock exchange upheavals had been affecting their activities to a great extent. Buyers therefore remained quite cautious especially after losing in recent months large amounts of money in Wall Street or elsewhere.
Most well-off French buyers have large parts of their assets in shares or bonds and the plunge of the Paris Bourse index has been for them a cause of anxiety which has dried down their thirst for art objects.
However, jewels have sold quite well at the Biennial. Graff from London was much elated stressing his sales had gone beyond all expectations. Exhibiting magnificent diamonds, including four 50 carat stones, he said his customers from Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines who had lost 80% of their assets following the slump of South East Asian shares now felt much more secure with their investments in rare precious stones.
Regarding art objects, furniture and paintings few American buyers showed up at the Biennial, the main reason being that it coincided with the Jewish New Year and Yom Kippur, a fact underlined by Torkom Demerjian of the Ariadne Gallery of New
York who said that organisers had been guilty of a «cultural mistake ».
Old Master paintings did not fare so well with only a view of the San Giorgio Maggiore Church by Guardi reportedly sold at just under US $ 3 million, the highest price recorded so far in this category.
De Jonckheere (Paris and Brussels) felt happy selling some 20 16th and 17 Century paintings priced between US $ 35,000 and 160,000.
19th and 20th century paintings were in demand but sales were limited to works worth under US $ 180,000. Still, dealers hoped that many contacts would eventually be successful in the weeks to come.
As for furniture, the «Biennale » started well during the first three days and then fell into some kind of lull, the best results being achieved by Segoura who sold an 18th century table by Oeben, Didier Aron who obtained US $ 525,000 for two 18th Century armchairs by Tillard Junior and Bernard Steinitz who managed to get US $ 625,000 for a 17th Century Augsburg-made cabinet.
Finally ceramics, rare books and illuminated manuscripts sold well giving the Biennial some better lustre but overall this edition seemed a bit disappointing.
Still professionals make a point of marking their presence in this event for the simple reason that it remains a must and also a useful springboard for their activities until the next edition. Adrian Darmon
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