The European Fine Art Fair, known as TEFAF, took over the Maastricht Exhibition & Conference Centre from March 7, and the fair will end on March 15. Some 280 dealers have traveled to the Dutch city for the 33rd edition of TEFAF Maastricht, which will proceed as planned despite the coronavirus outbreak in Europe.
Wildenstein and Co, Fergus McCaffrey and Galerie Monbrison have decided to pull out of the Maastricht edition in response to concerns over the virus, with TEFAF stating that the fair will take precautionary measures to ensure public health.
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This year, TEFAF Maastricht will once more provide collectors the opportunity to discover and potentially acquire some of the finest artworks available on the market. Among them are Edgar Degas’ Three Dancers In Yellow Skirts, which will be brought to the market for the first time in years by Hammer Galleries. For this vibrant oil-on-canvas, the French Impressionist experimented new techniques to depict his signature ballet dancers, notably painting the circles of orange above the dancers’ heads with his fingertips.
Although the asking price for Three Dancers In Yellow Skirts is unknown, The New York Times has reported that it could come close to the US$37 million (S$51 million) fetched by Degas’ Danseuse Au Repos in 2008 at Sotheby’s New York.
Also on view at TEFAF Maastricht will be the newly-rediscovered Venus And Cupid With Mercury And Psyche by Flemish master Bartholomeus Spranger. This allegorical oil-on-canvas has not been seen on the auction market since the mid-18th century, with Weiss Gallery now offering it for 5.5 million euros (around S$8.7 million). The finely preserved painting, representing a bejewelled Venus, is thought to have been commissioned by Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor, for his Schatz and Kunstkammer at Prague Castle.
For the 33rd edition of TEFAF’s flagship fair, Hancock Gallery will present a stunning circa 1890 tiara made for the fifth Marquess of Anglesey, Henry Cyril Paget. The piece of jewellery, worn by the sixth Marchioness of Anglesey at King George VI’s coronation in 1937, includes a graduated row of more than 100 carats of old European-cut and old mine-cut diamonds. This row can conveniently be detached to form a riviere necklace, with Hancock Gallery’s managing director Stephen Burton describing the piece as “the Rembrandt of tiaras” in The New York Times.
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Also returning to the market at the 2020 TEFAF Maastricht will be Paysanne Devant Une Chaumiere (Peasant Woman In Front Of A Farmhouse) by Vincent van Gogh, which will be presented by London dealer Dickinson. This landscape painting of a cottage was famously sold for £4 at a farm auction in 1967, before being authenticated by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Now on offer for an undisclosed price, Paysanne Devant Une Chaumiere comes from the private collection of an anonymous American collector, who reportedly acquired it for US$1.7 million at Sotheby’s in 2001.
TEFAF Maastricht will be open to the public to March 15, with tickets and additional information available on the fair’s official website.