Case:
D.1984.340 Case Epoux Saint Arroman v. Réunion des Musées nationaux & autres ,known as the Poussin case
Date:
13 December 1983
Note:
Translated French Cases and Materials under the direction of Professor B. Markesinis and M. le Conseiller Dominique Hascher
Translated by:
Tony Weir
Copyright:
Professor B. S. Markesinis

In view of article 1110 Code civil:

Given that when Maurice and Philippe Rheims and René Laurin were auctioning a painting belonging to M. and Mme Saint-Arroman which according to family tradition was by Nicolas Poussin but was attributed in the auction catalogue with the consent of the sellers to the School of the Carraccis by Robert Lebel, an expert whom the auctioneers had consulted, it was knocked down on 21 February 1968 for 2,200 francs, whereupon the Réunion des musées nationaux exercised its right of pre-emption and proceeded to display the painting as an original work by Poussin;

Given that when the Saint-Arromans sought the avoidance of the sale for error on an essential quality of the painting the Court of Appeal of Amiens (Full Court, 1 February 1982), hearing the case after a previous decision had been quashed, dismissed their claim on the ground that even if the Saint-Arromans “had been convinced at the moment the sale was concluded … that the painting could not be by Poussin”, neither the subsequent allocation of the picture to the Louvre as being by Poussin (decision of 20 March 1968) nor M. Rosenberg’s article in the Revue du Louvre of 1989, nor the display of the painting in the Louvre under the name of Poussin could have affected their consent at the time of the painting, even if they or their agents had known of them at the time, for these facts have no relevance to the views about the authenticity of the painting current at the time of the sale. Furthermore that when the Réunion des musées nationaux stated in their defence that notwithstanding what they did with the painting after they acquired it, there was no real certainty about its authenticity, the Court of Appeal held that “it is immaterial … what opinion the Réunion des musées nationaux had then or subsequently as regards the authenticity of the painting since it is on the day of the sale that the error must be established”;

Given that in so deciding and in refusing to allow the Saint-Arromans to invoke matters subsequent to the sale as helping to prove an error on their part at the time of the sale, the Court of Appeal violated the text cited above; and given that the liability of the auctioneers and their expert necessarily depends on the validity of the sale, the decision as to their liability must be quashed under art. 624 of the new Code of Civil Procedure;

For these reasons QUASHES the decision and remands the matter to the Court of Appeal of Versailles.

Subsequent Developments

Civ. 1, 13/12/1983 : Although it is right, in enquiring into a claim for nullity of the sale of an object, for the court to take account only of the conviction of the contracting parties on the day of the sale, to the exclusion of any later modifications of the object sold, the position is different in the case of the revelation, subsequent to the sale, of an inherent element of that object. As Advocate General Gulche wrote in his brief in this matter (Jurisclasseur Civil Périodique, 1984, II, 20186) “the admissibility of proof subsequent to the signature of the contract cannot be refused if it establishes the reality of the mistake made at that moment”. On the other hand, the Cour de Cassation, in particular in the area of urbanism and a real property sale, recalls that, since the validity of consent has to assessed at the moment of the formation of the contract, “a party who had entered into an agreement with the owner of the neighbouring property, which agreement did not observe the rules relating to the spacing between buildings laid down by the land density plan then in force cannot rely on a later annulment of that plan in order to claim the nullity of the agreement for mistake relating to the regulations applicable to his land” Civ. 3, 26 May 2004, Bull. No. 107).