After an N.F.L. Career, Keith Rivers Enters the Collector's Field

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Hilarie M. Sheets

Keith Rivers in his Beverly Hills home with, from left, “Untitled” (2017), by Arjan Martins; “Untitled (You drive a hard bargain)" (2011), by Barbara Kruger; and “Raised Eyebrows and Furrowed Foreheads” (2008), by John Baldessari.CreditCredit

“Art gave me something to segue into,” said Keith Rivers, a former N.F.L. linebacker, at his art-filled house in Beverly Hills. “During his rookie season with the Cincinnati Bengals in 2009, Mr. Rivers bought his first piece — an Andy Warhol Electric Chair print — after a trip to the Museum of Modern Art with a woman he had been interested in when he was studying at the University of Southern California. Since he retired from football in 2015, after also having played for the New York Giants and the Buffalo Bills, Mr. Rivers has deepened his pursuit of contemporary art and owns work by Kerry James Marshall, Kara Walker, and Arjan Martins, among others.[More]

Why Store Art, When You Can Share It? A Collector's Trove

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Robin Pogrebin

Reginald Van Lee at home with Tyler D. Ballon’s “The Pietà.”

What attracted you to an unknown like Tyler Ballon — his religious-themed scenes of African-Americans? "I was blown away. [Gesturing to a large painting over a sofa] This is “The Pietà.” My role in life is to enhance things. I really like to support young artists." Reginald Van Lee should have bought those Basquiats when he had the chance. Jean-Michel Basquiat, before he was famous, offered two of his paintings to Mr. Van Lee, who declined, having never been a fan. The decision was consistent with Mr. Van Lee’s principles over the 20 years he’s been collecting: buying only art that he loves, never acquiring a piece solely because it is likely to appreciate in value. [More]

The Music Producer Who Became an Advocate for Artists of Color

THE NEW YORK TIMES
By M.H. Miller

Kasseem Dean, a.k.a. Swizz Beatz (second from left), at his home in New Jersey with some of the artists whose work is in his collection (from left): Nina Chanel Abney, Kaws, Jordan Casteel and Cy Gavin. Above them is Kehinde Wiley’s “Femme Piquée par un Serpent” (2008).

Hip-hops interest in contemporary art is, by now, something of a cliché. American materialism has been at the center of rap lyrics since at least 1982 when Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five rhymed about stolen TVs and “double-digit inflation.” There was the hip-hop producer Swizz Beatz, who had his first hit single in the late ’90s while still a teenager, and who used the money to buy an Ansel Adams photograph. Swizz Beatz, whose real name is Kasseem Dean, lives in a house in Englewood, N.J., that used to belong to Eddie Murphy. [More]

Black collectors cultivated an art habit and romance at museum

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Hilarie M. Sheets

Monique and Ronald Ollie in front of Ed Clark’s “Untitled” (1975). Credit: Sam Gilliam/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York; Daniel Dorsa for The New York Times

When Ronald Ollie was an engineering student at the Missouri University of Science and Technology in the early 1970s, he would take dates to the St. Louis Art Museum. Today, Mr. Ollie, a retired mechanical engineer, and his wife, Monique, who has a doctorate in biomedical engineering, talked about their collection in their Newark apartment, which has a spectacular view of Manhattan and walls covered with abstract work by black artists. The collecting compulsion was a pre-existing condition when Mr. Ollie met his future wife in 2003 at the National Black Fine Art Show. “I have picked out a few pieces, but mine are in the back,” Ms. Ollie, who is a project manager at Johnson & Johnson, said good-naturedly. [More]

Black collectors, E.T. & Lynn Williams filling their lives with art

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Warren Strugatch

Lyn and E.T. Williams in their Manhattan home between two works by Claude Lawrence: left, “Yard — An Ode to Charlie Parker” and “At the Hop.”CreditCreditDaniel Dorsa for The New York Times

E. T. Williams Jr. and his wife, Lyn, began collecting art as newlyweds living in Baltimore in the mid-60s. “We had a couple of friends who were artists and we bought works from them,” said Ms. Williams, who studied art and briefly hoped to be a sculptor. As their collection grew, the Williamses, too, took part in art circles. They began to invite students and fledgling collectors as well as established curators and museum directors for casual exhibitions at home, which continue today. “We moved from prints into original works” as he switched to real estate finance, which gave the couple “more cash on hand,” Mr. Williams said. [More]

Collectors Gary and Denise Gardner championing Black artists

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Ted Loos

Gary and Denise Gardner in their home with Elizabeth Catlett’s sculpture “Mother and Child,” left, and Charles White’s 1950 graphite drawing “Untitled.”Credit: Catlett Mora Family Trust/Licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society (ARS), NY, (Catlett sculpture); Photograph by Whitten Sabbatini for The New York Times

CHICAGO---The collectors Denise and Gary Gardner are very public in their support of “Charles White: A Retrospective,” an exhibition now at the Art Institute of Chicago that will travel to the Museum of Modern of Art in the fall. They are listed as “lead individual sponsors.” More privately, the Gardners own a couple of works by White. The Gardners display more than 100 artworks at home — a few are out on loan — and many of them hang in a large basement gallery they retrofitted as their collection grew. Their focus is squarely on African-American artists, including Carrie Mae Weems, Sam Gilliam, Ed Clark, Amy Sherald, Elizabeth Catlett (who was once married to White) and Nick Cave. [More]

RELIGIOUS ART | NEWS OF WEEK

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
By Gregory & Ernest Disney-Britton

Verneida Britton wrapped in her beach-towel, "The Virgin Martyr St Cecelia" by Kehinde Wiley. Photo taken by her son, Greg Disney-Britton at Newport on the Levee. 

Visual artist Kehinde Wiley forever changed the way we see portrait painting. He re-conceptualized history to form a contemporary vision, and inspired us to do the same in our own lives. This weekend, as we celebrated our son Kai’s job promotion he interviewed his grandmother sharing family history. Today, we’ll dine at his grandfather’s (1936-2009) favorite restaurant, Frisch’s Big Boy for what would have been his 82nd birthday. Next month, we’ll take Kai’s nana to Tybee Beach for her 80th birthday wrapped in Kehinde Wiley’s “The Virgin Martyr St. Cecilia.” It's a beach towel version of Wiley’s 18-foot original, and that's why Kehinde Wiley’s “The Virgin Martyr St. Cecilia” is our art of the week.

From teacher to collector, Atlanta woman is keeper of black culture

ATLANTA JOURNAL CONSTITUTION
By Nedra Rhone

Theresa Easton, a retired school teacher from New York who has spent 30 years amassing a collection of art and memorabilia of African American interest, has converted the third floor of her home into a art gallery. Curtis Compton/ccompton@ajc.com

ATLANTA---It started with books -- first editions, most all of them signed and some of them with a story behind the story on the pages. Tucked on a second floor bookshelf are the full works of Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Walter Mosley and other authors of the contemporary African-American literary canon. When any author of note passed through Barnes & Noble Headquarters on Fifth Avenue in New York, Theresa Easton, a former New York City school teacher was there with a book in hand. Eventually she graduated from books to art, sports memorabilia and other items until she amassed a collection celebrating decades of black achievement including more than 200 works of art by 64 different artists. Eight years ago, after retiring to Atlanta, Easton searched for a home with enough space to house her collection. [More]

Gerun Riley and Jason Wilborn's house is a frame for handmade contents

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Adam Popescu

Gerun Riley and her husband, Jason Wilborn, at home. Credit Graham Walzer for The New York Times

CULVER CITY, Calif. — In a city known for a love of all things artisanal, “handcrafted” has become the descriptor du jour for everything from cocktails to ceramics. But it’s a good bet few Angelenos have actually built their own homes with their hands, as did Gerun Riley, 41, the president of the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, and her husband Jason Wilborn, 48, a television writer. In their minimal two-story home on a leafy street here, one room flows into the next, and so does the art — an Art Weeks oil painting, a framed Pat York photograph of a young Jane Fonda as Barbarella, a mixed-media work by Brenna Youngblood, a fairytale-esque Erin Stead watercolor and a piece made by one of the couple’s young daughters, who are 6 and 3. [More]

She married an artist, and now finds comfort in his work

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Hilarie M. Sheets

Merele Williams-Adkins in her family’s home in Clinton Hill, with work by her husband, Terry Adkins, behind her, and a piece by Glenn Ligon, lower left. Credit Cole Wilson for The New York Times

NEW YORK---Merele Williams, a lawyer by training, was sick of dating doctors and lawyers. She set her sights on meeting an artist, and at a party in 1991, she did. That night he proposed, and nine months later they were married. They lived, with their two children, in a Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, brownstone surrounded by Mr. Adkins’s work and filled with collections of African art, musical instruments and pieces by his peers. Long admired within New York circles of African-American artists and curators like Thelma Golden and Kellie Jones, Mr. Adkins died from cardiomyopathy in 2014 at the age of 60. A survey of his sculpture — often refined hybrids of found objects that were used as props in his musical performances — is on view through Feb. 17 in “Terry Adkins: The Smooth, The Cut, and The Assembled.” [More]

Starting an interfaith dialogue by collecting religious art

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
Showing Our Walls
By Ernest Disney-Britton

Greg Disney-Britton stands flanked by art in the living room of his Indianapolis home

INDIANAPOLIS, IN---A week ago, on Epiphany Day a Christmas tree stood in the spot where Greg Disney-Britton was photographed in his downtown Indianapolis home. He is flanked on his right by Tom Torluemke's "Let Freedom Ring, The Wedding Bells" (2011) and to his left by Anila Quayyum Agha's "Moon Beam For My Love 1" (2016). It is representative of a  recurring theme in the Disney-Britton collection. It is an ongoing dialogue between Christian art and the art of other faiths including Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic, and Jewish. The Torluemke was purchased to celebrate the freedom to marry when it became the law of the land; and the Agha work was purchased because of its message about interfaith dialogue and religious tolerance.

Collectors: Christmas ornaments, everyman's collectible and the end of Christmas

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
Showing Our Walls
By Ernest Disney-Britton

Friends gathered for the end of Christmas 2017

Who doesn't collect Christmas ornaments? Eleven friends gathered on January 6th for a Three King's Day party, and in this photo, each is holding an ornament they've each removed from the Christmas tree at the home of Ernest & Gregory Disney-Britton (Ted Givens was present too but not in photo). Top Left: Rev. Joshua Burkholder, Rev. Jackie Jackson, Donald Bievenour, Ernest Disney-Britton. Bottom Left: Greg Disney-Britton, Ginger Bievenour, Rev. Carolyn Burkholder (holding Xavier Burkholder and his ornament), Tracy Robinson, and Tina Sherrard.

Developing a collector's passion for religious photography

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
By Ernest Disney-Britton

Ernest Disney-Britton stands at home in Indianapolis next to new photographer Kelvin Buzon's diptych titled "Ama Namin” (“Our Father" in Tagalog) and “Ina ng Gracia” (“Mother of Grace"), AP prints; top left and middle left; Doug Birkenheuer's "Evil Innocence," bottom left; and William Rasdell’s “Jews in the African Diaspora" collection, bottom right.

There was a photography studio inside the arts center where I had my first arts management job after college graduation in 1984. I recall being struck by how the photographers saw themselves as storytellers, and it was during those years that I bought my first religious-themed photographs. When I left the Arts Consortium of Cincinnati, I also took a long hiatus from photography. However, since Greg and I married ten-years ago, we have begun following the work of a number of contemporary photographers who tell religious stories. Most recently, we met Filipino-American photographer Kelvin Burzon. In two self-portraits that we acquired this month, Burzon portrays both Jesus Christ (top) and the Virgin Mary (bottom). In short, it's a good time to collect religious art photography.

For Greg Disney-Britton, images of Christ brings church to his home

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS

Gregory Disney-Britton seated at home in Indianapolis holding newly acquired Kelvin Buzon's "Saint John the Baptist," edition 1 of 25; Nicollo Cosme’s ”Madonna & Child,” top left; William Wallace's "John 3:16," bottom left; William Fritsch’s “The Next Supper,” foreground right; and Henrich Hoffman's "Figure of Christ," center left.

Gregory Disney-Britton is surrounded by images of Christ each night as he sits down at home to manage his church's daily blog postings. “It's the most important tool our church has to share our member's journey and how they connect to scripture," he said of his work at Life Journey Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. While Greg's been collecting for years, it's a recent decision to transform his office den into an exclusive display of portraits of Jesus Christ, paintings, drawings, prints, and posters. Christ's baptism by Saint John the Baptist by photographer Kelvin Burzon is a recent acquisition, but works by Henrich Hoffman and Salvador Dali are also included.

Collectors Ellen & Jerome's Stern's chase for art, comes to a long goodbye

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Robin Pogrebin

Ellen Stern in her living room, with an untitled work by the Surrealist artist Roland Penrose, above left. The shelf holds three Joseph Cornell boxes; above them is “To Better the Guarded” by the British-Ghanian painter Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, and, at right, “Vespers” by Ms. Yiadom-Boakye. Credit Vincent Tullo for The New York Time

NEW YORK---Losing her husband, Jerome, in March was devastating for Ellen Stern. And preparing to part with much of their extensive art collection this fall is its own kind of grief. The Sterns’ Manhattan apartment is filled with paintings, sculpture and photography, as is the “art barn” on their 16-acre estate in Westhampton, N.Y. Valuable pieces from both locations will come up for sale at Sotheby’s starting in November. "We just had a lot of fun doing it. Jerome loved the chase, meeting the artists, getting to know the artists," said Stern. "Wangechi Mutu was married on our property in Westhampton. We helped support the artists. It’s nice knowing the artists and seeing how their careers develop." [More]

A collector and fashion maven’s retreat from the chiffon trenches

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Ted Loos

André Leon Talley at home with Bradley Theodore’s 2014 painting of Diana Vreeland and an undated photograph of Vreeland. Below the photograph is Manolo Blahnik’s drawing of a shoe. Credit Ike Edeani for The New York Times

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. — “Come in! Back here!” André Leon Talley’s voice rang out, instructing a visitor to enter his elegant white colonial here, which is surrounded by a tidy lawn and large hydrangeas. His home, where he has lived since 2005, is filled with art and baubles. Most of the items were gifts or auction purchases. Mr. Talley said that he particularly favored the sales at Doyle New York. Diana Vreeland, the late great Vogue editor, looms as an éminence blanche of sorts — the two largest pieces on one wall are depictions of her. Bradley Theodore’s 2014 painting of her hangs next to an undated black-and-white photograph. [More]

Meet Yusaku Maezawa, the megacollector who broke Basquiat's world record

SOTHEBY'S SELECT

Collector Yusaky Maezawa's tastes range from contemporary art to 20th-century design and Japanese ceramics. Here he poses with a group of 17th-century Oribe ware. Photograph by Yasunai Kikuma. 

Yusaku Maezawa is ready for his close-up. For his photo shoot with leading Japanese magazine photographer Yasunari Kikuma, the 41-year-old e-commerce entrepreneur arrives with a game attitude. The shoot will take place in front of a solid blue backdrop, the color chosen to echo the palette of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s Untitled, a 1982 painting that Maezawa bought at a recent Sotheby’s auction for a record $110.5 million. Within a few minutes, Maezawa’s 200,000 followers on Instagram and Twitter learned that he was the painting’s new owner. Posting a photo of himself taken a few days earlier during a private viewing of the painting in New York. [More]

First private Qatari collector shares major collection at the Museum of Islamic Art

THE PENINSULA QATAR

Fadel Al Mansoori, Collector during the media tour at his exhibition Powder and Damask which opened officially at the Museum of Islamic Art . Baher Amin

DOHA---The “Powder and Damask: Islamic Arms and Armour” from the Collection of Fadel Al Mansoori exhibition opened today at the Museum of Islamic Art. The exhibition, running from August 27, 2017 through May 12, 2018, presents edged weapons and firearms crafted primarily in Turkey, Iran and India from the 17th to the mid-19th century. The exhibition was curated by Dr Mounia Chekhab Abudaya and Julia Tugwell of MIA, with support from Al Mansoori. Fadel Al Mansoori, who became the first Qatari collector to exhibit his private collection at MIA, was on hand to walk guests through artefacts that represent some of the best examples of craftsmanship from the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires. [More]

Collector: Peter Menéndez collects the art of fellow Cuban exiles, but Miami is home

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Brett Sokol

Peter Menéndez at home in Miami with “Untitled (Pleiades no. 2),” a sculpture by Rafael Domenech from 2016. On the wall behind him is another work by Mr. Domenech, “Untitled (Una por Otra) Post Archeology — Complete,” also from 2016; below that is Carlos Alfonzo’s “Largo Three,” from 1984. Credit Moris Moreno for The New York Times

MIAMI---Miami’s once sclerotic arts world became roused by many of the newly arrived exiles (1980s) — including the novelist Reinaldo Arenas and the painter Carlos Alfonzo — who brought an energetic avant-garde spirit and an expansive vision. Work by those same Cuban artists fills Mr. Menéndez’s Miami home. Mr. Alfonzo’s haunting “Figurat,” from 1991, with crimson swathes encircling a figure, chronicles the painter’s own physical deterioration as the effects of AIDS ravaged his body. A recent sculpture by Rafael Domenech, who immigrated from Cuba in 2010, takes a less emotional approach, emphasizing its material process — elliptical bands around a hanging Saturn-like structure seem to defy gravity, while diagrams installed nearby trace those same bands’ die-cut origins. [More]

Collector: Cheech Marin, searching for a ‘Chicano Rockwell’

THE NEW YORK TIMES
Show Us Your Walls
By Michael Walker

The actor and comedian Cheech Marin with “Una Tarde en Meoqui,” by the artist Wayne Alaniz Healy. Credit Monica Almeida/The New York Times

LOS ANGELES---Cheech Marin gestures affectionately at a canvas hanging in the kitchen of his hilltop home here in Pacific Palisades. The multi-hyphenate actor, musician, author and founding member of the cannabis-infused Cheech & Chong is loath to cite favorites in his extensive collection of Chicano art but confesses a soft spot for Wayne Alaniz Healy’s “Una Tarde en Meoqui” (“One Afternoon in Meoqui”). “That’s Norman Rockwell, where I come from — if Rockwell were a Chicano,” Mr. Marin said. In May, Riverside, the Los Angeles suburb, agreed to convert a former public library into the Cheech Marin Museum of Chicano Art, Culture & Industry, currently in the early stages of fund-raising, which would display works from his collection alongside new paintings and sculpture. [More]