The collection of Philippe Guimiot will be auctioned at Sotheby’s Paris on June 17. The legendary tribal-art dealer acquired most of the 65 lots to stock his now-shuttered Brussels gallery, but, unable to bear parting with them, he says, he overpriced the pieces to discourage prospective buyers. The 81-year-old Guimiot is selling the trove because "it’s the reasonable thing to do with a 55-year-old wife and a 20-year-old son," he explains, adding that he is hanging on to a handful of works to "contemplate every night as I listen to Bach."

Sub-Saharan Africa figures prominently in the collection. Working from 1958 through 1972 as the manager of a uranium mine in French Equatorial Africa, close to what is currently the Congo-Gabon border, Guimiot discovered villages that were "still in the Bronze Age, a living testimony of ancient humanity," he says.

"Women's Work" originally appeared in the June 2009 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's June 2009 Table of Contents.