From Oprah Winfrey to Robert Pattinson, celebrities are trying their hand at curating art auctions
Celebs' passion for the visual arts is attracting the interest of auction houses, who are inviting more and more stars to select the artworks that will go under the hammer at their sales
Oprah Winfrey and actor Robert Pattinson have both curated auctions for Sotheby's.
Image: Oprah: Rachel Luna / Getty images North America / Getty Images via AFP; Pattinson: Angela Weiss / AFP
It's hard to keep track of the number of celebrities who collect art. Now, their passion for the visual arts is attracting the interest of auction houses, who are inviting more and more stars to select the artworks that will go under the hammer at their sales.
Robert Pattinson is probably best known for his roles in "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire," "Tenet," "The Lighthouse" and, more recently, "The Batman." However, the British actor is now trying his hand at curating an auction. He has chosen six works of art that will go under the hammer on September 30, during the forthcoming "Contemporary Curated” sale at Sotheby’s New York.
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Among them feature an untitled painting by American artist Willem de Kooning, dating from 1964, "Rotation #9" by his compatriot Richard Serra, or "Old Rope" by the British artist Lynette Yiadom-Boakye.
This eclectic selection reflects Robert Pattinson's artistic vision, which he describes as a taste spanning the "cosmic and alien" to the "subversive, naughty [and] slightly dangerous." These words fit well with "Kissing by the Window" by Genieve Figgis and "Portrait" by Thomas Houseago, two of the works in the sale that the "Twilight" star is particularly fond of.
This is the first time that Robert Pattinson has tried his hand at curating an auction. And it proved a highly rewarding experience, he says: "To be able to experience and have a dialogue with these works according to my taste—and to place massive titans of 20th-century art next to living artists—has been really satisfying."
