March 13 (Bloomberg) -- U.K. jeweler Laurence Graff sold a diamond for $5 million and bought a Jean-Michel Basquiat painting for 3.5 million euros ($4.5 million) yesterday as the world’s largest antiques and art fair opened in the Netherlands.

Graff’s big transactions came on the VIP day of the European Fine Art Fair -- Tefaf -- in the city of Maastricht. A record 239 dealers, including Graff himself, aim to repeat the success of the Yves Saint Laurent sale in Paris. Tefaf is owned and organized by exhibitors who are offering $1 billion worth of museum-quality artworks, from prehistory to the present day.

Dealers said the 22nd annual edition of the fair is the first major test of whether the Christie’s International YSL auction was a one-off, or an indication that wealthy people are once again looking at art as an alternative investment.

“There’s some serious money here,’’ Philip Hoffman, chief executive of the Fine Art Fund investment company, said in an interview. “People are in the mood to buy really good things. But I thought I’d see more red stickers by now.’’

Graff bought Basquiat’s 5 foot-high acrylic and oilstick on canvas “Untitled (The Black Athlete),” dated 1982, from the New York-based debut exhibitor Christophe Van de Weghe. The painting shows one of the artist’s trademark skull-headed boxers standing full-length with raised arms beneath a yellow halo.

‘Rare Piece’

“It’s a great rare piece,” Graff said in an interview. “You have to buy them when they are around. I think the price was amazing. I’ve got other Basquiats and another boxer that cost $8 million two years ago. I thought it was the best contemporary piece in the fair. I was lucky to get it.”

“I’ve been waiting five years to get into this fair,’’ said Van de Weghe. “I’m a U.S. citizen, but I was born in Belgium and speak French, Dutch and Spanish -- which is useful in this neck of the woods.’’

The Basquiat was fresh to the market from a private collection near New York, said Van de Weghe.

Earlier, Graff sold an emerald-cut white diamond, of about 30 carats, for $5 million to a U.S. client. The highlight of his booth is a 20-carat blue diamond priced about 25 million euros.

“Cash is useless at the moment,’’ said Francois Graff, Laurence’s son, and chairman of the jewelers that bear his name. “The lower end of the jewelry market has slowed, but the gems at the top remain steady,’’ he said.

Several big-ticket items were sold by dealers before the fair opened, said Hoffman.

Degas Pastel

Edgar Degas’s 1894 pastel “Toilette matinale,’’ displayed in the booth of London-based dealers and agents Dickinson, sold for between 10 million euros and 20 million euros a few days before the fair, Heinrich zu Hohenlohe, a director of the company, said.

Berlin-based photography dealer Kicken -- one of nine first-time exhibitors at Tefaf -- presold the early silver gelatine print of Man Ray’s 1926 Surrealist photograph “Noire et Blanche,” that it was planning to bring to the fair. The photograph was bought by a European collector for 600,000 euros ($760,000), gallery director Rudolf Kicken said.

Hours before the fair opened, Daniella Luxembourg, a London-based dealer, sold Luciano Fabro’s 1970 lead-and-wood sculpture of a map of Italy, “Sullo stato,’’ for 700,000 euros from her themed exhibition of contemporary works, titled “Disasters.’’ The purchase was made by a European collector on the telephone, said Luxembourg.

Old Masters remain the mainstay of Tefaf, with about a quarter of the fair’s dealers being specialists in pre-19th- century pictures.

Asset Protection

“Dealers are feeling more optimistic,” said David Dallas, of the London-based dealer Johnny van Haeften Ltd, which sells Old Master paintings. “The success of the YSL sale does seem to have had some effect. It’s crystallized people’s ideas. It’s made them remember that objects have been used for asset protection for such a long time. Sales so far are about the same as last year.”

Van Haeften had sold three paintings, with one more reserved in the early hours of the fair, said Dallas. A river landscape by the 17th-century Dutch artist Maerten Ryckaert sold for 800,000 pounds ($1.1 million) to a European collector, said Dallas.

“We’ve done well,’’ said London-based Renaissance sculpture dealer Daniel Katz, another first-time exhibitor, who sold a 16th-century bronze of Neptune by the Italian sculptor Tiziano Minio for between 300,000 euros and 500,000 euros. The buyer was another European collector, said Katz.

“We’ve seen curators from the Getty Museum, the National Gallery of Washington, Houston and the Fitzwilliam and Ashmolean museums in England,’’ said Katz.

Dealers said art magnates such as Sheikh Saud al-Thani, of the Qatari royal family, and New York contemporary art collector Adam Lindemann were also seen during the early hours of the fair.

Last year’s Tefaf at the MECC business center in Maastricht attracted 73,245 visitors, while 225 private jets flew into the local airport. The fair closes on March 22.

(Scott Reyburn writes about the art market for Bloomberg News. Opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer on the story: Scott Reyburn in Maastricht at sreyburn@hotmail.com.

Last Updated: March 12, 2009 20:00 EDT