Just after my last newsletter went out Christie's Francois Pinault bought Piasa, reportedly France's third largest auction house. The move came just ten days after LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton announced that it had agreed to buy Etude Tajan, France's largest auction house. That announcement came only four months after the company's purchase of Phillips auction house.
Pinault and Bernard Arnault of LVMH reportedly have no love lost between them and are extremely competitive. Both men went after Etude Tajan, and when Pinault lost, he quickly purchased Piasa as a backup. Piasa, like Etude Tajan, has photography auctions as a part of its business. Michele Chomette is Piasa's photography expert and writes the only major catalogue with condition reports in the industry
The purchases give Christie's and Phillips an inside track to the French auction markets a full six months or more than their rival Sotheby's.
Piasa claims there are no current plans to merge operations with Christie's, but they will certainly work very closely together, at least until Christie's itself is allowed by French law to compete next year. Meanwhile Arnault plans to group Etude Tajan with Phillips in facilities at 22 avenue Montaigne, facing Drouot's Montaigne salesrooms.
Novak has over 48 years experience in the photography-collecting arena. He is a long-time member and formally board member of the Daguerreian Society, and, when it was still functioning, he was a member of the American Photographic Historical Society (APHS). He organized the 2016 19th-century Photography Show and Conference for the Daguerreian Society. He is also a long-time member of the Association of International Photography Art Dealers, or AIPAD. Novak has been a member of the board of the nonprofit Photo Review, which publishes both the Photo Review and the Photograph Collector, and is currently on the Photo Review's advisory board. He was a founding member of the Getty Museum Photography Council. He is author of French 19th-Century Master Photographers: Life into Art.
Novak has had photography articles and columns published in several newspapers, the American Photographic Historical Society newsletter, the Photograph Collector and the Daguerreian Society newsletter. He writes and publishes the E-Photo Newsletter, the largest circulation newsletter in the field. Novak is also president and owner of Contemporary Works/Vintage Works, a private photography dealer, which sells by appointment and has sold at exhibit shows, such as AIPAD New York and Miami, Art Chicago, Classic Photography LA, Photo LA, Paris Photo, The 19th-century Photography Show, Art Miami, etc.
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