Art Deco Centenary:
Galerie Vallois brings together masterpieces at FAB Paris
Friday 27 June 2025
Galerie Vallois, an international reference in Art Deco, is set to make history at FAB Paris with an exceptional presentation.
For its first participation in the fair, it will orchestrate a grand celebration of the centenary of the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts of 1925, the founding event that gave birth to the Art Deco movement.
Under the majestic nave of the Grand Palais, from September 20 to 24, 2025, Galerie Vallois will transform its stand into a true ephemeral museum. More than 20 Art Deco masterpieces will compose this exceptional exhibition, bringing together the most prestigious signatures of the era: Pierre Chareau, Paul Iribe, Eileen Gray, André Groult, Pierre Legrain, Albert-Armand Rateau, Jacques-Émile Ruhlmann, Marcel Coard, and Jean Dunand.
The scenography, designed by René Bouchara, will showcase these iconic pieces. A remarkable feature of this museum-quality exhibition: the works come from private collections and will not be offered for sale, giving this presentation a purely artistic and heritage character, worthy of the greatest institutions.
Among the treasures on display will notably feature the famous Dragon Armchair by Eileen Gray (circa 1917-1919), acquired by Galerie Vallois for 10,000 francs in 1971 and purchased for one of its collectors for 22 million euros during the Yves Saint Laurent sale in 2009.
Eileen GRAY (1878-1976)
Lacquered wood armchair
Circa 1917-1919
Rounded form, upholstered in later brown leather, the back upholstered, the structure in orange-brown lacquered wood with patinated silver leaf inclusions, with a motif in light relief of brown lacquered stylised clouds, representing two dragons, the heads carved into the armrests, the eyes lacquered black on a white background, the bodies extending into the sinuous base at the back of the seat.
Provenance
- Suzanne Talbot Collection (later Madame Mathieu-Lévy), flat boulevard Suchet, Paris, 16th arrondissement.
- Robert and Cheska Vallois, Paris, 1971
- Michel Perinet collection, 1973
- Yves Saint Laurent et Pierre Bergé collection, Christie’s Paris sale 2009
Photo credit: Arnaud Carpentier – Galerie Vallois Paris
“I was lucky enough to meet Eileen Gray when she was 94. She didn’t teach me, she told me, she opened up a world to me and that saved me an incredible amount of time, I understood the difference between the beautiful and the exceptional”.
Cheska Vallois
A historic tribute in an emblematic venue of the 1925 exhibition
This presentation takes on a particular symbolic dimension: it takes place within the very walls of the Grand Palais, theater of the legendary 1925 exhibition – – spread between the Grand Palais and the Invalides – that attracted sixteen million visitors from April to October and definitively established Art Deco on the international scene.
This temporal convergence – one hundred years after the founding event – and the geographical opportunity offered by FAB Paris being held at the Grand Palais give Galerie Vallois’s initiative exceptional historical resonance.
The gallery, with fifty-four years of expertise and passion for French Art Deco creators, thus celebrates not only a revolutionary artistic movement, but also its own journey of exploration and valorization of these exceptional works.
“It was a revolutionary period for furniture, with unprecedented modernity from almost all the designers of the time. And this modernity was accompanied by an utterly magnificent sophistication, with superb materials.
Art Deco invented modernity, it was invented for us over 100 years ago and it hasn’t aged a day.”
Cheska Vallois
Jacques-Emile RUHLMANN (1879-1933)
A Macassar ebony and ivory triplan secretary cabinet, standing on slender fluted legs and silvered bronze sabots
Circa 1920
The central flap opens onto a coralwood and green-tinted leather interior decorated with gold pebbles. The side doors open onto coralwood shelves and compartments.
Photo credit: Arnaud Carpentier – Galerie Vallois Paris
Finally, to mark its fifty-four years of existence, Galerie Vallois will publish a 400-page reference book “Le regard des Vallois sur l’Art Déco” whose launch will take place at FAB Paris.
