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Maison

Trivius

In Trivio · Lux

Valorisation and transmission of works of art —
by private treaty, under mandate.

Maison — ParisFrom the 15th century to contemporary artMMXXVI

A work is worth what is known of it.

The first art of the house

The three arts

I.

Valorise

Archives, provenance, literature: the house establishes the text of a work as one establishes that of a classic — and entrusts it to the voices that carry authority.

II.

Transmit

By private treaty, under mandate. No stock, no vitrine, no auctions: one work, one owner, the right destination. Each passage is an act of reputation.

III.

Keep silent

What is transmitted here is not shown. No works on this site, no names, no prices. The light belongs to the works; the silence, to the house.

The mandate

The house acts under mandate. Four missions, one discretion.

Establish

For the owner who wants to know what they possess: archives, provenance, literature — the text of a work, established and documented.

Sell

The discreet sale: study, strategy, the right destination sought among its correspondents — by private treaty, under mandate, without publicity.

Seek

For the collector awaiting a specific work: the house searches — school, artist, period — through its network, in silence.

Accompany

Collections passing from one generation to the next: inventory, documentation, destinations — alongside the family's advisers.

Every engagement begins the same way: a conversation, by appointment.

“One should break silence only to say something that is worth more than the silence.”

Abbé Dinouart — L'Art de se taire, 1771

Les cahiers

Texts, not announcements. White, for the eye. Black, for the market. They appear when there is something to say.

All the cahiers →

The house receives by appointment.

correspondance@maisontrivius.fr

The name

I · Trivium — tres viæ

Trivium — from the Latin tres viæ: the place where three roads meet. In the ancient world the crossroads was the place of pause and exchange: there one stopped, one spoke, one traded.

From trivium comes trivial: what passed through the crossroads was judged common. The house holds the opposite to be true. Everything passes through the crossroads — which is precisely why an eye is needed to tell things apart.

Three roads meet here: the work, the one who owns it, the one who awaits it.

The medieval schools called trivium the three arts of the word: grammar, rhetoric, dialectic. The house works with words — it studies, it argues, it judges. And to these three arts it adds a fourth, which the schools did not teach: the art of keeping silent.

Matteo Bernabei  ·  Sophie Faro

Founders

The house has neither walls nor stock: correspondents, archives, time.

The publications of the house

Les Cahiers

Texts, not announcements. White, for the eye: they read works. Black, for the market: they read its mechanisms. They appear when there is something to say.

Cahiers blancs — the eye Cahiers noirs — the market
Maison Trivius Cahier noir · I

The Most Valuable Livestock in America Has Been Dead for 67 Million Years

July MMXXVI

On land, scarcity and the art market

Maison Trivius Cahier blanc · I

À paraître

MMXXVI

A reading, forthcoming

Correspondence

The house receives by appointment.

correspondance@maisontrivius.fr
Maison — ParisMMXXVI