Exhibition "Precious Art Deco Objects" (Paris)

 L’École, School of Jewelry Arts presents for the first time in France, a selection of art objects from a remarkable collection of the Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan. This exhibition runs from April 4-25, 2018.

The precious boxes that make up that collection were amassed for his wife, the Princess Catherine Aleya Beriketti, represents real incredible masterpieces of inventiveness, creativity, fantasy, skills and technical prowess.

These precious objects, whose craftsmanship was as important as their function, were specially designed for the first wave of ‘liberated’ women in the 1920s: women who smoked, enjoyed going out, applied make-up in public, and kept track of their numerous social engagements with a watch or a clock.

Cigarette cases, nécessaires (vanity cases), powder compacts and other precious objects in gold enriched in ornamental or precious stones, adorned with mother-of-pearl, lacquer or translucent enamel, sometimes enhanced with miniatures of Asian or Western inspiration, were presented for the first time in New York at the Cooper Hewitt Museum on the occasion of the exhibition «The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s».

Chinese dragons, Persian birds, Japanese plum blossoms, lake views and mountain landscapes . . . the smallest objects can contain entire worlds. The fifty or so Art Deco period boxes exhibited at L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts are magnificent examples of this.

Vanity cases, powder compacts and cigarette boxes are the backdrop for refined decorative effects, executed on the miniature surfaces. To look at, these feminine accessories are veritable masterpieces of creativity, fantasy and technique. Made from gold or platinum, they are enriched with precious stones and gemstones, and covered in mother-of-pearl, enamel or lacquer. They exist in a variety of forms—from the rectangular to the cylindrical, as well as more unusual and original volumes. These jewels of ingenuity shelter a secret, intimate universe, which is revealed in stages, like a sequence of special moments: the opening of the box, the compartments, and then the discovery of the beauty accessories inside, such as a mirror, comb, lipstick and miniature compact. To quote Henry Miller: ‘Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.’

All of the objects exhibited at L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts come from the former collection of Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, who collected over a hundred of these boxes at the end of the 20th century. The majority of these were created by the greatest Parisian jewelers of the 1920s and 1930s, and reflect the epoch’s penchant for Art Deco. They combine Oriental decoration and French savoir faire. A cultivated and refined figure, whose life and career were written between East and West, Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan understood the importance of dialogue between cultures.

This extraordinary exhibition can be said to attest to the exquisite tastes of Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, but also to the creativity and expertise of the Parisian jewelry houses that produced them.

This exhibition was presented at L’ÉCOLE Paris in Spring 2018, in Dubai during Spring 2019 and in Hong-Kong during Fall 2019 and it gathered a selection of art objects from an exclusive collection of Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan.
The precious boxes that make up that collection were amassed for his wife, the Princess Catherine Aleya Beriketti, and represent incredible masterpieces of inventiveness, creativity, fantasy, skills and technical prowess.
These precious objects, whose craftsmanship was as important as their function, were specially designed for the first wave of 'liberated' women in the 1920s: women who smoked, enjoyed going out, applied make-up in public, and kept track of their numerous social engagements with a watch or a clock.

The exhibition catalog is available in English and French.
Editor: L’ÉCOLE, School of Jewelry Arts
Price: 10 €

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