BMW Art Guide by Independent Collectors

Hidden Collections

by Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas

Besides giving you insight into private yet publicly accessible collections worldwide, we also want to provide background information on the art of collecting. This is why we included numerous Shorties, concise texts about collecting, in the BMW Art Guide by Independent Collectors.

The Art Guide is all about making privately owned art accessible to the public. Nevertheless, in the course of our research, we have come across fascinating art collections that value discretion and are not opened to the public. There are divers reasons for this.

This guide presents over two hundred private collections that are open to the public. Some collections have the character of a museum, accessible only during fixed opening hours. Others exist in strictly private rooms that may be visited by appointment only. Still others place an even higher value on discretion; these spaces are not publicly accessible. The reasons for this are manifold. These collectors have acquired art as an individual passion and want to share it only with an intimate circle of friends and family. Some collectors open their homes for a select group of VIPs during the major art fairs, but others prefer to steer clear entirely from public access. Why? It is understandable that in some South American cities collectors harbor a fear of being robbed and so conceal their collections from public view. In São Paulo, for example, there are grand mansions with amazing private collections, but for security reasons they are accessible only to selected visitors. Sometimes the reasons are pragmatic: the video collection of the French collector-couple Isabelle and Jean-Conrad Lemaître takes up very little space; it actually fits in the closet, neatly stacked next to Monsieur Lemaître’s shirts. But because the collectors pay enormous attention to the technologically perfect presentation of their treasures, they only work with select art institutions. One of the most important American private collections is not public. Norman and Irma Braman of Miami Beach have the most comprehensive inventory of works by Alexander Calder outside the museum world, next to key works by Damien Hirst, Mark Rothko, and Andy Warhol. But instead of opening a museum, the elderly billionaires decided in 2011 to posthumously auction off a large part of the collection to benefit breast-cancer research. An understandable and noble gesture.

The journalist couple Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas have been writing freelance art journalism and art criticism since 1997 for a variety of national and international art magazines and newspapers.

Insiders (73)

DANIEL ZAMANI

Artistic Director at Museum Frieder Burda.

Kateřina Havrlant

Collector behind the Havrlant Art Collection

JAEMYUNG NOH

Interview with the Korean collector who has been collecting art since high school.

ISSA MASÉ

Emerging Collectors - The Ori House

Pieter and Carla Schulting

The Schulting Art Collection

KOO HOUSE MUSEUM

Exhibition venue with the theme ‚Living with Art‘

Wilhelmina Jewell Strong - Sparks

Founder of BiTHOUSE Projects - BAAR Art Journey

MATTHIAS ARNDT

Collector behind the ARNDT Collection

Sandra Guimarães

Director of Museum of Contemporary Art Helga de Alvear

Grazyna Kulczyk

Founder of Muzeum Susch

THE FAIREST

Interview with Georgie Pope and Eleonora Sutter, Co-founders

Kamiar Maleki

Director at VOLTA

Gallery Weekend Berlin 2022

Tokini Peterside

Founder and Director, ART X Lagos

Poka-Yio

Founding Director of the Athens Biennale

Boris Ondreička

Artistic Director of viennacontemporary

Maribel Lopez

Director of ARCO

David Gryn

Founder and Director of Daata

Fondation Beyeler Audiovisual Broadcast

Fondation Beyeler and Nordstern Basel present Dixon x Transmoderna

Gary Yeh

Founder of ArtDrunk and Young Collector

WATCH: The Best of the BMW Art Guide

Where will you travel next to explore art?

Maike Cruse

2020 Gallery Weekend Berlin

Touria El Glaoui

Founding Director of 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair

Johann König

Messe in St. Agnes

PArt - Producers Art Platform

A crisis initiative to help artists directly affected by the pandemic

Barbara Moore

CEO of Biennale of Sydney

Unique Collector’s Item

by Independent Collectors

Alix Dana

Fair Director at Independent

When Collectors are Able to Commission

by Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas

Juliet Kothe and Julia Rust

Initiators of Collection Night, Berlin

Marie-Anne McQuay

Curator of Wales in Venice, 58th Venice Biennale 2019

Dorothy and Herb Vogel

Two extraordinary art collectors

Heather Hubbs

Director at NADA

Every Art Collection Needs Space

by Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas

Collecting Art with François Pinault

Rudolf Stingel at Palazzo Grassi

A Common Ground

by Silvia Anna Barrilà

Caroline Vos

Director at Amsterdam Art Weekend

Nicole Berry

Executive Director of The Armory Show

Daniel Hug

Fair Director at Art Cologne

The Role of the Art Fair

by Silvia Anna Barrilà

Peter Bläuer

Director at LISTE

A Brush Against Nature

by Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas

Ilaria Bonacossa

Director of Artissima

Excessiveness, the Latent Danger of Collecting Art

by Independent Collectors

Jo Stella-Sawicka

Artistic Director at Frieze

Florence Bourgeois

Director at Paris Photo

Where Artists Can Work More Playfully

by Christiane Meixner

Specifically Commissioned

by Silvia Anna Barrilà

Manuela Mozo

Executive Director of UNTITLED, ART Miami and San Francisco

Important Museums and Private Collections

by Christiane Meixner

Susanna Corchia

Director of the Barcelona Gallery Weekend

Emilia van Lynden

Artistic Director at Unseen, Amsterdam

Carlos Urroz

Director at ARCOmadrid

Shoe Smudges Streaked Across the White Walls

by Christiane Meixner

Amanda Coulson

Director at VOLTA Basel

Douwe Cramer

Director at Singapore Contemporary

Art and Architecture – Attractive Allies

by Nicole Büsing and Heiko Klaas

Jo Baring

Curator of Sculpture Series, Masterpiece London

Bidders and Buyers

by Christiane Meixner

Anne Vierstraete

Managing Director at Art Brussels

Nanna Hjortenberg

Director at CHART

The Crucial Role of the New

by Independent Collectors

Makers and Believers

On Art History’s Most Famous Patrons

The Past is Back

And collectors are buying it up

Are Artists the Better Curators?

On the diminishing boundary between professions in the art world

The Digital Museum

On the importance of the museum’s web presence

The Man in the Middle

On the curator’s private and public engagements

A Private Matter?

On the importance of physical space for the value of art

Off the Wall

How museums contribute to the worth of artworks

Where to Go Next?

The fragmentation of Manhattan’s gallery scene

To Buy or Not to Buy

Collectors on their experiences of letting an artwork slip away

How to Pass On a Passion

On long-term challenges for new private museums