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"The record-smashing &amp;#8364;373.9 million/$483.8 million Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berg&amp;#233; sale, the largest ever auction of a private collection (the total for which was later adjusted to &amp;#8364;342 million/$443 million) when a Chinese buyer refused to pay for his purchase in an act of protest), is still making waves in the upper ranks of Christie&amp;#8217;s International management. The man who bagged &amp;#8220;the sale of the century&amp;#8221; for Christie&amp;#8217;s, vice-president Fran&amp;#231;ois de Ricql&amp;#232;s, has been named the new president of Christie&amp;#8217;s France.  Fran&amp;#231;ois Curiel, president of Christie&amp;#8217;s Europe since 1999 and Christie&amp;#8217;s France since 2000, is going to Hong Kong as the new president of Christie&amp;#8217;s Asia to develop the booming Far Eastern market. British print expert Jonathan Rendell, Christie&amp;#8217;s deputy U.S. chairman, who had a hand in the YSL sale&amp;#8217;s success while working with Ricql&amp;#232;s and the French team, will move to Paris to reinforce the auction house&amp;#8217;s French development and international strategy.Marc Porter has been promoted from president to chairman of Christie&amp;#39;s Americas, where he will lead the Top Client Program in the Americas and remain president of Christie&amp;#8217;s Japan, as well as a board member.According to the French newspaper Liberation, which broke the story, the changes come after several months of tension between the two French protagonists.  But if that&amp;#8217;s the case, they both seem pleased with the outcome nevertheless. Ricql&amp;#232;s, 51, has shown a remarkable facility in attracting boldface-name collections, first with his eponymous auction house at the Salle Drouot, where the sale of the Hubert de Goldet collection in 2001 doubled its estimate to &amp;#8364;13.7 million, setting a then world record for tribal art at auction. Then, after selling his company to Christie&amp;#8217;s, he directed such successful sales as those of Paris art dealer Patrice Trigano (&amp;#8364;4.8 million); actor Claude Berris trove of photography, when a Man Ray rayogram made a record &amp;#8364;348,000; and the former collections of the Duc de Talleyrand (&amp;#8364;7.1 million) and the Marquis and Marquise de Ravenel (&amp;#8364;6.8 million).  &amp;#8220;It seems natural. It&amp;#8217;s been my m&amp;#233;tier for 30 years, since I was 21,&amp;#8221; de Ricql&amp;#232;s told ARTINFO. &amp;#8220;I sold my company to Christie&amp;#8217;s and then joined them in 2002,&amp;#8221; when a French law permitting foreign companies to hold sales in France was passed, he explains. How has his tenure at Christie&amp;#8217;s been going? &amp;#8220;It&amp;#8217;s worked out very well,&amp;#8221; he says. &amp;#8220;I realized that I could have a second career dealing with much more important collections.&amp;#8221; Few, perhaps, predicted that this prophecy would come to pass quite so spectacularly. De Ricqls salutes Berg&amp;#233; for his &amp;#8220;radical decision to sell almost everything. Most heirs want to retain a part. That staggered people.&amp;#8221;Does he have another YSL-scale surprise up his sleeve?  &amp;#8220;In France, there are collections worth 40, 50, 60, 90 million euros, of that I am sure.  But to find another between $300 million and $400 million, I think I&amp;#8217;ll have to wait for years.&amp;#8221;  Meanwhile, he hopes to maintain Christie&amp;#8217;s record as Paris auction-house leader. In 2009, the company continued its run on top, even without including the YSL/Berg&amp;#233; total. He emphasizes, &amp;#8220;The challenge is to be not only the first, but the best, with the most beautiful sales.&amp;#8221;Curiel is shouldering an even greater challenge. &amp;#8220;After Christie&amp;#8217;s New York, which I helped build in 1976 with Christopher Burge and Stephen Lash, then Paris in 2000 for nine years, I&amp;#8217;m off to Hong Kong to try and develop the Asian market, our biggest market at the moment,&amp;#8221; he says. Asia already provides 12 percent of revenues for the auction house; after New York and London, Hong Kong is its third largest salesroom. The take in Hong Kong is more than double Christie&amp;#39;s Parisian sales in a normal year. &amp;#8220;More important is that the region provides buyers for our sales worldwide,&amp;#8221; Curiel points out. &amp;#8220;In Impressionist and modern art, contemporary art, jewelry, Old Masters, and 20th-century decorative arts, our biggest buyers often come from mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Indonesia.&amp;#8221;The company is already active on the mainland, where Christie&amp;#8217;s Forever, a joint venture with a local Chinese dealer (a legal necessity) produced two auctions last year of mainly Chinese works of art totaling in the range of $20 million. &amp;#8220;Nothing compared to our Hong Kong sales,&amp;#8221; he admits, &amp;#8220;where Chinese art from the 16th to 19th century, jewelry, watches, and Chinese contemporary art are doing very well.&amp;#8221; Emerging buyers are the targets.  The two leading mainland Chinese auctioneers &amp;#8212; China Guardian and Poly &amp;#8212; sell between $250 million and $300 million a year, equal to Christie&amp;#8217;s Hong Kong sales.  Curiel has a team of a hundred in Hong Kong and, he says, &amp;#8220;the means to develop the market. I don&amp;#8217;t have the recipe yet,&amp;#8221; he admits, &amp;#8220;but I hope to grow the business in the same way we&amp;#8217;ve done in America and Paris.&amp;#8221;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.blouinartinfo.com/news/story/276046/major-management-moves-at-christies>