Art Viatic has an interview with Claire Durand-Ruel Snollaerts, one of the curators of the Marmottan Museum’s anniversary exhibition of Impressionist works in private collections:

These days, do you have to be a billionaire to buy an impressionist painting?

Probably, yes. You often have to pay millions for them. And yet, some collectors don’t keep the works at home. For example, Scott Black shares his collection between a Boston museum and a museum in Portland. He continues to buy works, but he prefers to exhibit them rather than keep them at home.

Most of the lenders wanted to remain anonymous?

They almost all asked to remain anonymous. Less than 10 accepted to have their name on the wall labels.

There are a total of 51 lenders for the 100 works presented. Which nationalities are most represented?

Two thirds of the works are from French collections. American lenders come in second. Other less expected nationalities also feature though. Mexico is well represented thanks to Juan Antonio Pérez Simón, who lent us 13 works for the exhibition.

The works are not very well known, but have they been exhibited at all previously?

The majority of the works have not featured in an exhibition for at least 80 years. Other paintings were acquired recently and have only been seen in the auction room. For example, Monet’s Les planches de Trouville was purchased 20 years ago in an auction, but prior to that it had spent 114 years in the same family. This is its first exhibition.

In addition to wanting to show previously unexhibited works, we wanted to feature paintings that have not necessarily been included in the artists’ retrospectives. The two Degas nudes in the exhibition did not feature in the Musée D’Orsay’s Degas and the Nude exhibition. Likewise, I discovered two paintings by Pissarro that I had not had the opportunity of seeing, other than in black and white images in the catalogue raisonné.

The Marmottan Museum and Its 51 Lenders (ArtViatic)