Maharaja Holkar of Indore, Manik Bagh Palace, Indore, India
Sotheby Parke Bernet, Monaco, "Mobilier Moderniste: Provenant du Palais du Maharaja d'Indore," May 25, 1980, lot 204
Private collection
Sotheby's, Paris, "Arts Décoratifs du XXe Siècle & Design Contemporain," November 22, 2011, lot 135
Acquired from the above directly after the sale
"Eileen Gray," Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, February 20-May 20, 2013 and then traveled to Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, October 12, 2013-January 19, 2014
ILLUSTRATED
Philippe Garner, Twentieth-Century Furniture, New York, 1980, p. 110
Peter Adam, Eileen Gray: Architect-Designer, London, 1987, pp. 188, 247
Patricia Bayer, Art Deco Interiors, London, 1990, p. 136
Philippe Garner, Eileen Gray: Designer and Architect, Berlin, 1993, pp. 36, 103
Reto Niggl, Eckart Muthesius 1930: The Maharaja's Palace in Indore, Architecture and Interior, Stuttgart, 1996, p. 74
Pierre Kjellberg, Art Déco: Les Maîtres du Mobilier – Le Décor des Paquebots, Paris, 1998, p. 110
Reto Niggl, Eckart Muthesius: India, 1930 - 1939, Berlin, 1999, p. 70
Le Palais Du Maharajah D'Indore; photographs, exh. cat., Galerie Doria, Paris, 2006, p. 89
Peter Adam, Eileen Gray: Her Life and Work, Munich, 2008, front cover pp. 96, 281
Jennifer Goff, "Shades of Gray," Irish Arts Review, September-November 2013, p. 107
Eileen Gray sous la direction de Cloé Pitiot, exh. cat., Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, 2013, pp. 69, 187
Irish • 1878 - 1976
One of the most important designers working in early twentieth-century Paris was in fact an unlikely expatriate: an extraordinary, aristocratic woman from provincial Ireland named Eileen Gray. After completing studies in painting at the Slade in London, Gray moved to Paris in 1906. There she partnered with the Japanese lacquer master Seizo Sugawara, applying the traditional technique to her original designs. She opened her gallery, Jean Désert, in 1922 and found steady work producing luxury objects for an elite clientele.
Soon, however, she branched out to larger projects. As an interior designer, she completed apartments for Juliette Lévy and her friend Jean Badovici. Encouraged by Badovici, she learned architectural drawing and designed the villa E-1027 in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, which was completed in 1929. Gray was largely forgotten until 1968, when the architectural historian Joseph Rykwert praised her in an article for Domus. Four years later her lacquer screen "Le Destin" achieved the top price in the historic auction of couturier Jacques Doucet's collection in Paris. Recognition — in the form of scholarship, exhibitions and collecting — has gained steady momentum ever since. As curator Jennifer Goff has written, "Collectors vie to own her furniture; historians compete to document her life."
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