Mercado de arte

Console by Diego Giacometti achieves $1,762,500

Detail from the unique console by Diego Giacometti; it was sold for $1,762,500 at Doyle New York

At Doyle New York’s April 8, 2013 auction; this is the New World Auction Record for the Artist.
Detail from the unique console by Diego Giacometti; it was sold for $1,762,500 at Doyle New York
 

A bronze and glass console table by Diego Giacometti achieved $1,762,500 at Doyle New York’s Doyle+Design auction on April 8, 2013. This stunning price set a new world auction record for a work by Diego Giacometti.
The circa 1975 console, titled Titled Chevreuil, Biche et Bambi, unique console by Diego Giacometti was sold for $1,762,500 at Doyle New YorkChevreuil, Biche et Bambi, is a unique piece commissioned from Giacometti by French fashion designer Serge Matta, brother of Surrealist painter Roberto Matta. Serge Matta was an enthusiastic collector of works by Giacometti, who was represented by Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York. Pierre Matisse also represented Matta’s brother, Roberto.
This one-of-a-kind console was commissioned for Serge Matta’s country house in France, and the lot is accompanied by a letter from Pierre Mattise to Matta stating:

Mon Cher Serge,
Our friend Diego just told me that the console (…Chevreuil, Biche et Bambi, 81 x 170 x 38 cm) that you commissioned for your country house is ready-it is preferable that you come to get it at his studio.  I will be in Paris at the end of the month.
Pierre

The consignor of the console purchased it directly from Serge Matta, and a second accompanying letter states:

Received the (agreed?) sum for the sale of the console in bronze (Chevreuil, Biche et Bambi, measuring 81 x 170 x 38 cm) signed on the (crossbar?) Diego and… initialed DG….. (made?) for myself from the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York
In Paris, 10 May 1982
Serge Matta

The bronze console with glass top depicts a bucolic scene of a buck (see detail), doe and fawn interspersed with three pine trees. Estimated at $400,000-600,000, it was the object of competitive bidding, which dwindled to two determined phone bidders, one from New York and one from the United Kingdom. The console was hammered down to the British buyer.