19 February 2025
Joy McCall
It is time to celebrate! And we are going to do just that at Lyon & Turnbull with a one-off sale, 1925: Celebrating Art Deco on 26th June 2025 in London.
The objective of the sale is two-fold, to celebrate 100 years since the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes and shine a spotlight on Art Deco as a style.
2025 marks the centenary since Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes was held in Paris. We are aiming to gather examples of items that were displayed at the 1925 exhibition for our forthcoming auction.
The second dimension of the sale is to focus on Art Deco as a style. It is out of the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes that the term Art Deco was coined. The phrase art deco had been used before, but it was only after 1966 that it first truly was assimilated into everyday parlance. There were arguably two main triggers for this – one was an exhibition entitled Les Années 25 : Art Déco, Bauhaus, Stijl, Esprit Nouveau, that was held at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, in Paris where it came to be identified as a specific style. The second was a book by Bevis Hillier entitled Art Deco of the 20s and 30s published in 1968 that spawned an exhibition in Minneapolis in 1971.
From an era often described as the Roaring Twenties, the Machine Age and the Golden Age of Travel, Art Deco was a style rich in diversity. Besides being both international and national with its regional variations, it was a style paying homage to other cultures. While luxury and traditional craftsmanship were esteemed, modernity was also revered with sawing skyscrapers and new materials explored.
Lyon & Turnbull is welcoming consignments for the sale which will include furniture, sculpture, lighting, carpets, glass, ceramics, silver, metalwork, jewellery and posters. Work by designers such as Edgar Brandt, Jean Dunand, Demetre Chiparus, Ferdinand Preiss, René Lalique, Daum, Gabriel Argy-Rousseau, François Decorchement, and Jean Puiforcat to name but a few, is being sought.
DANCER OF KAPURTHALA
THENCE TO HYDE PARK, 1930
TABLE LAMP, CIRCA 1930
TRAY, CIRCA 1925
CINQ CHEVAUX CAR MASCOT, NO. 1122
'LE JARDIN DES HESPERIDES' VASE, DESIGNED 1925
'LA TENTATION' FLOOR LAMP, DESIGNED 1920-26
VASE, CIRCA 1930
