Ambroise Vollard and the Vault of Fauve

Sotheby's holding selling a long-lost treasure trove of paintings, prints, books and drawings by key avant-garde artists of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. The works belonged to Ambroise Vollard, the legendary Parisian art dealer who played a pivotal role in the development of the Impressionist and Modern Art market: the artists he represented ranged from Renoir and Van Gogh to Cézanne, Picasso and the Fauves. Vollard’s contribution to the development of Modern art is perhaps unparalleled, as he created the market for Impressionist  & Modern art . 

The extraordinary trove of art treasures were discovered in 1979 in a bank vault at the Société Générale in Paris. The works were deposited there in 1939, soon after Vollard's death, by Erich Slomovic, a young Yugoslav associate of Vollard to whom the dealer had consigned the works. Soon after, Slomovic fled to Yugoslavia where he died in 1942 at the hands of the Nazis. The contents of the vault remained untouched for 40 years. On 21st March 1979, the bank was permitted under French law to open the vault and to sell any contents of value in order to recoup some 40 years of unpaid storage fees. As a result, the collection was consigned for a sale to be held at Hotel Drouot in Paris in March 1981. The announcement of the sale however, was swiftly followed by legal challenges, as a result of which the sale was cancelled. Those challenges now finally resolved, and the works are to be sold by agreement among the legal beneficiaries of the Vollard Estate. 

A second sale at Sotheby's in Paris reveals the broad range of Vollard’s enthusiasms. Highlights  include an early portrait by Cézanne of his childhood friend, the great novelist Emile Zola as well as risqué monotypes by Degas including the celebrated La Fête de la patronne. The sale also showcases a striking example of Gauguin's rare and inventive monotypes, or transfer drawings, that he made with Vollard's encouragement and such important early prints by Picasso as Le Repas frugal, 1904 from the artist's Blue Period and Les Saltimbanques, 1905 from the slightly later Rose Period. There is also a very touching self portrait by Renoir dedicated to Ambroise Vollard, as well as a striking colour lithograph of Le Chapeau Epinglé, one of the most popular printed works by the artist. Alongside these remarkable pieces, collectors will find smaller gems such as an anonymous photograph showing Vollard at a dinner table surrounded by his artist friends, and handwritten pages penned by Chagall recounting his first arrival in Paris.

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