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THE MAGAZINE UPCOMING AUCTIONS
HD
25 March
Kachinas from
the Yves Berger collection
All art lovers remember the first Yves Berger sale on 15 April 2002 as a real high point for Amerindian art. The sale at
Drouot that day featured one of the very few collections dedicated to North American Indians, built up over nearly 40
years by a true enthusiast. A major figure in French publishing who spent most of his career with Grasset, Yves Berger,
himself a best-selling novelist who won the Médicis and Renaudot prizes, collected some fifty iconic pieces, mostly
from before 1880. The dispersion was a success, totalling €405,000 in 44 lots. Ten years on, it's the turn of his Kachina
doll collection, carefully preserved by Berger's wife, to wend its way to the sale room (Eve auction house). Like Emil
Nolde and André Breton before him, Berger was interested in the aesthetic and poetic value of these so-called primitive
objects. The dolls are based on masked dancers, and form part of children's religious education. Key items in this
collection include these three pieces from before 1900, including the Pahi Ala kachina (€18,000/25,000) in the centre.
The sale will continue with some Pre-Columbian pieces featured in a separate catalogue (around 180 lots). Worth
noting: this large terracotta sculpture from Veracruz of a seated shaman with an expressive face (€50,000/60,000
photo), and a rare piece of Aztec jewellery in gold alloy, from the former American collection of Fred Eisermann. This is
an imperial relic of Moctezuma, the antepenultimate emperor of Pre-Columbian Mexico (€4,500/5,000).
S. P-D
36 GAZETTE DROUOT INTERNATIONAL I N° 23
Kachina Mongwa (great horned
owl Kachina), c. 1880, h. 22.5 cm.
Estimate: €15,000/18,000.
Pahi Ala (Three horned) Kachina,
c. 1890, h. 36 cm.
Estimate: €18,000/25,000.
Proud Kachina, c.1890, h. 25 cm.
Estimate €12,000/15,000.
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