‘Clearly I’m not interested – absolutely not – in competing with Christie’s and Sotheby’s’, declares Rodica Seward, owner and president of the French auction house Tajan S.A., which she bought in 2003. Mixing French style with forthright American business acumen and a Romanian openness and charm, she does not mince her words. ‘Reason number one is there is not enough business. Then, their business model I do not find attractive, with offices around the world. I believe it is obsolete. Today you do not have to be physically present all over the world. You can have an international market operating from one place. I want to be global using the best website, marketing and communication techniques, but remain local bringing international collectors to Paris to strengthen the French art market. When you have something good it doesn’t matter where you sell it.’ Mrs Seward pauses, sits up straight, leans forward for emphasis and smiles broadly but firmly. ‘So my aim is I want to be international in terms of client base but local in terms of physical structure. I want to have a very high-class boutique auction house that works with global auction methods and clients.’

A tall aim, given what she frankly calls ‘a huge economic crisis now’. But, then, Mrs Seward has the right skills for the job: financial entrepreneur, passionate collector – particularly of School of Paris and postwar abstract art – and a hands-on perfectionist. When we meet at Tajan’s handsome, spacious art-deco rooms tucked behind the Opéra in rue des Mathurins (Fig. 4), she greets me with an apology. ‘I’m so sorry you are seeing us in transition’, she says, referring to the galleries hung with what she calls a ‘nettoyage, a clearing-up sale at the end of the season’, but shortly to display a preview of Tajan’s luscious annual sales held in Monte Carlo’s Café de Paris. She ushers me into her art-filled office, where red dominates. Pieces from her own collection cover the floor, shelves and walls. A red dish and two woman-shaped jugs by Georges Jouve sit on a console table designed by Eric Schmidt; above hangs the Spanish artist Eduardo Arroyo’s painting Everybody’s Talking. There is a big, mainly red, picture by François Rouan hung above ceramics by Joan Miró, Paul Bonifas and César. Another wall has a painting by Fiona Ray, ‘a young British artist I like very much’. Unable to find a suitable desk, Mrs Seward designed her own, using oak, glass and red lacquer. Behind it, two contrasting Motherwells of 1946 and 1964 hang on the walls while a big wooden sculpture by Wang Keping stands on the floor (Fig. 2). ‘He’s the only contemporary Chinese artist I like’, she says with conviction, exploring its textures with her hands. ‘He works with simple pieces of wood, then burns and singes it. He was head of the Chinese rebel artists in the 80s, then left to come to France.’ She moves to a stone sculpture made by Pierre Durantet in 1947 and strokes it. ‘This is stone, heavy, magical; this is like a Picasso ceramic. I love it.’

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