T his season we are partnering with British textile brand, Christopher Farr. With a focus on art, design, and making, Christopher Farr is underpinned by a commitment to the finest materials, craftsmanship, and innovative collaborations with artists and designer around the world. This spring, their exclusive wall coverings and rugs, created in collaboration with the estates of Bauhaus artists and weavers Anni Albers and Gunta Stölzl, will form the backdrop of our global exhibitions, juxtaposing 17–19th century furniture and decorative arts with the modernist aesthetic.
Our Spring season sale in New York is distinguished by prestigious historic ownerships, with pieces formerly in the collections of James Alexander, 2nd Earl Caledon (1777–1839), Caledon Castle, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland (lot 25), Catherine the Great of Russia (1729–1796) (lot 55), Granville Leveson-Gower (1773–1846), later 1st Earl Granville, the British ambassador to Russia (lot 57), Carlos de Bestegui (1895-1970), Château de Groussay (lot 71), Lawrence P. Fisher (1852–1921), whose family wealth was made in the Detroit automobile industry in the 1920–30's (lots 126–127) and the Duke of Windsor (1894-1972) and the Duchess of Windsor (1896-1986) (lots 92–109).
In a city that abounds with storied properties, this house in Holmby Hills stands out as a sort of Regency villa transplanted to the warmer climes of the Pacific coast. Originally built in the 1930s for the comédienne Fanny Brice, better known at the Funny Girl of stage and screen, its most recent owner recreated the interiors to showcase her collection of Fine Art and Georgian and Regency furniture. “Like all the best decorating, English style doesn’t date,” she observes, and the result was a series of rooms distinguished by layers of texture and colour, which like all the greatest English country houses evoked a sense of having been lived in for generations.
The collection forms the opening sequence of both Sotheby’s spring auctions of Furniture and Design on 4th and 5th April, and highlights include an important Queen Anne Japanned Bureau Cabinet by W. Price signed and dated 1713, an impressive pair of Cary’s 21-inch library globes, a pair of Louis XV giltwood fauteuils by Heurtaut, chairs and tables by Gillows, Herend Rothschild and Dodie Thayer dinner services, and carefully formed assemblages of objects ranging from model staircases, ball clocks, Tartanware and ship dioramas to Palissy ware ceramics and 19th century hat moulds. The collection fully reflects the personality of the owner and her triumphant interpretation of the Regency style under the California sun.
An important Milton Avery oil on canvas, Rippled Sea, will be offered in the Modern Day Auction, New York, on 17 May 2023.
