His Grand Faon (Large Faun), 19in (49cm) tall, original Hebrard lost wax casting made Fr550,000 (£52,900) at Tajan on June 22. His Babouin Sacré Hamadryas (1910), in a lost wax casting by Hébrard numbered 8 (from an original series of ten), 17in (43cm) high, hit a top-estimate Fr3.15m (£303,000).
This appears to be a consistent price level for this figure – another example sold at Kohn Art last June for Fr2.8m (then £280,000) and another hit £305,000 at Christie’s in London in November.
Bugatti occasionally turned his attention to the human figure, as shown here by a Femme en Robe, 2ft 3in (69cm) tall, and signed on the base with a dedication à Mademoiselle Decori, that sold for Fr480,000 (£46,200).
Bugatti’s Petites Antilopes – a bronze group 9in (23cm) tall, showing two antelopes and subtitled The Sick Mother – rated Fr370,000 (£35,600) at Gros-Delettrez on June 26, where his Léopard Marchant, 71/2 x 19in (19 x 49cm), with black and dark green patina, also cast by Hébrard (numbered A3), padded over estimate to Fr1m (£96,000).
At the same sale, a Chiparus chryselephantine statuette, 22in (55cm) high, of the goddess Shiva sitting cross-legged on a fancy onyx base, each hand supporting an ivory pendant, sold over hopes for Fr1.16m (£111,500).
Pick of the furniture was Pierre Legrain’s unsigned, cubist-style settee with chamois lacquer featuring red tortoiseshell highlights, that sold well at Fr2.2m (£211,500) despite slight chips to the lacquer.
A parchment-covered oak commode by André Arbus and Vadim Andrusov, with two doors covered in square plaques of brown tortoiseshell, confirmed the current interest in Arbus by doubling estimate with Fr1m (£96,000). This was a variant on a model made for the Minister of Agriculture around 1936, and was fronted by a patinated bronze Medusa mask.
A slender-shafted patinated bronze standing lamp 5ft (1.53m) tall, designed by Alberto and Diego Giacometti and Jean-Michel Frank, also around 1936, scored Fr1.1m (£106,000).
True believers bid Bugatti’s Sacred Baboon to Fr3.15m
FRANCE: REMBRANDT Bugatti, the sculptor brother from the famous racing car family, has been a major saleroom force for some years and there is no stopping him at the moment to judge by recent sales in Paris.
