artnet News Top 200 Art
Collectors Worldwide for 2015, Part One
artnet News, Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Today's world is ever more globalized and increasingly interconnected—and that means the emergence of a new kind of multi-millionaire and billionaire with currency to spare (see The Top 10 Uber-Rich Art Collectors). Beyond their tendency to snap up properties of every shade, from penthouses to boats to businesses, this generation of tycoons, celebrities, and philanthropists are more regularly turning to another time-tested form of ritual consumption with a range of cultural benefits: art collecting. Be they heirs to Middle Eastern fortunes or young pioneers in the tech industry (see Meet 20 of the World's Most Innovative Art Collectors), art collectors in the 21st century represent a demographic more widely varied than ever before.
To chronicle our times and these champions of the arts who hail from all corners of the planet and every possible background, artnet News has compiled the ultimate two-part list. Our roster of collectors features those who have been most active within the past 12 months and have shown a remarkable commitment to collecting.
We acknowledge that the lineup is heavily skewed toward male collectors based in the US, but beyond the usual suspects, we've done our best to cast a light on collectors you may not have yet heard about. We're impressed by the number of influential women who made the cut (see The 100 Most Powerful Women in Art: Part One), as well as the marked contingent of younger Chinese men and women including Richard Chang, David Chau and Kelly Ying, Adrian Cheng, and Lin Han.
Some collectors are profiled in depth, while others, our "Collectors to Watch"—including emerging connoisseurs, those who are operating under the radar, and those who were once very active even if they've been quieter in recent years—are incorporated by name only.
Organized alphabetically, the index is the culmination of a three-month process that began with a poll of experts in the industry—including dealers, art advisers, and other insiders—and involved the efforts of staff and freelance writer Emily Nathan. (See Artnet News Top 200 Art Collectors Worldwide For 2015, Part Two).
We hope you find it useful!
Roman Abramovich and Dasha Zhukova.
Photo via DailyMail
Roman Abramovich and Dasha Zhukova (Russia)
Moscow-born Dasha Zhukova opened the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in 2008 in Moscow (see Dasha Zhukova to Debut Moscow's Rem Koolhaas–Designed Garage Museum June 12), and, with her partner Roman Abramovich (the owner of England's Chelsea Football Club) she is now developing “New Holland," a 19-acre island in Saint Petersburg, into a similar creative hub. Together, they recently bought the world's largest collection of works by Ilya Kabakov (the priciest living Russian artist). Her collection is now legendary, containing thousands of mostly contemporary artworks. Her husband seems to prefer modern and Impressionist art, if auction records are any guide.
Robbie Antonio.
Photo: Courtesy of Clint Spaulding/ Patrick McMullan.
Robbie Antonio (Philippines)
Real estate developer Antonio's Manila home was designed by Rem Koolhaas—the first residential commission the architect had taken on in 15 years—and it houses the Filipino collector's private collection. His current obsession is a series of portraits of himself that he has commissioned from some of the world's hottest contemporary artists (he has already paid $3 million for the two dozen that have been completed), including Julian Schnabel, Marilyn Minter, David Salle, Zhang Huan, the Bruce High Quality Foundation, and Takashi Murakami.
Bernard and Hélène Arnault.
Photo: Courtesy of Billy Farrell/Patrick McMullan.
Hélène and Bernard Arnault (France)
Chairman and chief executive officer of the Louis Vuitton Foundation, Arnault is the richest man in France. His newest creation, the Frank Gehry–designed Louis Vuitton Foundation, opened in the Bois de Boulogne this past October (see As a Museum, Frank Gehry's Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris Disappoints), with commissioned works by the likes of Olafur Eliasson, Ellsworth Kelly, Sarah Morris, and Taryn Simon. His collection spans many thousands of contemporary and modern artworks.
Maria and Bill Bell.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Bill and Maria Bell (United States)
Maria, the former head writer of CBS's The Young and the Restless, a chair of the National Art Awards, and a former board co-chair of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (MOCA), got her start collecting modestly priced George Hurrell photos, and has always favored the work of idiosyncratic contemporary producers like Francesco Vezzoli and Mark Ryden. Her husband Bill's taste tends toward the more iconic, including works by Marcel Duchamp. Early in their collecting career together, the Bells were drawn to Andy Warhol, but, as they recently told the New York Observer, they wanted to look to more contemporary producers—and deemed Jeff Koons an appropriate choice. These days, they have amassed a substantial collection of works by Koons, along with many other mega names.
Peter Benedek.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Peter Benedek (United States)
Peter Benedek, co-founder of United Talent Agency and one of Hollywood's most powerful agents, began collecting art some 20 years ago, and has since filled nearly all the walls of his Brentwood home and his Beverly Hills office with works by some of the biggest names in modern and contemporary art—from David Hockney and Gerhard Richter to Alex Katz, Milton Avery, and even Francis Picabia and Giorgio Morandi. He is reported to have purchased a John Currin nude long before the painter was a hot name, and an Alice Neel portrait of dealer Robert Graham—which he purchased at auction—still hangs in his office: "It's great to have an agent looking at me every day," he told the Hollywood Reporter.
Debra and Leon Black.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Debra and Leon Black (United States)
Owner of Apollo Global Management, Phaidon Books, and Artspace Marketplace, so-called “buyouts man" Black is reported to have a fortune of $5.4 billion. In 2012, he made waves when he purchased one of four existing versions of Edvard Munch's The Scream for $119.9 million—at the time, the highest price ever paid for a work of art at an auction.
Christian and Karen Boros.
Photo: Courtesy FvF/ Wolfgang Stahr.
Christian and Karen Boros (Germany)
In 2003, ad agency founder and publisher Christian Boros purchased a former Nazi air raid shelter in central Berlin, and transformed it into the Bunker, an 80-room exhibition space for contemporary art. Featured artists from Boros's personal collection of some 700 works include contemporary stars like Elmgreen & Dragset, Sarah Lucas, and Rirkrit Tiravanija, classics like Olafur Eliasson (a Boros favorite, with 30 works in his collection), Franz Ackermann, Wolfgang Tillmans, Ed Ruscha, Damien Hirst, and Terence Koh, and even members of a new generation of Berlin-based artists, including Thea Djordjadze, Alicja Kwade, Klara Lidén, Michael Sailstorfer, and Danh Vo.
Norman and Irma Braman.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Irma and Norman Braman (United States)
Since they began collecting in 1979—they fell in love with sculptures by Alexander Calder and Joan Miró at the Maeght Foundation in southern France, as the story goes—auto-industry magnate Braman and his wife Irma have built a veritable empire of modern and contemporary art. Dividing their residences among France, Colorado, and Florida, the couple helped establish Art Basel in Miami Beach in 2002, and they are now single-handedly funding the design and construction of South Florida's newest major museum, the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami.
Peter Brant.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Peter Brant (United States)
The owner of Interview magazine (which he bought directly from its founder, Andy Warhol), as well as Art in America and Antiques, and the creator of the Brant Foundation in Greenwich, Connecticut (see Is the Brant Foundation a Tax Scam or an Art Investment Vehicle?), Brant is known for his blue-chip collection of primarily American art, though his recent acquisitions include Vancouver artist Steven Shearer. Brant made news recently when he purchased artist Walter de Maria's 16,400-square-foot East Sixth Street studio and home for $27 million (see Peter Brant Paid $27 Million for Walter De Maria's Old Studio); he has already hosted a show by Dan Colen in the space (see Peter Brant Hosts Dan Colen Show in Walter De Maria Studio), and many speculate that he will transform it into an exhibition venue.
Eli Broad.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Eli Broad (United States)
Widely considered one of Los Angeles's leading art patrons, entrepreneur Broad and his wife Edythe have been collecting for over five decades, assembling one of the world's most prominent collections of postwar and contemporary art (see 10 Los Angeles Art Power Couples You Need To Know). They are currently building the Broad, a $140-million showcase designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro which will house their vast trove and is slated to open its doors in the fall of 2015 (see Broad Museum Director Opens Up About First Exhibition and Eli Broad Sues Museum Contractor for $20 Million Over Delays). Among the most recent acquisitions to the still-growing collection (see Kusama, Kentridge, and Kjartansson Among Eli Broad's Latest Acquisitions) are Jordan Wolfson's multimedia, animatronic sculpture Female figure (2014) (see Eli Broad Adds Jordan Wolfson's Terrifying Robot to Collection), Yayoi Kusama's immersive Infinity Mirrored Room – The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away (2013); Ragnar Kjartansson's video installation The Visitors (2012) (see Kara Walker, Ragnar Kjartansson, Henri Matisse, Robert Gober and More Win AICA Awards); and William Kentridge's sculptural video work The Refusal of Time (2012).
*More Collectors To Watch:
Paul Allen
Basma Al Sulaiman
Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani
Marc Andreessen
Laura and John Arnold
Camilla Barella
Swizz Beatz
Claudia Beck and Andrew Gruft
Robert and Renée Belfer
Lawrence Benenson
Frieder Burda.
Photo: Courtesy of Joe Schildhorn/ Patrick McMullan.
Frieder Burda (Germany)
The son of a renowned German publisher and art collector, Burda bought his first picture, a Lucio Fontana, in his early 30s, and in 2004 he opened his Frieder Burda Museum in Baden-Baden. The collection has now grown to include more than 1,000 works of art. Like his father, Burda focuses on established modern movements such as German Expressionism (Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, August Macke, Max Beckmann) and Abstract Expressionism (Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning), and he has acquired a substantial collection of works by his German contemporaries, among them Sigmar Polke, Georg Baselitz, and Gerhard Richter.
Richard Chang.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Richard Chang (United States)
American-Chinese investment professional Richard Chang, the founder of the Domus Collection, is a trustee of the Royal Academy in London, a member of Tate's International Council and its Asia-Pacific Acquisitions Committee, and a trustee of MoMA PS1 and the Whitney Museum in New York, where he is also co-founder and chair of the performance committee. Dividing time between New York and Beijing, he is considered key in bridging Western and Asian art; he often sponsors special projects, such as Beijing-based artist Huang Ran's feature film The Administration of Glory in 2013 (which was selected for the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2014—see 31-Year-Old Artist Ran Huang Selected for Cannes' Palmes d'Or), and Pipilotti Rist's first exhibition in China, at the Times Museum in Guangzhou.
Kim Chang-il.
Photo: Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal.
Kim Chang-il (Korea)
Founder of the recently launched Arario Museum, Kim Chang-il is one of Korea's top gallerists as well as collectors, and is also an artist. His collection began with an interest in contemporary and modern Korean artists, but, as reported by the Huffington Post, a visit to MOCA in Los Angeles in 1981 inspired him to expand his collection. His holdings now number around 3,700 pieces, and include work from Korean contemporaries as well as YBAs, members of the Leipzig School, and young artists from China, India, and Southeast Asia, as well as respected big-name artists from the West.
Kelly Ying.
Photo: Courtesy of Forbes.
David Chau and Kelly Ying (China)
Based in Shanghai, David Chau and his wife, Kelly Ying, acquired the bulk of their wealth from David's fleet-management company, and estimate that they spend around $1.5 million annually on art acquisitions. Chau set up a $32-million art investment fund when he was 21, and is the financial backer of two galleries, Leo Xu's and Simon Wang's Antenna Space. He is also the co-founder, with Ying, of Shanghai's newest art fair, Art021. Their personal collection is anchored by work by three young Chinese artists, Liu Wei, Xu Zhen, and Yang Fudong, as well as an extensive selection of video art.
Pierre Tm Chen.
Photo: Courtesy of Sotheby's/ Andrew Loiterton.
Pierre T.M. Chen (Taiwan)
Chen made his first purchase in 1976 while still a student—a wooden sculpture by Chinese artist Cheung Yee. It took him a year and a half to save up the funds to do so. Today, the computer engineer's extensive collection features hundreds of paintings and sculptures by blue-chip artists including Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Henry Moore, Les Lalanne, Antony Gormley, Cai Guo-Qiang, and Jeff Koons. He is currently most excited by Western contemporary art, and purchases rather emotionally: he is said to have bought an untitled Cy Twombly because it made him feel “calm" and a yellow Warhol Fright Wig because he found it “so fresh."
Adrian Cheng.
Photo: Courtesy of Larry's List.
Adrian Cheng (China)
One of the world's youngest billionaires, Cheng is heir to a property-development fortune in Asia. He graduated from Harvard and has gone on to found the nonprofit K11 Art Foundation,
which supports art villages in Wuhan and Guiyang, China; its collection focuses on international artists, such as Yoshitomo Nara and Olafur Eliasson, while Cheng's own personal collection includes work by Chinese artists such as Zhang Enli. In 2012 Cheng was also invited to join Tate's Asia-Pacific Acquisitions Committee.
Kemal Has Cingillioglu.
Photo: Courtesy of Vebidoo.
Kemal Has Cingillioglu (United Kingdom)
Son of Turkish financier Halit Cingillioglu, Kemal Has Cingillioglu serves as a member of the European advisory board at Christie's. He made headlines this past year when he purchased Cy Twombly's 1960s work Untitled (Rome) for $4.4 million at Christie's.
Patricia Phelps de Cisneros.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Patricia Phelps de Cisneros (Venezuela and Dominican Republic)
Phelps de Cisneros is one of the world's most prominent collectors of Latin American art, and her trove contains some 2,000 works ranging across colonial, modern, and contemporary periods, along with ethnographic objects from the Americas. She sits on the board of MoMA, and London's Royal Academy recently presented an exhibition of 90 works in geometric abstraction that were drawn from her holdings.
Steven Cohen.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Steven Cohen (United States)
Billionaire former hedge fund manager Steven Cohen, who is reportedly worth some $11.1 billion, is said to spend 20 percent of his income on art, with a collection that famously includes a Pollock drip painting and Damien Hirst's iconic shark piece, which he bought from Charles Saatchi for $8 million in 2004. In 2006, he offered to buy Picasso's Le Rêve from Steve Wynn for $139 million, but Wynn accidentally put his elbow through the painting and the deal was off until last year, when Cohen finally purchased the painting, now repaired, for $155 million. He was also the secret buyer of the Alberto Giacometti sculpture Chariot in November, which he bought at Sotheby's for a near-record $100,965,000.
Carlos and Rosa de la Cruz.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Rosa and Carlos de la Cruz (United States)
Carlos de la Cruz is the chairman of a $1 billion-per-year business empire that includes Coca-Cola bottling plants in Trinidad and Tobago and Puerto Rico. Along with his wife Rosa, he is known for staging state-of-the-art annual exhibitions that coincide with Art Basel Miami Beach. These were initially held in their private Miami residence, but are now staged at their eponymous three-story, 30,000-square-foot art space, which they opened in 2009. The couple is keen on acquiring works from across the wide range of contemporary American production, most recently purchasing pieces by Dan Colen and Nate Lowman.
*More Collectors To Watch:
Nicolas Berggruen
Jill and Jay Bernstein
Ernesto Bertarelli
James Brett
Jim Breyer
Christian Bührle
Monique and Max Burger
Valentino D. Carlotti
Edouard Carmignac
Trudy and Paul Cejas
Dimitris Daskalopoulos.
Photo: Courtesy Trevor Leighton.
Dimitris Daskalopoulos (Greece)
Beyond his vast collection of contemporary art, Greek food and beverage entrepreneur Daskalopoulos is a member of the board of trustees of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, Tate International Council, the Director's Vision Council of the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and the Leadership Council of New York's New Museum. He is also a founding partner of the Whitechapel Gallery's Future Fund. In 2014 he was honored by Independent Curators International (ICI) with the Leo Award, which celebrates a “visionary" approach to collecting. He is also a champion of the contemporary art scene in his home country, and recently founded a nonprofit, NEON, committed to bringing contemporary culture to everyone in Greece.
Zöe and Joel Dictrow.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Zöe and Joel Dictrow (United States)
These long-time West Village residents, Zoe a former magazine advertising manager and Joel a former Citigroup executive, have lived in the same apartment for four decades, though they eventually purchased two neighboring apartments to accommodate their expanding art collection. They are known for their support of emerging artists, but their holdings include work by established producers like Gerhard Richter, Robert Gober, Cindy Sherman and Sarah Sze.
George Economou.
Photo: Courtesy of Nicholas Hunt/ Patrick McMullan.
George Economou (Greece)
The Greek shipping magnate has a predilection for paintings and drawings, particularly of the 20th-century German and Austrian persuasion, and he frequently purchases work by lesser-known artists, or minor works by big-name producers, from Picasso, Twombly and Magritte to Kees van Dongen. A prolific collector, he acquires between 150 to 200 works a year, and usually chooses to go through smaller auction houses and galleries based in Germany and Austria rather than Sotheby's or Christie's.
Alan Faena.
Photo: Courtesy Patrick McMullan/ Patrick McMullan.
Alan Faena (Argentina)
Argentina's most successful hotelier and real estate developer, Faena is an avid collector of Latin American art. In December of 2015, he aims to debut his new exhibition space, a Rem Koolhaas–designed structure called the Faena Forum, opening in Miami.
Harald Falckenberg.
Photo: via Wikipedia.
Harald Falckenberg (Germany)
One of the world's most respected art collectors, Falckenberg has received the Art Cologne Prize and the Montblanc de la Culture Arts Patronage Award, and published numerous books on art. Known for his ability to stay ahead of the art market, he was among the first collectors to purchase works by now-major figures like Martin Kippenberger, Richard Prince, and Jonathan Meese, and his collection comprises over 2,000 pieces, shown in a 65,000-square-foot former factory building in Hamburg in collaboration with Deichtorhallen/Hamburg.
Mark Falcone and Ellen Bruss.
Photo: artspace.com
Mark Falcone and Ellen Bruss (United States)
Real-estate developer Falcone and his wife Ellen Bruss live next door to the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver in a home designed for them by architect David Adjaye. In recent years they have become avid collectors of Mexican art, and their collection now includes works by Gonzalo Lebrija, Eduardo Sarabia, and Federico Solmi, as well as Denver artists Stephen Batura, David Zimmer, Adam Milner, Bill Stockman, and Mary Erhin.
Amy and Vernon Faulconer.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Amy and Vernon Faulconer (United States)
Founded by oil and gas magnate Vernon Faulconer and his wife Amy, the Amy and Vernon Faulconer Collection contains painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installation works made from 1945 to the present, with notable contributions by such artists as Cecily Brown, John Chamberlain, Francesco Clemente, Donald Judd, Anish Kapoor, Anselm Kiefer, Martin Kippenberger, Bridget Riley, James Turell, and Kara Walker, among many others. Together with his friends and fellow Texan super-collectors the Rachofskys, the Falconers opened the Warehouse in 2012, in part to accommodate works that were too large for the Faulconer's private home.
Howard Farber.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Howard and Patricia Farber (United States)
The Farbers fell in love with the art of Cuba during a visit to the island in 2001, and have since created a stunning collection of some 200 pieces by artists including Belkis Ayón, Abel Barroso, Tania Bruguera, Los Carpinteros, Sandra Ramos, Duvier del Dago, Carlos Garaicoa, René Peña, and Rocío García.
Marilyn and Larry Fields.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Larry and Marilyn Fields (United States)
Lawyer and former commodities trader Larry and his wife Marilyn, one of Chicago's most prominent collecting couples, have amassed an array of some 500 objects from almost 300 living artists, 150 of which are installed in their private residence, and many of which have a political bent. The collection includes many pieces by African-American artists such as Kara Walker, Glenn Ligon, Mark Bradford, and Theaster Gates, whom they have been collecting in depth. Recent acquisitions include works by David Hammons, Jim Hodges, and Christopher Wool.
*More Collectors To Watch
Marie Chaix
Michael and Eva Chow
Frank Cohen
Michael and Eileen Cohen
Isabel and Agustín Coppel
Anthony D'Offay
Theo Danjuma
Hélène and Michel David-Weill
Antoine de Galbert
Ralph DeLuca
Amanda and Glenn Fuhrman.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Amanda and Glenn Fuhrman (United States)
Fuhrman, co-managing partner of MSD Capital, studied art history and was recently listed by Business Insider among the most serious art collectors on Wall Street. He is a trustee of the MoMA, is a trustee of Tate Americas Foundation, is a board member of the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia, and is founder of The FLAG Art Foundation in New York.
David and Danielle Ganek.
Photo: patrickmcmullan.com
Danielle and David Ganek (United States)
A former equity trader for SAC Capital and a trustee of the Guggenheim, Ganek and his wife, editor and novelist Danielle, have a sprawling art collection that includes work by Richard Prince, Diane Arbus, Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, John Currin, and Mike Kelley. David bought his first work of art at the age of 17, and has since gone on to commission work from mega-hot contemporary artists such as Ed Ruscha, whom he hired to create a painting incorporating the word “Level" for the walls of his firm's Greenwich headquarters in 2003.
Ingvild Goetz.
Photo: Courtesy Suddeutsche.de
Ingvild Goetz (Germany)
Former gallerist Ingvild Goetz began to collect media art in the 1990s, and today she owns one of the largest private collections of video art and media works in the world. Her Goetz Collection, housed in a private museum designed by Herzog & de Meuron in
