The Doyennes of the Art World | Art Portfolio | Bon Int No.20

The Autumn/Winter 2011-12 Bon Art Portfolio took a different angle, focusing on the female collector. See excerpts of the exclusive contributions by four leading art ladies. 

Collecting art has long been a distinguishable enterprise. In a world strongly dominated by men, whether artists, dealers or collectors, Bon wanted to concentrate on the women who are paving the way for the female collector. Not since Peggy Guggenheim, The Cone sisters and Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney have four women made such an impression. Pushing the boundaries of patronage and philanthropic support, they represent the new global horizon.

Collecting art isn’t enough for Valeria Napoleone, she wants to be in the thick of it, meeting and forging relationships with artists, supporting their practice as well as contributing and getting involved in special projects for art institutions. After graduating in Journalism at NYU, Valeria started collecting but didn’t follow her parents love of antiques instead veered towards contemporary art. So what got her into collecting in the first place, “My deep need to challenge and stimulate myself constantly, the excitement to be able to connect with leaving artists and not just accumulate beautiful art works.”

Patrizia Sandretto Re Rebaudengo has been collecting art for the past 20 years. At first she would focus on Italian art, photography and female artists, cultivating a more thematic collection but she explains, “Today we live in a global world and art has gone the same way, with so many artists from diverse cultures across the world involved and therefore my collection, FSRR too has developed into a global map of art production.” 

Anita Zabludowicz started collecting art with her husband in 1994. Inspired by the ‘High and Low’ exhibition at MOMA New York, a hunger to discover and understand varied art practices resulted in building up the now renowned Zabludowicz Collection. 

In the past eleven years, Amy Phelan along with her husband, have amassed an impressive collection of over 600 pieces. Focusing on a variety of media from painting, sculpture to photography and video, Picasso’s and de Kooning’s sit alongside the likes of Damien Hirst, Cindy Sherman and Thomas Ruff. Annually they open their Aspen home for the artCRUSH fundraiser and once more exclusively for Bon, Amy opens the doors on their collection.