Dakis Joannou was in London. It was the spring of 1996 and he was thinking about how to furnish the Athens house in which he was also installing emblematic works from the extraordinary collection of contemporary art that he had been assembling for a decade. It was in 1996 that he put his collecting activities on the world map with his groundbreaking exhibition of contemporary art Everything That's Interesting is New: the Dakis Joannou Collection. Joannou was thinking that classic Art Deco might provide the perfect foil for his artworks and create a luxurious, livable ambiance. He walked into the Fulham Road gallery of Gordon Watson and spoke to Watson's young associate Sean Berg, explaining that he was looking for good Art Deco furniture. Berg took the time to engage in discussion with him, showing him Pierre Kjellberg's tome on the subject and asking Joannou to identify the kind of pieces that interested him. Berg saw that he was drawn to many of the great works of the 1920s that were simply no longer available on the market. Joannou had a good instinct for quality but he also evidentely had a shrewd appetite for adventure. Clearly it would not be challenging for such a groundbreaking art collector to plough an overworked furrow by seeking the work of creators already well established in the market place. Joannou might be better advised, and would surely have more fun, exploring less well charted territory - as he had done with such flair in the contemporary art field. Joannou's art collection is part of his Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art, the name Deste being, appropriately, derived from the Greek word for 'to see'. Joannou is someone who enjoys seeing, and always does so with a fresh and couageous eye. Shortly after, Berg was in Paris and saw, chez dealer Jacques Lacoste, an exceptional example of the Royère 'Ours Polaire' salon with its original upholstery in excellent condition. He figured this could be a perfect starting point for Joannou, called him and persuaded him to buy it blind. Joannou took a chance, said yes, and had it shipped directly to Greece. When it arrived, he and his wife were thrilled with what became the centerpiece of their living room. The die was cast for Joannou to put together a group of works that would broadly illustrate the ideas that followed on from French Art Deco - Modernist and mid-century pieces that bring design history one stage closer to the present. Joannou set a high standard and he was also concerned to acquire pieces that worked together as an environment and that could co-habit with art works by Jeff Koons, Kiki Smith, Gilbert & George and other cutting-edge contemporaries. There survives a sheet of A4 tracing paper bearing a pencil floor plan of his house. On to this Joannou has sketched the furniture, working out the potential disposition and configurations of the pieces he was purchasing. He made his decisions with a tape measure in hand, with one eye for style and quality, another for the practicality of fitting each piece into a cohesive whole within his home - how deep were those armchairs? Would they work with the Royère cabinet? Would the Frank fit that recess? He wanted the very best pieces, but he was not a museum curator - the pieces would furnish his home and serve the purposes for which they were conceived. Several months, and several trips to Paris later, the collection was more or less formed. Joannou and Berg had been regular, and no doubt welcome visitors to the area in St. Germain where the key dealers in this field are clustered. It seems perhaps misleading to call the end product a collection. The word sounds too formal, too self-important for the spirit in which this exceptional group of furnishings was brought together. The search became an adventure, an intuitive pursuit of an area of French design - with a couple of great Italian exceptions - that was yet to enjoy a widespread appreciation. Time has validated the sure character of that intuition. The extraordinary, anthropomorphic table by Alexandre Noll, for instance, is now acknowledged as one of the masterpieces by this then-overlooked sculptor, perhaps the most expressive of only a handful of major pieces of furniture that he sculpted from blocks of wood. Carlo Mollino's skeletal table is equally inspired, the perfect illustration of this inventive, individualistic designer's vision. Charlotte Perriand's unique metal and glass table, from 1927, is a flawlessly proportioned exercise in Modernist design, and a significant precursor of Minimalism. Dakis Joannou is disinclined to verbalise ideas on aesthetics. His way is to trust his instinct, and he makes his statements by doing, and leaves others to rationalise the process in words. The selection of works offered in this catalogue bears witness to the strength of that instinct. Philippe Garner

LOUIS SOGNOT (1892-1969) and CHARLOTTE ALIX (1897-1987)

A NICKELED-METAL AND GLASS OCCASIONAL TABLE, CIRCA 1930

Details

LOUIS SOGNOT (1892-1969) and CHARLOTTE ALIX (1897-1987)
A Nickeled-Metal and Glass Occasional Table, circa 1930
23¼ in. (59 cm.) high, 35 in. (88.9 cm.) diameter

Provenance

Private collection, Paris.
With Galerie Doria, Paris.

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