Dealer Spotlight: Wartski

Geoffrey Munn of Wartski takes us from the ancien regime to Gigi.

We are living in an age transfixed by the cult of personality.  Jewelery is such a personal item that one wears and reflects how people wish to represent themselves.  How important to your clients is the provenance of a piece?

Well, it makes a huge difference to me, and I suppose by extension it will to the customer.  There are various royal objects to be seen here within inches of me.  The pearls on this necklace are said to have belonged to Marie Antoinette and there’s no reason to doubt it because it’s descended through a family from the Duchess of Sutherland who was in waiting to the French Queen.  It is said that Marie Antoinette gave her the pearls when she was in prison and the Duchess smuggled them out. 

So they would have been loose pearls?

Yes.  And I suppose that story has some credibility, but what is certain is the descent within the family.  And while that may be a romantic provenance, what is not and is based on stone hard fact is that we have several pieces here from Fabergé that we know belonged to the imperial family.  And the reason we know it is that they were engraved with inventory numbers and you can send those off to Russia and they will tell you that it was purchased by Nicholas and Alexandra, on what day, how much, and with a photostat of the bill with the czar’s instructions to pay it. 

a Faberge nephrite box belonging to Czar Nicholas

So that applies to the nephrite box over there which is a cigarette box bound in two colors of gold.  We know it passed through the czar and czarina’s hands.  There is enormous magic in Fabergé because part of the fascination with Fabergé is that it is the last flowering of court art, the last great statement of luxury from any dynasty.

a pair of cufflinks given by Maurice Chevalier to his pianist

 You go from the imperial family to Maurice Chevalier?

I suppose it is a reflection of one’s personal interest, and that is important.  Also I think that there is a talismanic quality about jewelry.  It is absolutely unchanging.  It can’t fade and it is exactly the same visual experience for us as it was for our predecessors.  There’s always been very strange sublimated fascination.  People don’t feel it immediately, but they sort of know it. 

When I put on the tiaras show at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the visitors came and it was a bit like elephants who pick up the bones of their ancestors and move them around and rub them.  The great irony of these things is that they’re unchanging, they’re utterly permanent.  It is they that are going on and it is us that are utterly ephemeral.

You wrote the book Tiaras as well as curated the show.  Where do tiaras have a place in 20^th century life?

Well, they probably don’t in a funny way….

Except Paris Hilton!

Exactly.  They are very seldom worn.   They were worn when the Queen had receptions, more often then not the women were required to wear tiaras.  They’re not a sign of rank at all, it’s only the high rank of the circumstances.  So if you went to a very grand dance where it was white tie, it would be implicit that the women would wear head ornaments.  And now there is no white tie at all.  There is black tie but that is not the same thing and it’s not at all appropriate [to wear a tiara].  There is still a deep fascination with them because they’re the biggest, best, most eccentric, most glamorous of all types of jewelry.  They transcend everything from necklaces to earrings, and they’re just better and more fun.  That’s why we like them.  On the stand we have one in the form of a pair of diamond wings.

It is by Chaumet, platinum and diamonds.

What is the date?

  

About 1890, 1900 when the concept of flight didn’t exist.  Flight was a much more exotic, magical thing to talk about.  Today we zoom around the world like Ariel from Shakespeare in a second.  But in those days travel was very cumbersome and slow and so here you have wings.  It’s also the wings of love without a doubt.  It’s a reference to Mercury.

It’s very modern in its simplicity.

People do love it.  Winged jewelry isn’t very easy to sell, if it’s a brooch or something like that, but this for somehow or another has captured everyone’s attention.