by Anne Crane - Antique Trade Gazette
The French National Antique Dealers’ Association (Syndicat National des Antiquaires), organisers of the long-running Paris ‘Biennale des Antiquaires’, have decided to mount an additional new annual fair for the French capital – the first to be held next spring.

The fair, to be known as Paris Beaux-Arts, will run from April 1-5 at the Carrousel du Louvre (where the Biennale was staged until it moved to the Grand Palais in 2006). It will have a new four-man organising committee: Olivier Delvaille as president, plus Mathias Ary Jan, Fabien Mathivet and Matthieu de Bayser.

The SNA's aim is to hold a high-quality, wide-ranging, multi-discipline vetted fair with plenty of traditional art and antiques as well as contemporary and modern art. They are hoping to fill a gap in the Paris calendar.

Own Identity

Talking to ATG, Olivier Delvaille said that while Paris has specialist fairs for contemporary art, drawings and Old Masters, "there is no annual, multi-discipline fair of quality" along the lines of Masterpiece and Frieze Masters in London or BRAFA in Brussels. And by staging it in the spring rather than the September slot used by the Biennale, he hopes to create "a fair with its own identity".

Paris Beaux-Arts aims to have around 80 exhibitors, of which around 10% are expected to be foreign. Some 50 dealers are already seriously interested and have been sent contracts, around 40 of them SNA members.

The stand allocation will be decided by drawing lots. Stand sizes will be single or double modules of 20 square metres, although there will be the option for triple modules if two or more exhibitors want a group stand.

by Gareth Harris - The Art Newspaper
A new antiques and art fair aimed at younger collectors is due to launch in Paris next spring. Paris Beaux-Arts, which will be held at the Carrousel du Louvre (1-5 April 2015), will be organised by the Syndicat National des Antiquaires (SNA; the association of antiques dealers in France).

The new 80-dealer fair will include classic art, drawings, sculpture, jewellery, furniture and Modern art. But the inclusion of contemporary art galleries means that Paris Beaux-Arts is distinct from another Paris-based fair run by the SNA: the prestigious Biennale des Antiquaires, which had its 27th edition in September.

The Brussels-based antique silver dealer Bernard de Leye and the Old Masters dealer De Jonckheere in Paris have already signed up to the new event. Stands will be assigned by drawing lots, while a vetting committee will undertake quality checks on the floor.

“Paris Beaux-Arts is aimed at a wider general public, and prices start at around €1,000. Allocating stands based on drawing lots is also a new thing. It will mix up the categories and make it fairer for all the dealers,” says Mathias Ary Jan, a member of the SNA’s four-man organising committee for the new fair.

The move follows the dismissal of Christian Deydier as president of the SNA over the summer, after members of the association argued about the frequency of the Biennale. Some members would like it to be an annual event (the new fair will take place every year, and run in parallel with the Biennale which will still open in the autumn).

Meanwhile, Dominque Chevalier, the new president of the SNA, has pledged to reform and reinvigorate the Biennale. Chevalier, a Paris-based tapestries dealer, has asked a panel of trade specialists led by the Parisian design dealer François Laffanour to help him “rethink the biennial and give it a new dimension”.

The high price of hiring a stand at the Biennale venue, the Grand Palais—€1,400 to €1,600 per sq. m—is thought to deter international dealers, while the preponderance of jewellery dealers is an issue for some French galleries.