Adrian Sassoon (born February 1961) is an English

art dealer An art dealer is a person or company that buys and sells works of art, or acts as the intermediary between the buyers and sellers of art. An art dealer in contemporary art typically seeks out various artists to represent, and builds relationsh ...

art collector A private collection is a privately owned collection of works (usually artworks) or valuable items. In a museum or art gallery context, the term signifies that a certain work is not owned by that institution, but is on loan from an individual ...

and writer. He was schooled at

Eton College Eton College ( ) is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school providing boarding school, boarding education for boys aged 13–18, in the small town of Eton, Berkshire, Eton, in Berkshire, in the United Kingdom. It has educated Prime Mini ...

, where he was taught ceramics by Gordon Baldwin; he went on to study further at Christie’s Education. He worked as an assistant curator at the

J. Paul Getty Museum The J. Paul Getty Museum, commonly referred to as the Getty, is an art museum in Los Angeles, California, United States, housed on two campuses: the Getty Center and Getty Villa. It is operated by the J. Paul Getty Trust, the world's wealthies ...

in the department of

decorative arts ] The decorative arts are arts or crafts whose aim is the design and manufacture of objects that are both beautiful and functional. This includes most of the objects for the interiors of buildings, as well as interior design, but typically excl ...

. He is the owner and founder of a gallery that shows contemporary art,Crichton-Miller, Emma (23 September 2016
"Japanese historic art with contemporary sensibility"
''Financial Times''. Retrieved 21 November 2019. as well as 18th Century French porcelain.Etherington-Smith, Meredith
Adrian Sassoon’s Classic Country Retreat in Devon, England
architecturaldigest.com, Published 3 November 2015, date retrieved 21 November 2019.

Early life and education

Sassoon in interviews has stated that he grew up in a family that had an interest in art, and was therefore interested in it from a young age. He was schooled at

Sunningdale School Sunningdale School is a boys' preparatory independent boarding school of up to 105 pupils, situated in Sunningdale in Berkshire, close to London, England. History The school was founded in 1874 by William Girdlestone, it has of gardens and ...

and

, where he was taught ceramics by Gordon Baldwin; he went on to study further at Christie’s Education.Etherington-Smith, Meredith
Adrian Sassoon’s Classic Country Retreat in Devon, England
architecturaldigest.com, Published 3 November 2015, date retrieved 21 November 2019. He became fascinated with collecting items and began to do so while still a teenager.

Career

Sassoon began his career working at the

at the age of 19 in 1980. He worked as a junior curator specialising in 18th Century French works of art. This specialty has remained with Sassoon throughout his career but has more recently also focused on

contemporary art Contemporary art is a term used to describe the art of today, generally referring to art produced from the 1970s onwards. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a ...

. After working at the

Getty Museum The J. Paul Getty Museum, commonly referred to as the Getty, is an art museum in Los Angeles, California, United States, housed on two campuses: the Getty Center and Getty Villa. It is operated by the J. Paul Getty Trust, the world's wealthies ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, Sassoon moved to work with a prominent

in London, who was known for selling 17th & 18th Century

to American museums. In 1991, he authored the catalogue of Vincennes porcelain, Vincennes and

Sèvres porcelain Sèvres (, ) is a French Communes of France, commune in the southwestern suburbs of Paris. It is located from the Kilometre zero, centre of Paris, in the Hauts-de-Seine department of the Île-de-France region. The commune, which had a populatio ...

in The J. Paul Getty Museum. By 1992, Sassoon had amassed a

collection Collection or Collections may refer to: Computing * Collection (abstract data type), the abstract concept of collections in computer science * Collection (linking), the act of linkage editing in computing * Garbage collection (computing), autom ...

of Vincennes ceramics from the 18th century. Apart from a handful of pieces, he sold the collection in the early 1990s to the Sèvres City of Ceramics Museum when he first went it alone as a prominent dealer in this field. Since selling his first Vincennes collection, he has over the subsequent decades formed another collection of new finds of the same early French porcelain. Twenty pieces of this second collection are on long-term loan to The J. Paul Getty Museum. A number of pieces in Sassoon's art collection have been displayed in museums around the world. He is also known to be a collector of sculptures by Hiroshi Suzuki, a leading contemporary

silversmith A silversmith is a metalworker who crafts objects from silver. The terms ''silversmith'' and ''goldsmith'' are not exact synonyms, as the techniques, training, history, and guilds are (or were, at least) largely the same but differed in that t ...

and other contemporary works of art. Sassoon curated a selection of contemporary ceramics and silver in ‘Inspired by Chatsworth’ for Sotheby’s New York exhibition in 2019 in association with The Chatsworth Estate. During the same year, it was announced that three works by Dame Magdalene Odundo from Sassoon's collection were on display at The Hepworth Wakefield. Since the mid-1990s, Sassoon has represented a number of established artists working in

ceramic A ceramic is any of the various hard, brittle, heat-resistant, and corrosion-resistant materials made by shaping and then firing an inorganic, nonmetallic material, such as clay, at a high temperature. Common examples are earthenware, porcela ...

glass Glass is an amorphous (non-crystalline solid, non-crystalline) solid. Because it is often transparency and translucency, transparent and chemically inert, glass has found widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in window pane ...

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

lacquer Lacquer is a type of hard and usually shiny coating or finish applied to materials such as wood or metal. It is most often made from resin extracted from trees and waxes and has been in use since antiquity. Asian lacquerware, which may be c ...

and hardstones, and is most widely known as a leading art dealer in this field. Kate Malone, Stephen Cox and

Elizabeth Fritsch Elizabeth Fritsch CBE (born 1940) is a British studio potter and ceramic artist born into a Welsh family in Whitchurch, Shropshire, Whitchurch on the Shropshire border. Her innovative hand built and painted pots are often influenced by ideas from ...

are among the artists represented by Sassoon. He has expanded his expertise to include not merely contemporary

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

, but also

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

and Japanese works of art, including those by ceramicists

Pippin Drysdale Pippin Drysdale (born 18 May 1943) is an Australian ceramic artist and art teacher. She is regarded as the foremost interpreter of the Australian landscape in the field of ceramics. Her works are known for their intensity of colour and linear m ...

and Tanabe Chikuunsai IV respectively. In 2007, Sassoon was appointed as a

Trustee Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, refers to anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility for the ...

of The Wallace Collection, holding the position until 2015. From 2013 to 2019, Sassoon served as a Trustee of The Silver Trust, London, which provided a collection of contemporary British silver for the use of the

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

at Number 10 Downing Street. In 2013, Sassoon authored a monograph for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, on JAR, the leading contemporary jewellery designer Joel A. Rosenthal. He is currently a Trustee for the Hermitage Foundation UK, which supports The State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia, and a member of the International Council of The Metropolitan Museum.

Personal life

Sassoon is a member of the

Sassoon family The Sassoon family were a wealthy Baghdadi Jews, Baghdadi Jews, Jewish family dynasty, associated with finance, banking, capital markets, the exploration of oil and gas, Judaism, British Conservative Party, Conservative politics, opium trade wit ...

, and was born in London, the son of Hugh Meyer Sassoon (first cousin of

Siegfried Sassoon Siegfried Loraine Sassoon (8 September 1886 – 1 September 1967) was an English war poet, writer, and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World ...

) and Marion (née Schiff); he is the great-great-grandson of

Sassoon David Sassoon Sassoon David Sassoon (August 1832 – 24 June 1867) was a British Indian Iraqi businessman, banker, and philanthropist. Sassoon was the first member of the Sassoon family to expand the family's business interests into England. Biography ...

Articles and essays

* Vincennes and

Sèvres Sèvres (, ) is a French Communes of France, commune in the southwestern suburbs of Paris. It is located from the Kilometre zero, centre of Paris, in the Hauts-de-Seine department of the Île-de-France region. The commune, which had a populatio ...

Porcelain from a European Private Collection, International Ceramics Fair & Seminar, 2001

Books

* Vincennes and Sèvres Porcelain: Catalogue of the Collections. J. Paul Getty Museum, 1991.Sassoon, Adrian, ''Vincennes and Sèvres Porcelain: Catalogue of the Collections'', J. Paul Getty Museum, 1992, . * Decorative Arts: A Handbook of the Collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum. Getty Trust Publications: J. Paul Getty Museum. *Jewels by JAR.

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

, New York. 2013 * Kate Malone : Inspired by

Waddesdon Waddesdon is a village in Buckinghamshire, England, west-north-west of Aylesbury on the A41 road. The village also includes the hamlets of Eythrope and Wormstone. Waddesdon was an agricultural settlement with milling, silk weaving and la ...

. Foreword by Adrian Sassoon, 2016. *Colin Reid: Glass Sculpture. Foreword by Adrian Sassoon. Eds: By Clare Beck and Kathleen Slater

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sassoon, Adrian 1961 births Living people English art dealers English writers English male writers

Adrian Adrian is a form of the Latin given name Adrianus or Hadrianus. Its ultimate origin is most likely via the former river Adria from the Venetic and Illyrian word ''adur'', meaning "sea" or "water". The Adria was until the 8th century BC the ma ...

British writers of Indian descent British people of Indian-Jewish descent Baghdadi Jews People educated at Eton College People educated at Sunningdale School