Photo via: Express
Princess Eugenie, the Royal Family’s most arty member, is returning to London to become associate director at the top-tier gallery Hauser & Wirth.
“Princess Eugenie has joined Hauser & Wirth as an associate director, and we are delighted to have her as part of the team,” a spokesperson from the gallery said in a statement.
According to the Telegraph, the daughter of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, was poached by Hauser & Wirth from the New York-based online auction house Paddle8, where she has been working for almost two years.
London-born and bred Eugenie moved to New York in September 2013 to do a three-month internship at the online company, which later turned into a full-time, £25,000-a-year job, according to the Daily Mail.
Princess Eugenie (right) with Kate Middleton and Prince William
Photo via: US
Her original plan was reportedly to spend some time in New York and then return to the UK to start the London branch of Paddle8. But it seems that the brick-and-mortar, blue-chip gallery made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.
The gallery also has branches in New York and Zurich, so her return to London suggests the princess was keen to be close to her family, friends, and boyfriend Jack Brooksbank, a former waiter who now runs a cluster of clubs and restaurants favored by the rich and famous.
Prior to her full-fledged professional life in the art world, Princess Eugenie studied art history (like her cousin-in-law Kate Middleton) at the University of Newcastle.
In 2010, she did an internship at Christie’s London—where her second cousin, David Armstrong-Jones, Viscount Linley is chairman—and at the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace.
Princess Eugenie during the VIP preview of Frieze London 2014
Photo via: Royalista
Eugenie, eighth in line to the British throne and a regular in the art world, was photographed last October attending Frieze London and visiting Art Basel in Miami in December.
Last November, Harper’s Bazaar ran an interview between Eugenie and YBA Tracey Emin. The pair met through mutual friends and developed a friendship in New York, where Emin has been based on-and-off since 2013.
“I remember when I was still at school I went to New York for two days and went to see the gallerist Tony Shafrazi,” she told Emin. “[…] I walked into his gallery and it was all Basquiat. […] I just thought: ‘Oh, I want to do that.’ I want to see this art, I want to put it on the walls, I want to give people the feeling that he gave me when I saw it. Helping someone build up their collection is just so exciting,” she enthused.
She will now be helping Hauser & Wirth’s illustrious roster of clients to build theirs.
Representatives from Hauser & Wirth were not immediately available for comment when contacted by artnet News.
Princess Eugenie and Tracey Emin
Photo: Henry Bourne via Harper’s Bazaar