Why collect?
Tuesday 12 May - Thursday 4 June 2020
The Benjamin West Lecture Theatre, Burlington Gardens, Royal Academy of Arts
Various events, booking required
Gauguin and the Impressionists
Join us to hear current art collectors offer a rare insight into their collections and to learn what motivates individuals to collect art today.
In this series of events including in conversations, talks and a film screening, we ask: Why collect? What opportunities are contemporary collectors presented with today? How does chance affect collecting? Is the purpose of collecting to provide a legacy for family and the wider public? Or is it to join a community and build a friendship? How easily can collecting become a compulsion or necessity?
Wilhem Hansen’s Ordrupgaard collection, currently on display in our exhibition Gauguin and the impressionists, showcases one of the greatest collections of Impressionist works in northern Europe. Hansen was passionate about art and seized an opportunity to collect Impressionist masterpieces in the early decades of the 20th century. We use the Ordrupgaard collection as a springboard for our events as we uncover the often unexpected and surprising impulses behind contemporary collecting today.
Final event to be announced.
Why collect? programme
As part of our Why Collect? series of events, we host an in conversation with art advisor and collector Valeria Napoleone who, over the last 20 years, has amassed a collection of works by only women artists.
Join us as we host a screening of Herb & Dorothy, a documentary following two unlikely collectors who over the course of 45 years amassed a major collection of art.