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PARIS - The private jets are landing at Le Bourget, the suites are booked at the Crillon and the best tables reserved at the Meurice and Fouquet's as the mega-rich gather in Paris for what has been dubbed the auction of the century.
One of the greatest collections of art in private hands, assembled over decades by the late couturier Yves Saint Laurent and his partner Pierre Berge, is coming under the hammer.
Museums and millionaires are to joust over more than 700 rare works, which Christie's estimate could raise up to 300 million ($750 million), a record for a single collection at auction.
The treasure trove includes works by Picasso, Braque, Matisse, Brancusi and Mondrian, bronzes and sculptures from the ancient world, surrealist "ready-mades" and jewels of art deco furniture and ceramics.
"Most of the pieces are of very high quality. Most of them would be worthy of display in any museum," said Michel Maket, an expert in 19th and 20th century art.
Interest - or hype - has been so intense that the collection is being displayed at the Grand Palais, a crystal cathedral normally reserved for vast exhibitions.
At a cost of more than 6 million, Christie's has redecorated 12 halls in Saint Laurent's signature colours of black and white and recreated rooms from the Latin Quarter homes where the fashion genius and Berge lived in an Aladdin's Cave of art.
More than 2500 people attended an elite view on Saturday night local time, including President Nicolas Sarkozy, former Premier Laurent Fabius, writer Simone Veil, actors Dustin Hoffman and Charlotte Rampling and fashion designer Paul Smith.
Around 30,000 members of the public are expected to file past the display before the doors close tomorrow for the three-day sale.
Up to 1200 personally vetted bidders will then start pitching for the 733 lots in the Grand Palais' main hall, with 100 others placing bids by phone. The auction will be broadcast live on the internet.
Those eyeing an auction catalogue as a cut-price alternative may think twice. The catalogue weighs 10kg, comes in a designer box and costs 200.
People queued last week in the hope of getting one of these hefty trophies, and some even brought along a trolley to haul the catalogue home. Alas for many, the print run of 6000 swiftly sold out.
The sale's stars are a cubist Picasso, Instruments de Musique sur un Gueridon, valued at up to 30 million; a rough-hewn oak sculpture by Brancusi of Paris hostess Leonie Ricou, Madame L.R., estimated at 15 million to 20 million; and a Matisse, Les Coucous, Tapis Bleu et Rose, which could fetch as much as 18 million.
There are also items of furniture from the arts decoratifs period, including a pair of seats made of palmwood, leopard skin and red lacquer by Gustave Miklos - estimate 2 million to 3 million - and a pair of monumental vases by Jean Dunand that featured in a 1925 exhibition that kicked off the art deco movement.
The auction is being scrutinised by the art world, eager for signs that fine art remains a haven at times of recession. Half its proceeds have been pledged by Berge to Aids research.
But it has been overshadowed by a last-minute dispute with potential to become a diplomatic row.
China sought to block the sale of two sculptures - a rat's head and a rabbit's head in bronze - that were looted from the imperial palace in Beijing by French and British troops during the Opium War, a time remembered as a deep humiliation by the Chinese.
The two pieces, each thought likely to fetch around 10 million, were part of a 19th-century fountain, designed for Emperor Qianglong by a French Jesuit, Michel Benoist, that featured the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac. China has tracked down five other sculptures, which are on show in a Beijing museum.
Berge did not dispute that the pieces had been pillaged, but argued he and Saint Laurent had bought them legally and in good faith.
"These sculptures were looted 150 years ago in China, just as the Parthenon frescoes were looted in Athens and are now in the British Museum, just as many other pieces of art that were looted are now in museums around the world," he said.
He and Saint Laurent built up their collection over half a century, reflecting an eclectic taste in which styles, eras and continents were mixed. But they also focused on quality and love of the work itself, rather than its investment potential.
The pair were the most influential couple on France's fashion scene, with Saint Laurent - as chronically shy as he was gifted - providing the creative spark and Berge providing the entrepreneurial flair as head of his fashion house.
They were also gay idols, forming a relationship that began in 1958 at a time when homosexuality was outlawed but becoming France's best-known and most admired homosexual partnership.
Their union broke many taboos, helping to pave the way to civil recognition of same-sex couples and laws against homophobic violence. It was ended only by death, when Saint Laurent died last June, aged 71.
The break-up of their beloved collection "is the final page of a tumultuous novel written over more than 50 years", the daily Liberation said.
AUCTION OF THE CENTURY
* 200 to 300 million expected to be raised.
* 733 pieces of art.
* Six sessions over three days.
* 30,000 people expected to see the collection.
* 1200 personally vetted bidders.
* 200 for the 10kg catalogue.
