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Russian tycoon buys Faberge eggs - Front Page - Brief Article
Art in America, April, 2004
On Apr. 20 and 21, Sotheby's had planned to sell at auction one of the season's biggest treasure troves, a group of nine jewel-encrusted Faberge Imperial Easter Eggs consigned by the Forbes Collection. The celebrated works were expected to fetch around $120 million. In early February, however, auction house officials announced that the eggs had been sold privately to Viktor Vekselberg, a prominent Russian industrialist.
Sotheby's brokered the transaction on behalf of the Forbes family, which welcomed the deal aimed at keeping the works together and returning them to Russia. While the final sale figure was not announced, experts have suggested a sum of about $110 million. Saving the costs of producing a catalogue and promoting the works with exhibitions in New York and London, not to mention avoiding the uncertainties of the shaky auction market of recent years, Sotheby's opted to forgo the auction and accept a 12-percent commission for the private sale. Vekselberg plans to exhibit the works in Russia, although he has not yet designated a public venue. In order to help ensure that the works return to the country, the Russian government decided to waive all import taxes and duties on the gems. Officials from the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg and the Kremlin Museums in Moscow, whose collection already contains 10 Faberge Easter Eggs, have both expressed interest in housing the works. But Vekselberg, a billionaire who made his fortune in oil and aluminum companies, has stated to the press that the eggs might best be displayed in Yekaterinburg in East-Central Russia. Vekselberg is currently building a church in that city, on the site where Czar Nicholas II and other members of the Russian imperial family were put to death by the Bolsheviks in 1918.
COPYRIGHT 2004 Brant Publications, Inc.
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