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Sotheby’s to sell the former Peter Stuyvesant Collection

Tony by Niki de Saint-Phalle

Tony by Niki de Saint-Phalle, executed in 1965
Estimate: €250,000 – 350,000

Sotheby’s to sell the Peter Stuyvesant Collection

Sotheby’s is delighted to announce that it will offer for sale 163 works fromthe former Peter Stuyvesant Collection, property of British American Tobacco Netherlands (BAT), onMonday, March 8, 2010 at Sotheby’s in Amsterdam. The works from the collection to be offered for sale areestimated to realise in excess of €4 million.

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January 3rd 2010, source: Sotheby’s
The collection is the largest collection of Post War and Contemporary Art ever to come at auction in theNetherlands. Starting in the late 1950s it became famous as the Peter Stuyvesant Collection and now consists ofmore than 1000 works created by artists from over 40 countries. The core body of the collection, which will beoffered for sale in March, comprises 163 works by leading artists such as Karel Appel, Arman, AlighieroBoetti, Corneille, Alan Davie, Simon Hantai, Mike Kelley, Martin Kippenberger, Per Kirkeby, WilfredoLam, Robert Mangold, Robert S. Matta, Kenneth Noland, Roman Opalka, Niki de St Phalle, SergePoliakoff, Manuel Rivera, David Salle, Giuseppe Santomaso, Jan Schoonhoven, Jesus Rafael Soto,Gunther Uecker and Victor Vaserely. All these artworks are completely fresh to the market.

The story behind how this remarkable collection was formed is inspiring: in the late-50s Alexander Orlow, theManaging Director of Turmac Tobacco, put his love for abstract art to industrial use. “However complicated theoperations of a machine may look,” he said “it soon becomes monotonous to factory worker”. He wanted toimprove their working environment, raise the spirits of his dedicated employees, he decided to and did this bybuilding year by year what in time became a world-class collection of large, colourful contemporary worksspecifically chosen to be shown in the factories above the machinery and so provide inspiration and stimulation.

As Dr. Wim Beeren one of the advisers to the collection wrote: “Alexander Orlow came up with the sublimeidea to place paintings by modern artists in the factories surrounded by the industrial process. Itdemonstrated the great faith that Orlow had in the works of art to create a stimulating environment within thework process.”

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Sotheby’s to sell the former Peter Stuyvesant Collection