Gallery tribute to art collector

Works by US artist Alexander Calder are included in the exhibition

Works by Joan Miro, Henri Matisse and Georges Braque are to go on show at an art exhibition in London.

Almost 150 paintings, sculptures, ceramics and prints will be displayed at the Royal Academy to celebrate the dealer who first brought them together.

The exhibition is a tribute to the Galerie Maeght - the Parisian gallery set up in 1945 by Aime Maeght and his wife Marguerite.

Some of the works have never been shown in public before.

The exhibition reflects "the freshness, optimism and inventiveness of the art that took post-war Paris by storm", the museum said.

Creative collection

"There are a lot of things here that are very personal, very special to the family," said Isabelle Maeght, a grand-daughter of the Maeghts who was in London ahead of the exhibition opening on Saturday.

Henri Matisse, whose work is on display, was friends with Maeght

Matisse and artist Pierre Bonnard, who both feature in the exhibition, were friends with Maeght when they lived in the south of France during World War II.

The pair persuaded Maeght to open an art gallery after the war, and helped put together the collection. It is now considered one of the most influential and creative of the 20th Century.

The exhibition also includes a film made by Maeght's son, Adrien, aged just 14, which shows Matisse painting a portrait of Marguerite Maeght.

"You get the sense that they are happy and that my grandmother was posing not for an artist, but a friend," said Adrien's son Jules Maeght.

Aime Maeght and His Artists opens on Saturday and runs until 2 January.