ITALY/ FRANCE.- The entrance of auction houses Christie’s and Sotheby’s into the formerly restricted markets of France and Italy, now opened thanks to the new European Union, continues to have repercussions among local auctioneers in those countries. In Paris, the Hôtel Drouot, after entertaining bids from as several suitors (including fashionista Pierre Bergé, the insurance giants AXA and Barclays Private Equity, and the Dutch bank ABN AMRO), has raised €71 million to establish its own management company to run the business, called Drouot Holding, according to a report in the Antiques Trade Gazette.
In Italy, the Venice-based auction house Semenzato is merging with Finarte of Milan. The new company will be known as Finarte-Semenzato Casa d’Aste, and it will have salesrooms in Milan, Florence, Rome and Venice, and boast annual sales of over €90 million. Italian auctioneer Giorgio Corbelli, who is currently under investigation for the sale of fakes through television shopping channels, according to the Antiques Trade Gazette, has holdings in both companies.