Tell me Jean, Am I Beauty in this Mirror ?

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

In the catalog for Christie's sale in London on September 24, I viewed an incongruous and unexpected piece. Its fable worth destiny shows how can be transmitted to the modern world the influence of a style otherwise completely out of fashion.

The designers of the era of Louis XVI loved the theme of putti. They included them everywhere. Our piece of furnishing is a gilt bronze table mirror, 1 meter high, made by Gustave Dore between 1880 and 1883 for a Russian Imperial commission, and now estimated at 200 K £.

In the months before his fatal heart attack, Doré began to be interested in decorating. A prolific artist influenced by romanticism and fantasy, he had previously specialized in book illustrations, for which he was one of the best draughtsmen of his time.

Clinging to the drapés, the putti of our mirror are realistic and active. It's the only thing that distinguishes them from their predecessors, but it has probably been enough to draw the attention of Jean Cocteau, a great fan of the works of Dore, who became its owner.

Thus this object inspired in 1946 one of the most poetic and most atypical films in the history of movies, "Beauty and the Beast"!

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

The Mirror of Gustave Dore was not sold.

The seller would it too expensive, but it is always difficult to find a buyer for too atypical lots.

If the price of an object is, according to my assumption, a reliable indicator of its cultural significance, for sure the result of the auction is to be taken into account, not the estimate.