The resurgent Russian art market should receive an almighty boost in London on December 2 when Fabergé’s glittering Winter Egg heads a 48-lot Russian Sale at Christie’s.
The Winter Egg is made of rock-crystal and stands 14.2cm high. It was conceived by Fabergé’s most celebrated female designer Alma Pihl and crafted by her uncle, workmaster Albert Holmström. The interior is engraved with frost motifs, the exterior applied with rose-cut, diamond-set platinum snowflakes; diamond-set platinum borders conceal the hinge. The Egg is topped by a cabochon moonstone; its rock-crystal base, mimicking melting ice, is applied with rose-cut diamond-set platinum rivulets. The Egg contains a trelliswork platinum basket containing white quartz anemones and a demantoid garnet with nephrite leaves.
SHEIKH AND NOT STIRRED
The Winter Egg was commissioned by Nicholas II in 1913 – year of the Romanov tercentenary – at a cost of 24,600 rubles, making it the third most expensive Egg Fabergé produced. The Tsar presented it to his Danish mother, Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, who kept it at the Anichkov Palace in St Petersburg until September 1917, when it was dispatched by the Provisional Government to the Kremlin Armoury. In 1922 Soviet authorities transferred the Egg to Gokhran (the State institution responsible for jewellery and precious metals), who sold it to Wartski for £450 a few years later. It was subsequently owned by Baron Alington, Sir Bernard Eckstein and Arthur Ledbrook, who died in 1974. In 1994 it was auctioned as the ‘Property of a Trust’ for CHF7,263,500 (£3.5m) at Christie’s Geneva. It reappeared a Christie’s New York in 2002, fetching $9,579,500 (£6.6m). Both prices set new records for Fabergé at auction.
The Winter Egg, Christie’s Geneva, 1994
The buyer in 2002 was Saud bin Muhammed Al-Thani (1966-2014), one of the world’s most rapacious art collectors either side of the Millennium as Qatar’s culture supremo. Al-Thani was a Sheikh. Why are Christie’s claiming the Egg and rest of their short sale hail from a ‘Princely Collection’?
Al-Thani spent close to £1 billion on artworks before being accused of misusing public funds in 2005, dying in exiled disgrace nine years later, aged just 48. Did he actually pay for the Winter Egg, I wonder? Rumour has it the Egg was never collected from Christie’s, let alone paid for – and that Christie’s are essentially selling the Egg to recoup money they upfronted back in 2002.
WILL IT SELL ?
Hard to say. The fact that Russians cannot bid because of sanctions doesn’t help. But the Winter Egg is a unique work of historical importance and extraordinary beauty – the highlight of the V & A’s blockbuster Fabergé exhibition in 2021-22. The Egg would enhance any Fabergé collection in the world – so there’ll be no shortage of willing new owners. Whether they can afford Christie’s price-tag is another matter.
WHAT COULD IT MAKE ?
Christie’s hope the Winter Egg will bring upwards of £20m. That’s a lot of dosh in anyone’s language. The highest price for a Fabergé Imperial Easter Egg to date is £8.9 million for the Rothschild Egg at Christie’s London in 2007.
The Rothschild Egg
WHO COULD BUY IT ?
I doubt we’ll know immediately. It’s unlikely to be bought by someone present in the saleroom – more likely on-line or over the phone. It’s not inconceivable that a Russian buyer could seek to acquire the Egg through a proxy. Viktor Vekselberg owns nine Imperial Easter Eggs, the Kremlin owns ten; he could be tempted to draw level. I wonder if my old buddy Alexander Ivanov will be bidding this time? I can just imagine Putin buying the Egg through Ivanov or another proxy as a ‘fuck sanctions’ gesture – then giving it to Donald Trump in return for the Donbas.
NOW IS THE WINTER EGG OF OUR DISCONTENT
What if the Egg doesn’t sell? Will the Russian market suffer?
I don’t think so. Most Fabergé Imperial Eggs are in museums; only a handful may ever come on the market. They are so rare and expensive that they exist in a financial world of their own. Just now the Russian Art Market is, at last, springing shoots of revival. I can’t see these being frozen by an unsold Winter Egg.
