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ALPHONSE MUCHA & MASTERS OF ART NOUVEAU:
THE HARRY C. MEYERHOFF COLLECTION
It is amazing to consider that this is the first auction dedicated to a private
collection of posters and works by Alphonse Mucha. This exceptional
collection began in the late 1970s and grew through the ’80s, at a time
when the poster market had only newly come into its own.
The modern resurgence of interest in Art Nouveau and poster collecting
can be traced to the 1960s. From the end of the nineteenth century until
that time, the market for posters was inconsistent. Interest solidified with
the organization of two seminal exhibitions at the Victoria and Albert
Museum in London:
Art Nouveau and Alphonse Mucha
, 1963, and
Aubrey
Beardsley
, 1966. They were a revelation and raised awareness about the
earlier era. Following these exhibitions, prominent books on the topic were
written: Jane Abdy’s
The French Poster
, 1969, and Bevis Hillier’s
Posters
,
1974. By 1976, Rizzoli had published a major book on Mucha.
Intellectual interest turned into collecting interest, and in 1978 the Musée
de l’Affiche opened in Paris and auctions of posters began to appear both
in France and the United States. In 1978, Maitre Savot started organizing
specialized poster auctions in France with Florence Camard as his expert.
In November 1979, Jack Rennert organized the first auction exclusively of
posters at Phillips in New York. A new generation of collectors discovered
Michel Romand’s Galerie Documents in Paris and Philip Granville’s Lords
Gallery in London, and dealers around the world came to prominence as
they began to specialize in posters.
Harry C. Meyerhoff jumped into this young market
.
He was a pioneer when
it came to collecting posters and Art Nouveau, but he also had his own,
unique perspective
.
He focused as much on rarities as he did on more
common masterworks, even ones in pristine condition. His collection is
surprising in that many of Mucha’s classic images of Sarah Bernhardt and
other recognizable images are not present. On the other hand, Meyerhoff
acquired some posters that were so scarce they have never been seen at
auction before. He largely shied away from such signature, ubiquitous