The only child of Sultan Mahomed Shah (known by his title, Aga Khan III), Prince Sadruddin and his second wife, Princess Catherine Aga Khan, lived an extraordinary life together surrounded by incredible riches – and now, their breathtaking art collection is to be auctioned at Christie’s later this month.
‘A collection like this appears once in a generation, if that,’ Sara Plumbly, Christie’s Head of Islamic and Indian Art, told Tatler. The sale, which will take place in London on 28th October, comprises 95 works which the Prince and Princess collected for their home, Chateau de Bellerive, on the shores of Lake Geneva. Including several masterpieces of Indian and Persian painting, the group is one of the most important collections of its kind in the world, has been studied by leading scholars and featured in ground-breaking exhibitions. With estimates ranging from £2,000 to £1 million for each piece, the sale is expected to realise in excess of £8 million in total.
A French-born statesman and activist who served as UN High Commissioner for Refugees from 1966 to 1977, Prince Sadruddin mixed with a crowd of famed intellectuals and creatives, including Paul Matisse (grandson of the French artist, Henri), Paris Review founders George Plimpton and John Train, and Stephen Joyce, grandson of the Irish writer, James. Although he was raised in Europe, his father, who was the 48th hereditary Imam of the Nizari Ismaili Muslims, had a strong influence on him, and he grew up listening to his grandmother recite the epic poems of Persian history.
In 1972, he married his second wife, Catherine Aleya Beriketti Sursock. The couple had no children together, although the Prince became stepfather to her three sons, Alexandre, Marc and Nicholas, whom Catherine shared with her ex-husband, Lebanese aristocrat Cyril Sursock. Together, the couple assembled an incredible collection of Islamic art over approximately five decades, some of which will be on sale at Christie’s.
