France to sell part of national furniture collection but not all agree
Critics fear the decision will legitimise further sales of art from national collections and turn attention that sales profits will go to a healthcare foundation chaired by Brigitte Macron
A piece of furniture from the national collection. Source: Mobilier national/Musée des Avelines/TAN
Hervé Lemoine, the director of France's national furniture collection, is going to sell 100 pieces of furniture at an auction this autumn in aid of French healthcare workers. He stresses that "no major pieces of furniture" will be offered for sale, the Art Newspaper reports.
The auction is scheduled for September 20-21. The items to be sold are made during the Louis Philippe I period (1830-1848). All proceeds from the sale will go to Foundation for Paris Hospitals and French Hospitals chaired by the president's wife Brigitte Macron.
The national collection includes over 130,000 items that are used to furnish the chateaux, palaces and embassies of France, along with state offices such as the presidential Élysée Palace.
"The collection is in theory inalienable [cannot be disposed of], but furniture no longer having any use or heritage value can be sold if a relevant [sale] commission is proposed," Sylvie Kerviel wrote in Le Monde.
"In our warehouses. we keep masterpieces and lopsided wardrobes in the same conditions. It is therefore necessary to identify the really important pieces so as to protect and identify them," Lemoine said. "Today, almost 30% of our budget is eaten up by the cost of these spaces at the expense of restoring or acquiring remarkable pieces."
"The Mobilier National keeps vast quantities of furniture which are no longer of use and would find no place in a museum. There are kilometres of stores which carry significant costs. But the way the sale has been marketed—in aid of the Brigitte Macron foundation—is wrong," Didier Rykner, the editor of the website La Tribune de l'Art, added.
Subscribe to our mailing list:
Komentar
Posting Komentar