Dior Beverly Hills to show Louis and Nicole Cane ahead of Christie's sale

Dior, the French luxury house, will stage an exhibition of work by Louis Cane and his wife Nicole Cane at its Beverly Hills boutique from Oct. 3 to Oct. 16. WWD The show presents sculpture, furniture and other pieces ahead of a Dec. 8 tribute sale at Christie's Rockefeller Center in New York City.

Cane was a painter, sculptor and furniture designer linked to Supports/Surfaces, the French art movement that emerged around 1969 and tested what a painting could be made from and how it could hang. He died in Paris in 2024 at age 80. He developed much of his work between studios in Paris and Villefranche-sur-Mer in the south of France.

The Los Angeles presentation focuses on material and making. It brings together works in bronze, marble, parchment, lacquer and precious woods, produced over nearly six decades in collaboration with artisans. Expect trees in bronze. The line-up also includes figurative pieces, lanterns with monkey motifs and furniture decorated with butterflies.

Dior has used its shops as previews for auction material before. In 2022 the house showed more than 20 works by Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne at 30 Montaigne in Paris ahead of an auction of their work. The Beverly Hills show follows that pattern, placing collectible art and design inside a retail space before it goes to the saleroom.

The December sale sits in Design, the Christie's sale category covering collectible furniture, lighting, ceramics and sculpture, which Christie's organises live and online in New York and Paris. Christie's Christie's said its Paris design auction included a tribute to Cane with 50 works taken directly from his studio-home on the Côte d'Azur. Christie's

There is already a Los Angeles link for the auction house. Christie's, the auction house, opened its signature gallery space in Beverly Hills in April 2017. Shortly after that opening, its flagship there featured an exhibition worth around $500 million, a sign of how much buying power the city was expected to draw. Robb Report

For visitors, this means a shop visit that works like a gallery visit. No bidding paddle is needed in Beverly Hills. The buying happens later, in New York.