PARIS.- On December 1st, 2026, Artcurial will auction in Paris the collection of Marie-Claude Beaud (1946–2024), a leading figure in contemporary art.
Marie-Claude Beaud was one of those who leave a lasting mark on institutions. As the first director of the Fondation Cartier, she brought to life, as early as 1984, this pioneering experiment in private patronage, founded on artistic freedom and dialogue between disciplines. Convinced that a museum should be an experience to be lived as much as it is to be visited, she pursued this ambition at the Mudam Luxembourg, and subsequently at the Nouveau Muse National de Monaco.
The selection of nearly 200 lots offered for sale traces the career of a woman whose vision and freedom of spirit left their mark on several generations of artists and institutions.
From Csar to Jean-Michel Othoniel, from Raymond Hains to Alighiero Boetti, the works in the Marie-Claude Beaud collection bear witness to a life spent alongside artists.
Between institutions and friendships
Director of the Fondation Cartier since its creation in 1984, Marie-Claude Beaud helped shape the identity of this institution, before going on to head the Mudam Luxembourg. In 2005, at the invitation of H.R.H. the Princess of Hanover, she joined the Prince Pierre Foundation, before taking over as director of the Nouveau Muse National de Monaco in 2009. She has thus made a lasting mark on the Principality through her work, with a demanding and resolutely multidisciplinary programme.
Once the exhibitions are over, what remains are memories of encounters, friendships forged and, sometimes, the artworks themselves. Marie-Claude Beaud’s collection was built up from these intimate fragments, gathered over a lifetime spent at the core of the creative world. Whether gifted or chosen, these works have been a constant companion to a woman for whom every institution was meant to be a home for artists.
In 1984, Marie-Claude Beaud inaugurated the Fondation Cartier with Les Fers de Csar. L’Insecte from 1955, estimated at €20,000 to €30,000, echoes this founding chapter. Several works by Shiro Kuramata recall the exhibition she dedicated to him at the Muse des Arts Dcoratifs in 1998, whilst a vase by Grayson Perry, valued at €30,000 to €50,000, refers to My Civilisation, exhibited at the Mudam in 2008.
A free-form canvas by Jean Degottex, estimated at €15,000 to €25,000, recalls the exhibition Trois villes, trois collections, in which Marie-Claude Beaud featured the artist as early as 1977. An embroidery by Alighiero Boetti, estimated at €50,000 to €70,000, notably completes this collection.
“Her curiosity, insatiable, transcends periods, disciplines and hierarchies, bringing into dialogue, with equal naturalness, worlds that might at times seem to have nothing in common. For Marie-Claude, art has never been a matter of boundaries, nor even of collecting: it is a way of being in the world, a constant presence in everyday life. All the objects and works of art that surrounded her, and which are now brought together here, thus come together to form an implicit yet deeply personal portrait: that of an independent, eclectic and exacting taste, guided above all by the pleasure of discovery and an enduring sense of freedom.” - H.R.H. Princess of Hanover
