Displaying items by tag: Collectors

Major Surrealist art collectors, Ulla and Heiner Pietzsch, are hoping to donate their impressive holdings to the city of Berlin. The only problem is there doesn’t seem to be room in any of the museums for the works. Worth nearly $200 million, the Pietzsch’s collection includes pieces by Salvador Dali (1904-1989), Max Ernst, (1891-1976) Rene Magritte (1898-1967), Yves Tanguy (1900-1955), and Joan Miro (1893-1983). The result of over fifty years of fervent collecting, the Pietzsch’s collection is currently hanging on the walls of their home in a suburb of Berlin.

The Pietzsches lent their collection to Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie for an exhibition in 2009. The show drew almost 200,000 visitors and proved that their holdings would be an asset to the city’s art offerings. Upon seeing the public’s high level of interest in their collection, the Pietzsches decided to donate the works to Berlin after their deaths; their only stipulation is that the works be kept on permanent display.

Earlier this year, officials suggested moving the Berlin’s Old Master paintings to make room for 20^th century works but an online petition and spate of angry newspaper columns ensued. Authorities are currently working on plans to accommodate the gift.

One option currently being explored is the construction of an entirely new museum to house the Old Masters collection. If the city decides to do so, the Gemaeldegalerie at Potsdamer Platz would be freed up for 20^th century art, including the Pietzsch’s collection. Currently, the only space in Berlin for 20^th century art is at the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe-designed Neue Nationalgalerie. However, the space is too small to display all of Berlin’s holdings, much less the Pietzsch’s expansive collection.

Officials aim to release alternative plans to accommodate the Pietzsch gift during the first half of 2013.

After all of the galas, events, and parties that took place at Art Basel week in Miami died down on Sunday, December 9, it was clear that the show enjoyed another stellar year. In fact, many critics, exhibitors, and visitors deemed 2012 the best Art Basel presentation to date. Steady sales and a constant stream of visitors that totaled 70,000 were reported over the course of the five-day fair. Among the show’s patrons were over 130 museum and institution groups as well as powerful private collectors from across the globe. Exhibitor Adam Sheffer of Cheim & Read Gallery in New York said, “We were delighted again this year by the results of Art Basel Miami Beach. It remains the gold standard of the international art fair circuit.”

PULSE Miami, another contemporary fair that takes place during Miami’s art week, also reported stable sales and high attendance. In fact, the number of visitors to Ice Palace Studios where the show is held was up by 20% from last year. Cornell DeWitt, Director of PULSE Contemporary Art Fairs said, “We are thrilled by the increased number in attendance this year…Collectors at all levels purchased work ranging in price from mid-level well into six figures.” Works by major contemporary artists such as Chuck Close and Robert Longo, and William Eggleston were among the top sales.

With all of the attention and success that Art Basel week has garnered, collectors, exhibitors, and art enthusiasts are surely not wasting any time in making plans for next year’s trip to Miami.

The anxiously awaited event, Art Basel, begins tonight, December 5, with a VIP preview and runs through Sunday, December 9. Now in its 11^th year, Art Basel has become a defining event in the art world and each year the city of Miami is taken over by collectors, curators, artists, celebrities, and art enthusiasts as well as a host of art fairs.

Taking place at the Miami Beach Convention Center, Art Basel features over 260 big-name galleries from around the world and exhibits works by more than 2,000 artists of the 20^th and 21^st centuries. Renowned for its support of young and emerging artists and galleries, Art Basel includes performance art, public art projects, lectures, and video art installations. Some exhibitor highlights include Acquavella Galleries, Mary Boone Gallery, Gagosian Gallery, Hauser & Wirth, Lisson Gallery, and White Cube, among many others.

Regarded as Miami art week’s anchor fair, Art Miami got a head start on Art Basel and hosted a VIP preview on December 4 at the Art Miami Pavilion in the city’s Wynwood Arts District. The fair, which features modern and contemporary offerings from more than 125 international galleries, runs from December 5 through December 9. While Art Basel tends to be spotlighted during Miami’s art week, Art Miami is the original and longest-running contemporary art fair to be held in the area with 23 years under its belt. Exhibitors include Douglas Dawson Gallery, Eli Klein Fine Art, Haunch of Venison, Hollis Taggart Gallery, Jerald Melberg Gallery, Michael Goedhuis, and Waterhouse & Dodd.

This year, Art Miami coincides with the inaugural CONTEXT art fair, which features 50 galleries representing emerging and mid-career artists. Located in an ultramodern pavilion adjacent to Art Miami, CONTEXT boasts indoor and outdoor projects as well as solo artist installations, curated projects, and multimedia exhibits. Between Art Miami and CONTEXT, there will be over 200,000 square feet of exhibition space and over 250 participating galleries.

Another highlight of the city’s art week is Scope Miami, which opened on December 4 with a VIP preview and will run through December 9 at a new location in the midtown arts district. With a 100,000 square foot pavilion, Scope features 20 new galleries as part of its “Breeder Program” and 85 established exhibitors. Besides modern and contemporary art, there will be design, music, and fashion offerings.

Pulse Miami opens to the public on December 6 and runs through December 9 at The Ice Palace Studios. One of Art Basel’s many satellite fairs, Pulse is in its eighth year and features 86 international galleries exhibiting works on paper, paintings, sculptures, performances, installations, and video art. Pulse also includes its signature series, Pulse Projects, a selection of installations proposed by galleries and not-for-profit institutions. This year’s Pulse Projects includes a short film by Zackary Drucker shown earlier this year at MoMA PS1, marble installations courtesy of Venske & Spanle and Margaret Thatcher Projects, and a special screening of street artist Invader’s Art 4 Space, courtesy of Jonathan LeVine Gallery.

While there are countless fairs, events, parties, concerts, and openings happening in Miami this week, one not to be missed affair is the Masterpieces from the Berardo Collection exhibit at the Gary Nader Art Centre. Opening on December 5, the show features pieces from one of the finest modern and contemporary art collections in existence. Hand-picked from the private holdings of Joe Berardo, a Portuguese mogul, the 110 works are worth $500 million. Featured artists include Francis Bacon, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Alexander Calder, Salvador Dali, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Roy Lichtenstein, Pablo Picasso, Diego Rivera, Cy Twombly, Andy Warhol, and many more.

Over fifty major works totaling about $64 million were offered as payment to the UK for nearly $40 million worth of inheritance tax that accumulated between 2010 and 2012. Those in control of the estates of authors, artists, and collectors have been allowed to use cultural and historical artifacts to pay the tax since 1910.

The UK has recently received a number of masterpieces including two oil portraits of aristocratic families by Sir Joshua Reynolds, a renowned 18^th century English artist. One portrait will be placed in the Tate and the other will go to the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery. Other works include two landscapes by JMW Turner; an oil sketch by Peter Paul Rubens titled The Triumph of Venus that will be placed in Cambridge’s Fitzwilliam Museum; a work by Italian 17^th century master Guernico that has been allocated to the National Gallery; and four sculptures and three works on paper by Barbara Hepworth.

The ability to donate significant works to pay off inheritance tax has introduced a number of remarkable pieces to the UK’s galleries and museums, bringing monumental works out from behind closed doors and into the public arena.

On December 5, Sotheby’s in New York will help cosmetics executive, Leonard Lauder, auction off jewelry that once belonged to his wife, Evelyn, and mother Estée. The collection is worth at least $13.4 million and includes a 47.714-carat heart-shaped yellow diamond with connections to the Duchess of Windsor, a Van Cleef & Arpels brooch featuring a pair of ruby tulips and diamonds, a flawless 6.54-carat fancy intense pink diamond ring by Oscar Heyman & Bros, and a 22.16-carat platinum and diamond ring from Graff.

Part of Sotheby’s Magnificent Jewels auction, the proceeds from the 35 pieces will benefit the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, an organization founded and championed by Evelyn Lauder. Additional pieces from the collection will be offered in New York as part of the Important Jewels auction in February 2013, also sold to benefit the Research Foundation. Leonard Lauder, chairman of The Estée Lauder Company and acting chairman of The Breast Cancer Research Foundation said, “We are pleased to be partnering with Sotheby’s for this important auction. Each piece of jewelry is unique and very special.”

 The auction comes at a time when high-end jewelry has been outperforming most of the art market. Buyers and collectors continue to seek recession-proof assets and have turned to quality jewelry designed by big names such as Bulgari and Van Cleef & Arpels for stable investments. Sotheby’s said its jewelry sales were up 19% this year.

David Hickey, one of America’s foremost art critics is known for his acerbic commentary, but his latest tirade against the world of modern art is downright scathing. Hickey, a professor, curator, and author, told the Observer that he will be walking away from contemporary art, a genre he says has been ruined by rich collectors who are more concerned with money and celebrity than quality.

Hickey claims that art editors and critics have lost their edge, spending more time catering to the wealthy people who hold the reigns on the contemporary art market than surveying the actual work (which he says is also lacking). Hickey is not alone in this claim. A number of contemporary art curators, museums, and galleries have deemed the work of such artists as Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, and Antony Gormley bloated and empty – the result of too much fame and not enough criticism. While the notion of the artist as celebrity is not new, today’s market is saturated with it and gaining status has taken precedence over making revolutionary, ground-breaking art.

A former dealer, Hickey is attuned to considering art in monetary terms but his objections stem from his belief that contemporary art has become too broad, too elitist, and lacks discretion. Hickey’s retirement will remove an important critical voice from the equation. He plans to complete a book on the pagan roots of America, aptly titled Pagan America, as well as a book of essays titled Pirates and Framers.

There was a time when Anthony Van Dyck’s Isabella, Lady de La Warr was considered one of the most important paintings at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts. Purchased in 1930 for $121,440 by the MFA donor, Mrs. Frederick T. Bradbury, the work went on view in the Hamilton Palace period room. It wasn’t until the 1980s when the painting went into storage that Isabella’s future started to look bleak.

When Malcolm Rogers rediscovered Isabella not long after he took over as the MFA’s director in 1994, he found the painting’s surface was discolored from protective varnishes and shoddy retouching had left the work with mismatched paint. Painted by the Flemish artist in 1638 during a stay in England, Rogers knew that Isabella could be recovered. A technical examination in 2011 reinforced Rogers’ belief.

The painting underwent nearly a year of restoration by the MFA’s paintings conservator, Rhona MacBeth and has just been installed in the MFA’s newly renovated Koch Gallery. Depicting an elegant woman, the wife of Lord Henry who served as a diplomat and treasurer of one of Van Dyck’s most famous subjects, England’s King Charles I, the painting is an excellent example of aristocratic portraiture that was in high demand by American collectors during the first few decades of the 20^th century.

The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens acquired thirteen pieces of furniture by the American architect, Frank Lloyd Wright. The selection of furniture had previously been on display at the Library since 2009 as part of a long-term loan from the prominent New York collectors, Joyce and Erving Wolf. The purchase was made directly from the Wolfs for an undisclosed amount.

The highlight of the group is a nine-piece dining room suite designed in 1899 for the now-demolished Husser House in Chicago. The commission marked a turning point in Wright’s career as he moved away from his more architecturally rigid views on interiors towards the notion that interior space can be open and flowing. The other four pieces in the acquisition were from signature Wright houses in Illinois including the Avery Coonley House, the Arthur Heurtley House, the Little House (which has been demolished), and the Ward W. Willits House.

One of the greatest architects of the 20^th century, Wright played a pivotal part in changing design sensibilities from the highly ornate styles of the late-19^th century to more streamlined designs for modern times. In addition to developing plans for upward of a thousand buildings, Wright designed furniture, leaded-glass windows, light fixtures, metal ware, and textiles – all made to harmonize with the buildings for which they were intended.

165 years ago, the Knoedler Gallery opened its doors in New York and went on to help create some of the country’s most celebrated collections including those of Paul Mellon, Henry Clay Frick, and Robert Sterling Clark. Throughout the years, top-notch works by artists such as van Gogh, Manet, Winslow Homer, John Singer Sargent, Louise Bourgeois, and Willem de Kooning passed through the gallery. When the Soviet government sold hundreds of paintings from the State Hermitage Museum in Leningrad in the 1930s, they chose to work with Knoedler to sell paintings by masters like Rembrandt, Raphael, and Velazquez.

Knoedler’s exemplary past is often forgotten as the gallery’s present has been mired in lawsuits and accusations that the company’s former president, Ann Freedman, was in the business of selling fakes. Last year, Knoedler Gallery closed its doors for good.

This week, Los Angeles’ Getty Research Institute announced that it had bought the Knoedler Gallery archive. Spanning from around 1850 to 1971, the archive includes stock books, sales books, a photo archive and files of correspondence, including letters from artists and collectors, some with illustrations. The Getty was interested in Knoedler’s archive because it offers an expansive glimpse into the history of collecting and the art market in the United States and Europe from the mid-19^th century to modern times.

The archive was purchased from Knoedler’s owner, Michael Hammer, for an undisclosed amount. Meticulously preserved, the archive will be available to scholars and digitized for online research after the Getty catalogues and conserves it all.

French prime minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, decided not to impose a wealth tax on works of art after a massive backlash that involved the country’s leading museums, including the Louvre. The tax, which was proposed by President Francois Hollande as part of his 2013 budget plan, was to be enforced on works worth upward of $65,545 (50,000 euros) in an effort to reduce France’s deficit. Museum leaders became particularly incensed after budget minister, Jerome Cahuzac, championed the tax.

The heads of France’s seven largest museums banded together and sent an angry to the culture ministry stating that the tax would harm their collections as owners would be dissuaded from lending their privately-owned works in an attempt to hide their identities. Additionally, the tax could scare off potential art collectors, weakening the overall market.

In light of the harsh criticism, Ayrault stated that the wealth tax would not be approved although it had already been passed by the Assemblee Nationale’s finance committee.