Hunters Faberzhe.Kollektsiya Ivanova, Vekselberg ...

«Back in business!» - Cried the auctioneer James Bruce Gardayn, meeting the first jewelry auction "Russian Trading» Christie's. By this time the tenders are for the third hour, replacing an expensive painting a series of budget figures and wooden furniture in the Russian style is a yawn in the hall. But at the turn of Faberge items, so that the monotonous process immediately replaced by a chain of fierce battles.

Representatives of billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, partners fund Aurora Fine Art Investments, Vladimir Voronchenko and Andrei Ruzhnikov desperately fighting for one of the top lots - a gift Faberge snuff box with precious stones, enamel, and a portrait of Emperor Nicholas II. But winning a client involved in the bidding by telephone - for £ 937,200 snuffbox leaves Texas industrialist and major collectors Artie McFerrin. It seems, of Aurora is about to get the second imperial snuffbox - after a short trade in all of the competitors give up. But then behind Voronchenko and Ruzhnikova appears ran up the stairs, panting man in inconspicuous jacket and throws up his hand, drawing the attention of the auctioneer. Newcomer can easily raise the price, jumping immediately to the tens of thousands of pounds, and for £ 505,250 to get him a snuff-box. "Congratulations, good thing" - Voronchenko shakes hands with the winner, his face is not expressed great cordiality.
He has already lost this man three years ago, when in the same hall house Christie's in London's King Street for $ 18.5 million was sold to an Easter Egg of Rothschild "(a record price for a single item, made by master Russian jeweler). Winner, meanwhile sits in a room with the same casualness buys most exposed to the "Russian auction" Faberge. A man named Alexander Ivanov. He has his own museum of Faberge in the German city of Baden-Baden, and he claims that he owns the world's largest collection of these products - about 3000 items.
Triangle for connoisseurs of Faberge

In Russian history there is no more famous jewelry firm than Faberge. At a global level the name of Peter Carl Faberge, is no less impressive than the names of Charles Tiffany and Louis-Francois Cartier, but there are products Russian jeweler - cigarette cases, clocks, carvings, brooches - are already far more expensive than products of its long-standing rivals. Russian collectors have started a real hunt for Faberge: some are buying it very quietly and do not show to anyone other than Alexander Ivanov, the influence of a powerful and open, like a bulldozer. The most notable purchases are made at the auctions. But where most transactions are made in a quiet private homes or at convenient locations specialized salons.

One of them - only 10 minutes walk from London Hall Christie's. In mid-December in London in full swing Christmas sales, the main shopping streets are closed to automobile traffic and filled with tens of thousands of people moving from store to store. Showcase firm Wartski, «Promotion of Her Majesty the Queen and His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales", discounts are not promises: Do not see the point to entice passers-by. Here, special customers. Here the director Wartski Kieran McCarthy respectfully accompany from stand to stand hung with expensive jewelry elderly lady. Behind the glass display dozens of Faberge - cigarette cases, clocks, flowers, figurines of animals. Of these, 56 subjects - a collection of one of Russian collectors. This is called an exhibition, but still sold, though no price tag. "How much does it cost, who is the seller who buyers?" On all three questions McCarthy answers: traditionally the company exclude the disclosure of such information. But the world of Faberge's too small, everyone knows everyone, and several guests on the "Russian auction" hunters Faberge told Forbes, which exhibited a collection gathered Wartski London art dealer Viktor Ilyukhin (himself from communion with the dodged Forbes), for everything about everything He wants to help out at least £ 20 million, for example, in figure worshipers from jasper, jade and onyx Wartski asking £ 2,5 million, and for a bunch of lilies of the valley of gold, jade and pink diamonds - £ 1 million

In Wartski almost always more expensive than at auctions, but the firm sells Faberge for over 80 years and guarantees quality and authenticity, collectors say. In addition, this is the current price level: the same sunflowers in 1994, bought for $ 18,000 in 1998 - more than $ 180,000. Are there any buyers today? "Of course, we have already sold several items from this collection at a very good price" - responds to McCarthy, an elegant middle-aged man, the author of several studies on the most famous Russian jeweler. In Wartski have customers who buy one product Faberge every few years, and there are those who annually buys a dozen or two. Among the regular customers a lot of Russian, said McCarthy, but bought them as a rule, remain here - in the vaults of the firm or auction houses. "If you draw a triangle between conditional Wartski, Christie's and Sotheby's, then inside the triangle will be more pieces of Faberge, than in all of Russia", - said the director of Wartski. Does the number of Russian clients, Alexander Ivanov? With the permission of the latter confirms McCarthy - yes, in a London company known for its 10 years.
Collection Ivanov for $ 2 billion

If you walk a hundred yards from the Moscow Central Department Store to Pushechnaya the street, on your right will be a two-storey old building. At one of its entrances hangs a small sign "Russian National Museum." But this is not a museum, the building does not exhibits, but the name - registered mark by Alexander Ivanov, back in 1993. For a transparent front door a long corridor, flanked by several shops that offer a standard set Moscow for antiques. Stand stands with books written by the owner of the museum - about the jewelry business, the assay in question, on Faberge. Ivanov is a front office in a neighboring building, but he himself, he admits, preferring to sit here in a tiny cubbyhole, littered with dusty catalogs, books, pamphlets and posters. Nothing around does not give a landlord a man evaluates his collection of at least $ 2 billion "The money I now propose the Arab sheiks, but I'm not selling, it costs more," - says Ivanov.

External modesty landlord explains the style of business. "I've never bought planes, presidential suite, I drive a Toyota, I do not spend money on crap, I have all invested in antiques," - he says. According to Ivanov, collecting antiques, he was back in the late 1980's as a student at the Law Faculty of Moscow State University and the successful co-operative. He created cooperative "Selena" brings into the computers of the USSR in exchange for supplying fertilizers, and earned on the difference between external and domestic price windfall: one in 1988, according to Ivanov, it was $ 6 million "money literally had nothing to spend, I started buying antiques, which cost a penny "- he continues. Somewhere nearby, he says, he worked cooperative "Technique" Artem Tarasov. "The first Soviet millionaire" and current advisor to IFC Metropol Tarasov not remember Ivanov, but it confirms: that kind of money in this business make it quite realistic and antique masterpieces of the cost back then was very cheap. "One man bought a painting by Malevich $ 3000, and brought me, I have it for a long time was in England, in the safe, then I resold it for $ 150,000 - says Tarasov. - And now it is as far as I know, is worth $ 10-20 million. " Another pioneer of domestic capitalism, the creator of the Russian Commodity Exchange, Konstantin Borovoy told Forbes, he remembers a cooperative under the name "Selena": "It was absolutely structure KGB officers, they were not afraid of anything, exported raw materials in large quantities of imported computers, I had them several times to buy from, "Selena." Earn $ 6 million a year? "No problem, per month could earn so much money, especially if you stood clear who" - he adds.

Ivanov said that the business went into the early 1990's and since then has not engaged in anything other than a sale of antiques. Starting with the fine arts in 1990 he switched to Faberge, who became a matter of time throughout his life. "But I have other meetings - a large collection of old cars, gold, pre-Columbian era, a large collection of old masters, including several works by Leonardo da Vinci" - suddenly he adds. On his face is no trace of irony.

The owner of the Russian National Museum "extraordinary reputation in the Russian antiques market: it reluctant to talk about our colleagues, and those who have something tells prohibit mention their names. "I do not want me then broke his head in the entrance crowbar" - says one of them. This source, and several respondents Forbes Art Market participants believe that Ivanov was exaggerating and the collection of this magnitude had not, and buying and selling antiques in principle, can not generate revenues that would allow to spend tens of millions of dollars to buy Faberge. "He really buys a lot of good, quality things, but I do not know whose money it is, perhaps, secret partners or people in uniform, I do not even want to know" - said one of the participants in the antique market.

Ivanov, all these assumptions are completely rejects. "Any partner I have never been to law enforcement authorities have no relationship, the KGB never served, about me a lot of this talk" - he says. All this he calls a gossip based on envy. "I do have many friends in high places, including in government, I know them since the late 1980's, and sometimes sell them something or advise, but no more" - continues to Ivanov. But the mere "Rothschild egg" and opened a half years later the museum of Faberge in Baden-Baden, cost him about $ 50 million From that kind of money from a person who is not engaged in the business since the early 1990's? "I always buy underpriced items and after a while resell at a high profit, well, sold a few dozen things Faberge smaller caliber," - replied Ivan.

Who buys Faberge? In Russia, many private collections of antiques and art, which sometimes do not know anything, not only the public but even by the professionals, says vice-president of the Association of Antiquaries of St. Petersburg Mikhail Suslov. A good example - the former head of Uralkali Dmitry Rybolovlev, of the estimated hundreds of millions of dollars painting collection which became known only because of his divorce proceedings, he said. "Our world is very small, we all know, but here everything was done so quietly that no one knew at all, although Rybolovlev open a businessman, an official billionaire like him have nothing to fear" - emphasizes Suslov. Who just do not Faberge. When preparing to print this number to news agencies reported the robbery at home of the founder of the company "Russian gold" Alexander Tarantseva. Among the kidnapped - products Petersburg jewelry firm.

Market participants know about the collections of Faberge, the collected developer Shalva Chigirinsky and former president of "Spartacus" Andrei Chervichenko, but they admit that Russia may be other major collectors. Ivanov adds: "Antiques buys a lot of people, including officials, for such large sums of money - the guard. In addition, officials we are very fond of presents, a very expensive gifts. "

The rapid rise in prices for Faberge due not only to interest on the part of wealthy Russians. Products of this company are equally attractive to foreigners. The reason - in history.
Vekselberg Collection for $ 350 million

By world standards, the Russian art market is incredibly small, and recognized abroad, the sections can be counted on the fingers of one hand: a little classical Russian art, a bit avant-garde icons, porcelain and Faberge. Faberge - the only market for Russian art, where there are serious foreign collectors willing to pay big money and even buy "against" Russian ", - says head of Christie's Russian department Alexey Tiesenhausen. Moreover, the current market Faberge crucially was formed efforts of Western antiques dealers and collectors, as it is in the West after 1917 was a significant amount of company products. The Soviet government did not need the jewelry, but she needed currency. Among other works of art of the USSR sold abroad many works by Faberge. Precise data on the amounts and recipients of such sales are not made public until now, but we know that many of the items sold literally worth its weight. "

Then Faberge was seen no more than "second-hand goods," says co-owner of a New York antique gallery A La Vieille Russie (ALVR) Paul Shaffer. "We have kept the invoices from the Soviet government: figurines of animals sold for up to $ 2, the flowers - for $ 05.02, a set of objects for about $ 1" - continues to Schaeffer. In 1930 ALVR Wartski and became the largest buyers of Fabergé, and then - its biggest sellers, who have managed to maintain and promote the name of the international market, after the firm ceased to exist by Faberge.

On the creation of Faberge's reputation as a unique symbol of a vanished empire of luxury antiquarians worked slowly and carefully. The number of customers gradually shirilsya - they were mostly big industrialists and showbiz stars. Grew and the price. In the early 1960's figures of animals sold for $ 500-800, the flowers - for $ 850, Easter eggs - for $ 1000-2000. Large collections of nearly was not. Task is to collect systematic collection of the first set before a publisher of Forbes magazine Malcolm Forbes.

Having bought in 1960 in a London antique shop for $ 1000 Faberge cigarette case (he did not know this brand, just like it), Forbes caught what he ironically called Faberge bug, «virus Faberge. By the end of his life he had more than 300 objects, including the world's largest private collection of Easter eggs. The fact that Forbes was buying thousands and tens of thousands of dollars by the end of 1980 was worth hundreds of thousands and millions. When 14 years after his death in 2004, the heirs decided to put up at Sotheby's a big part of the collection, called at that time none other than legendary, these trades were waiting literally all serious collectors of Faberge, hoping to buy anything. Selling the entire collection for a few days before the auction a Russian businessman Viktor Vekselberg was a shock for this community.

"Nobody thought that it will do so even then there were complaints, some vexatious treatment at Sotheby's, but legally it was done purely", - said Vladimir Voronchenko. He is not only representative of Aurora Fine Art Investments, and president of the established Vekselberg Foundation "The Link of Times", as well as the closest partner and consultant of the billionaires on the art market. Two hundred and fifteen Faberge items from the world's most famous private collection, including nine Imperial Easter eggs - Vekselberg just could not miss such a chance. "He just wanted to get something unique, meaningful, with something to start a new hobby, such as collections reduce the time and give a head start, because we, unfortunately, not so young" - explains Voronchenko. Estimates of the transaction amount ranges from $ 130 million to $ 250 million and it was only the beginning - Vekselberg Foundation continued to buy the best Faberge appearing on the market. To date, the collection includes about 700 items. "This is certainly the largest private collection of Faberge, not only in Russia but throughout the world" - says CEO of the Moscow Kremlin Helena Gagarin.

It is estimated that this meeting was spent in total more than $ 350 million Faberge were to become the foundation established in 2005, the fund Aurora Fine Arts Investments. The idea was to collect several collections of art and then resell them at a profit, dividing the profits among shareholders. About a year ago, fund was virtually eliminated, and Vekselberg collection will be the exposition of the two private museums in coming years will be opened in St. Petersburg and Moscow.

In any case as soon as Vekselberg has no plans to sell its Faberge Voronchenko says, but the volume of purchases of products of the famous jeweler recently decreased significantly. "What would now not appeared on the market, we have it, and usually better quality," - explains Voronchenko. However, were sold in December 2007, the Rothschild egg "- the subject of a unique, why after a long struggle by the representatives of Vekselberg's still lost his Ivanov? "I think I just got lucky, maybe they lingered too long and thought it was worth only wish I would have not received it" - speaks of these trades Ivanov. Voronchenko said that the fight to the end did not try: "We are already 15 Easter eggs, and it's still not" Imperial "egg".
Antique dealers - snakes

"After the sale of eggs Rothschild" had a different Wikipedia: behold, he raised his hand at an auction, pontovalsya and so on - but I something to hide? "- Throws up his hands Ivanov. "If officials from hiding their incomes by taking a separate room and quietly bought out, that's their business" - he adds.

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