The Boyd Collection – III. Life of Design 
8 November 2018
The Boyd Collection – III. Life of Design 
162

Tony Duquette

collection of four spears from the Drawing Room at Cow Hollow

USA, c. 1965
carved and painted wood 63 h × 5¾ w × 1 d in (160 × 15 × 3 cm)
estimate: $2,000–3,000
result: $1,875
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This collection of four spears hung in the drawing room of Duquette's San Francisco estate, Cow Hollow.
provenance: Estate of Tony Duquette, San Francisco | Collection of Michael and Gabrielle Boyd
literature: Tony Duquette, Goodman and Wilkinson, pg. 268 illustrates these examples

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Whenever you were with him, or in a place that he had made, something magical and totally out of the ordinary happened. There was that strange sense of just magic and witchcraft, but very positive, and voodoo, and all kinds of really great things if you were open to it.

Bruce Weber

“The Bird of a Thousand Eyes”

Tony Duquette was a visionary designer, lending his bricolage, exuberant aesthetic to stage, film, costume, sculpture, jewelry and most notably, the interiors of his California homes and the homes of high-society clientele such as Elsie de Wolfe and Elizabeth Arden. Duquette was inspired by and incorporated motifs from an incredibly wide-range of styles and eras. He worked with both high and low influences and with a feverish, ecstatic passion for materials and cultures. French poet Louise de Vilmorin said that his creations "are no more than preconceived dreams...dreams caught in the net of reality."

Inside Duquette's studio. Image: Tony Duquette, Goodman and Wilkinson

Duquette's eclectic and exhilarating approach was on full display in his extravagant homes. The interiors show bold and unexpected combinations of styles, textures, colors, historical eras and cultures. Duquette was also known as a magician of sorts, being able to transform ordinary objects with his fantastical imagination. 

Duquette's Cow Hollow residence in San Francisco.

Beauty, not luxury, is what I value.

Tony Duquette

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