Photography Collectors in the 2013 ARTnews 200

ARTnews recently released its annual list of the largest, most active art collectors in the world (here, magazine cover at right, via ARTnews), and it's always intriguing to see how photography fares among this elite group. Each collector (or pair) is listed with their geographic location(s), how they came into their money, and the general categories of their collections.

In 2013, the following 11 collectors (out of 200) had some form of photography called out in their collection description, often one of many artwork types in a larger list:

 

Cristina and Thomas W. Bechtler-Lanfranconi
Joop van Caldenborgh
Ella Fontanals Cisneros
Danielle and David Ganek
Ydessa Hendeles
Alison and Peter W. KleinThomas H. Lee and Ann Tenenbaum
Heather and Tony PodestaLisa S. and John A. Pritzker
Aby J. Rosen
Chara Schreyer

Compared to similar lists from prior years, there is remarkable consistency in the names above; most have been on this list for plenty of consecutive years. Of course, this short photo-focused list is a little deceiving, in that roughly 85% of the names on the complete list of 200 collectors have "modern", "contemporary", or "emerging" art in their bios, so many of them likely collect some photography as a subset of their larger efforts, but haven't had it called out specifically as an interest; in fact, there may be other names with broad collection descriptions that may indeed own more photography than some of the names above. More generally, it would be fascinating to know how many of the complete list of 200 own at least one photograph; my guess is that it's meaningfully more than 50%, which points to a much broader rate of inclusion than the data here explicitly shows. All in, this annual list is always an entertaining barometer of what the most active among us are collecting, allowing us to sketch out a faint picture of the machinations at the top end of the market.

Shared Vision: The Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla Collection of Photography @Aperture

JTF (just the facts): A total of 127 black and white and color photographs, variously framed and matted (although most are displayed in blond wood), and hung in the main gallery space, separated by two dividing walls. All of the prints come from the collection of Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla. The show was curated by Ben Thompson and Paul Karabinis, in conjunction with an exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville. A catalog of the collection was recently published by MOCA and Aperture (here). (Installation shots at right.)

The show is divided into thematic/subject matter groups. For each section, the photographers included have been listed, followed by the number of works on display and their dates in parentheses.

Entry
Louis Faurer (1, 1947)

Poses and Gestures
Diane Arbus (2, 1965, 1966)
EJ Bellocq (1 diptych, 1912)
Brassai (2, 1932)
Manuel Alvarez Bravo (2, 1935, 1938-1939)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1, 1944)
Imogen Cunningham (1, 1931)
Bruce Davidson (1, 1958)
William Eggleston (1, 1972)
Walker Evans (1, 1932)
Louis Faurer (1, 1946)
Graciela Iturbide (1, 1993)
Yousuf Karsh (1, 1954)
Leon Levinstein (1, 1958)
Lisette Model (1, 1940)
Andrea Modica (1, 1992)
Cirenaica Moreira (1, 1999-2002)
Man Ray (1, 1933)
Alec Soth (1, 2002)
Paul Strand (1, 1954)
Edward Weston (1, 1921)
Garry Winogrand (1, 1968)

Minor Matters
Wynn Bullock (1, 1951)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1, 1954)
Mario Cravo-Neto (1, 1989)
Bruce Davidson (1, 1966-1968)
Rineke Dijkstra (1, 1993)
Flor Garduno (1, 1996)
Mario Giacomelli (1, 1957-1959)
Emmet Gowin (1, 1974)
David Hilliard (1, 2005)
Peter Hujar (1, 1981)
Loretta Lux (2, 2004)
Sally Mann (4, 1987, 1989)
Mary Ellen Mark (1, 1987)
Ralph Eugene Meatyard (1, 1961)
Polixeni Papapetrou (1, 2006)
Swapan Parekh (1, 1995)
W. Eugene Smith (1, 1946)
Jock Sturges (1, 1987)
Roman Vishniac (1, 1939)
Garry Winogrand (1, 1960)

Invisible Sight
Eugene Atget (1, 1906)
Wynn Bullock (1, 1957)
Paul Caponigro (1, 1968)
Elger Esser (1, 1996)
Laura Gilpin (1, 1930)
Mark Klett (2, 1990, 2003)
Clarence John Laughlin (1, 1941)
Richard Misrach (1, 1999)
Abelardo Morell (1, 2010)
Josef Sudek (1, 1967)
Hiroshi Sugimoto (1, 1993)
Massimo Vitali (1, 1998)

Urban Exposures
Berenice Abbott (1, 1933)
Robert Adams (1, 1968-1971)
Olivo Barbieri (1, 2002)
Edward Burtynsky (1, 2004)
Henri Cartier-Bresson (1, 1953)
Bruce Davidson (1, 1959)
Robert Doisneau (1, 1948)
Walker Evans (1, 1941)
Robert Frank (2, 1956)
Lee Friedlander (1, 1962)
Andre Kertesz (2, 1948, 1954)
Ray K. Metzker (1, 1964)
Marc Riboud (1, 1953)
Alfred Stieglitz (1, 1901)
Thomas Struth (1, 1991)
Catherine Wagner (1, 1989)
Weegee (1, 1945)
Garry Winogrand (1, 1962)

The Insistent Object
Bernd and Hilla Becher (1, 1968-1973)
Harry Callahan (1, 1942)
Imogen Cunningham (1, 1957)
Harold Edgerton (2, 1957, 1960)
Mitch Epstein (1, 2000)
Adam Fuss (1, 1999)
Man Ray (1, 1931)
Aaron Siskind (1, 1944)
Frederick Sommer (1, 1939)
Hiroshi Sugimoto (1, 1980)
Edward Weston (1, 1931)

Subjective Inventions
Bianca Brunner (1, 2004)
Richard Misrach (1, 2007)
Vik Muniz (1, 1997)
Cindy Sherman (1, 1980)
Laurie Simmons (1, 1991)
Mike and Doug Starn (1, 2001-2004)
Miro Svolik (1, 1986)
Ruth Thorne-Thomsen (2, 1979, 1987)
Jerry Uelsmann (1, 1996)
Joel-Peter Witkin (2, 1982)
Francesca Woodman (1, 1977-1978)

The Form of Content
Laurent Elie Badessi (1, 1998)
Bill Brandt (2, 1951,1954)
Harry Callahan (2, 1948)
Roy DeCarava (1, 1953)
Mario Giacomelli (1, 1961-1963)
Beatrice Helg (1, 2005)
Peter Keetman (1, 1959)
Andre Kertesz (1, 1938)
Robert Mapplethorpe (2, 1983)
Andrea Modica (1, 1996)
Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (1, 1939)
Andres Serrano (2, 1987, 1988)
Alfred Stieglitz (1, 1923)
Edward Weston (1, 1927)
Minor White (2, 1959, 1961)

Comments/Context: As photography collectors ourselves, my wife and I likely have more interest in other people's collections than your average gallery goer. While of course the art itself is what matters in the end, the process of making trade-offs and choices is endlessly fascinating (at least to me), and seeing how others have made their own decisions and followed their own rules and systems provides context and contrast for how we attack the same task. Our photo library has an entire shelf full of catalogues of other people's photography collections (private, corporate, and public) and each one has its own personality and flair.

One of the books that has been on our shelf for more than a decade now is a selection from Sondra Gilman's vast collection, published in the late 1990s. The book is organized into loose thematic sections, groupings that aren't strict or rigid, but allow for non-obvious juxtapositions across time period, subject matter, and stylistic approach. The edit mixes iconic images and relative unknowns with equal measure, but each image always has some hook, something special or unexpected to draw the viewer in.

The reason I am going over this background is that I think it says something very important about how Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla think about photography. This current show of their collection is also thematically grouped, but the themes and ideas have changed over the past 15 years. Some of the same pictures have been included in this edit, others have been left out, to be replaced by those on the sidelines last time, or by new acquisitions. My point here is that they have not approached collecting as a monolithic checklist to be methodically completed year after year, but as something more organic and open-ended, where pictures gain new resonances as they are mixed with new neighbors. We too try to effect this kind of refreshing and renewal by rotating the pictures on our walls, but given the scale of their collection, Gilman and Gonzalez-Falla have a tremendous opportunity to continually remix their visual stimuli. My guess is that this is a constant source of interest for them, as there are always new things to discover in great photographs.

Even in this reduced selection of images, this collection rivals most museum permanent collections of photography. It is strongest in classic 20th century black and white imagery, and many will be astounded by the parade of rare vintage icons that are on display. In many cases, these are not just great images by Abbott, Kertesz, Alvarez Bravo, Cartier-Bresson, Frank, Winogrand, Weston, Siskind, White, and countless others, but these are the best known, the most well loved photographs that these masters made, all in vintage examples. While it would be easy to drift by these familiar pictures and feel like they have been seen before, the fact that they are all vintage and all in one private collection is nothing short of breathtaking.

But what I like about this exhibit is that doesn't have the aura of showing off that it could have given the strength of the material. It has opted for something more eclectic and personal, an organization that proves that these pictures aren't individual trophies, but are together as a collection a kind of living organism that is always evolving. Each new acquisition has the potential to rebalance the entire body, changing how one picture relates to another. The sections of portraits, children, landscapes, urban scenes, still lifes, staged/manipulated imagery, and formally driven images might seem predictable as themes, but mixing a Brandt nude, a White peeling paint, a Moholy-Nagy photogram, a Kertesz distortion, a Stieglitz equivalent, a Keetman raindrop screen, a Mapplethorpe nude, and a Serrano piss and blood composition (just part of the formally driven section) isn't exactly your run-of-the-mill group show. While all the pictures can easily stand alone, together they are evidence of broad curiosity and passion for the medium.

Apart from the lack of 19th century work, this single show is a close to a comprehensive history of photography as you will find outside our major museums, so don't miss the chance to see these treasures before they disappear from public view once again.

Collector's POV: Not only is this a non-selling venue, but the vintage prints in this collection would undoubtedly fetch some stratospheric prices should they ever come back into the market. So we'll forgo the usual price discussion for today, with the tangible reminder that a lifetime of collecting exceptional examples of iconic photographs can certainly generate significant value.

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• ARTnews Top 10 Photo Collectors (here)

Shared Vision: The Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla Collection of Photography
Through April 21st

Aperture Gallery
547 West 27th Street
New York, NY 10001

Cindy Sherman: Works from Friends of the Bruce Museum

JTF (just the facts): A total of 31 black and white and color works, variously framed and matted, and hung against orange and white walls in a series of 6 divided spaces. Information on the specific print processes was not available, but I'm assuming that the works are either gelatin silver prints or chromogenic prints (perhaps digital for the most recent), made between 1975 and 2008. Physical dimensions range between 8x10 and 71x90. All of the works on view were drawn from private collections in the Greenwich area. A catalogue of the exhibition is available in the gift shop for $20. (Installation shots at right.)

Comments/Context: It's long been known that there was a significant (and growing) concentration of wealthy, discerning contemporary art and photography collectors in the Greenwich, CT area. If evidence for this claim were still somehow necessary, the fact that a respectable mini-retrospective of the work of Cindy Sherman can be put on by a local museum like the Bruce, drawing only from the private collections of the immediate community, should put any doubts about this to rest for good. Ahead of the full scale Sherman retrospective scheduled for next year at the MoMA, this small show is like an appetizer prior to the upcoming main course.
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Gathering work from a variety of collections has led to a show that jumps from project to project, hitting highlights across Sherman's career, with a minimum of scholarly backdrop or narrative thread. A few unexpected early black and white works from her graduate school days are quickly followed by a selection of Untitled Film Stills (with prints in all three available sizes). Color gets introduced via a pair of early 1980s works, along with a pair of terrific large scale images from the Centerfolds series. A group of tougher images from the mid 1980s Fairy Tales and Disasters projects leads into a selection of the crowd-pleasing History Portraits, flanked by a pair of more recent clowns. The final room of the exhibit mixes images from Women from California and her most recent pictures of aging high society ladies. It's a whirlwind tour of nearly 40 years of Sherman's artistic output, boiled down to a series of easily digestable representative examples.

At its simplest level, this show is a solid introduction to the work of Cindy Sherman for those who are unfamiliar with her brand of self portraiture; it gathers a wide variety of high quality (and valuable) photographs and organizes them in roughly chronological order; even a Sherman neophyte could come away with a general understanding of what she's been up to (while I was in the gallery, an older woman was walking around the show with her toddler grandchild, and at each picture, the boy would scream "it's Cindy!"). I don't think this show will add much to the deeper, academic understanding of Sherman's work, but it is likely to be a local crowd pleaser.

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Beyond the parade of Sherman treasures on view, this exhibit also made me think about the increasing role of large, sophisticated private collectors in lending to public exhibitions at venues like the Bruce, where nearby supporters can now enable impressive, museum-quality shows nearly single handedly. From a quick review of the wall labels, the collections of Pamela and Arthur Sanders, Jennifer and David Stockman, and the Brandt Foundation have clearly made careful, long term choices in the Shermans they own; I'd certainly be curious to see what other photographic gems they (and others) have tucked away on their walls. Given the breadth and depth of the collecting going on in greater Greenwich, hopefully this will be the first of many shows at the Bruce that will mine the rich vein of contemporary art buried in this community.

Collector's POV: Since this is a museum show, the works on view are obviously not for sale. Sherman's photographs have become ubiquitous in the secondary markets in recent years, both in the photographs and contemporary art sales. Prices typically settle into the five and six figure ranges, with a few lesser known outliers on the low end and a few iconic works routinely up over the one million dollar mark and higher. The artist is represented by Metro Pictures in New York (here).

Rating: ** (two stars) VERY GOOD (rating system described here)

Transit Hub:

• Reviews: NY Times (here), Hartford Courant (here), Stamford Advocate (here)
• Most recent Metro Pictures show, 2008 (DLK COLLECTION review here)

Cindy Sherman: Works from Friends of the Bruce Museum
Through April 23rd

Bruce Museum
1 Museum Drive
Greenwich, CT 06830

David Mahoney on SFMOMA Collection Rotation

SFMOMA has a cool feature on its blog where the museum invites various folks to curate a mini-exhibit of items from its online collection database. Passionate, long-time photography collector and SFMOMA trustee David Mahoney (a true expert on 1970s American photography by the way) has just put his selections up; you can find them here.

Top 10 Photo Collectors in ARTnews

While ARTnews has been producing an annual list of top collectors for quite a few years now, the March issue of the magazine digs down into our own world of photography and selects The Top 10 Photo Collectors (here). My first reaction to such a list was a mix of curiosity and outright skepticism. Could they really get such a list "right"? And what criteria would they use to choose the names?

According to the article, the list was selected via a process of consensus gathering; in short, ask enough dealers, auctioneers, collectors, museum directors, and curators until a pattern starts to emerge. Here's the list they came up with:

David Dechman
Randi and Bob Fisher
Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla
Daniel Greenberg and Susan Steinhauser
Michael Jesselson
Elton John
Andrew Pilara
Lisa and John Pritzker
Thomas Walther
Michael Wilson

While this is clearly a remarkably esteemed list, a couple of things stick out for me. One, there is zero overlap with the names on the overall list of top art collectors, so there really isn't any way to compare the activities of photo specialist collectors and broader contemporary art collectors who collect photography as one part of their activities. Two, there are some major photography collectors, with jaw-droppingly impressive collections, who are not on this list.

The article goes on to say that the names "were selected based on how active they are rather than on the size or value of their collections". So in some ways, this explains the omission of some vast and comprehensive collections; perhaps they have become less "active" as their holdings have increased.

So then I started to parse this word "active". How might we actually define it? A simple way would be to use it to highlight those collectors who spent the most money on photography in the recent year. The problem with this definition is that a single collector who bought half a dozen very high priced works might be deemed most active. But that then leads to the following conundrum: is a collector who buys 2 $500K photographs more or less active than a collector who acquired 200 $5K photographs? To my mind, the effort and work required to intelligently select and purchase 200 works far outweighs that of purchasing 2; so in addition to quality, quantity must somehow be considered as a meaningful part of this equation.

I think that the major intangible here is the voracity of the searching that a collector exhibits. I'm sure that for some collectors, the two efforts of searching and buying may be roughly equivalent in size. However, I've certainly experienced with our own collecting that over time, we've seen our searching and learning effort expand exponentially, while our end buying has remained relatively constant; we just spend a lot more time looking, reading and thinking than we used to, and our searching and selecting has become much more targeted. As such, a couple of the names on the list above stand out for me based on this intensity of activity; of course, they are buying photographs on a regular basis, but what makes them important is not the size of their wallets, but their overflowing passion for both the art form and the never ending process of hunting.

In the end, I suppose that whether this list is perfectly representative or not is really beyond the point. The fact that ARTnews went to the trouble of trying to figure out who the top collectors are is real evidence that photography is becoming more and more of a central part of the artistic dialogue, so much so that those avid photography supporters who have quietly amassed museum quality collections are now being recognized as the leaders they have always been.

Photography Collectors in the 2010 ARTnews 200

Every year, ARTnews publishes its list of the largest, most active art collectors in the world (here, magazine cover at right, via ARTnews), complete with their geographic location(s), how they came into their money, and the general categories of their often varied collections. Given our photography focus, we're always interested to see which photography collectors are on the annual list.

Compared to the 2009 list, not much has changed. Eight of the 2010 collectors who have the word "photography" in their bio were on the list last year:

Cristina and Thomas W. Bechtler-Lanfranconi

Joop van Caldenborgh

Danielle and David Ganek

Ydessa Hendeles

Martin Z. Margulies

Lisa S. and John A. Pritzker

Aby J. Rosen

Chara Schreyer

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Of the other 2009 listed "photography" collectors, Sheikh Saud bin Mohammad bin Ali al-Thani is still very much on the active list, but photography is no longer part of his diverse bio. Leonora and Jimmy Belilty are not included at all in 2010.

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Two new "photography" names have been included in 2010:

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Ella Fontanals Cisneros

Thomas H. Lee and Ann Tenenbaum

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This short photo-focused list is a little deceiving, in that more than 85% of the names on the complete list of 200 collectors have "modern" or "contemporary" art in their bios, so many of them could (and likely do) collect some photography as a subset of their larger efforts, likely at the top end of the contemporary market that crosses over from traditional vintage photography.

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Overall, my takeaway from this year's list is that the world of focused photography collecting remains relatively small, and that the largest, most powerful collectors remain fairly constant/consistent from year to year; most people don't change their collecting passions overnight, especially coming out of an economic downturn. This kind of list is however a strong reminder that the major challenge for the community as a whole is how to entice more and more significant contemporary collectors to pay more attention to photography; this is the "low hanging fruit" in terms of potential growth.

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By the way, if your name is on the list above and we don't already know that you are visiting this site from time to time, please do drop us a line to say hello.

A JGS/Forward Thinking Museum Update

I've been meaning to do an update on all the changes over at the Joy of Giving Something (here) and the Forward Thinking Museum (here), and the summer lull is the perfect time to catch up on their activities.

As a reminder, JGS is the philanthropic non-profit organization that houses the private collection of Howard Stein. Aside from the more than 10000 photographs in the collection (all online, found here), the foundation supports traveling and local exhibitions, funds artist books, publishes its own journal (Witness), and runs juried contests. I think it is perhaps the best example of what happens "after collecting", when the hunting and gathering of individual images becomes routine and the collector wants to get more involved in actively and personally supporting the community. Keep your eyes peeled for the JGS logo when you're out at museum exhibitions, reading books or attending fund raisers; the foundation is a consistent, low key supporter of a lot of what is going on in photography.

The Forward Thinking Museum is another of JGS' many projects, an online experiment in museum building. The newest iteration of the museum has left behind some its more original quirks and streamlined the viewing process a bit. Gone are the Japanese museum guide, the elevator, the hand held assistant, and the hot dog stand; the museum is now a more straightforward place, and much easier to navigate quickly.

One amazing thing about a virtual museum is that it lacks space constraints; it can keep exhibits up indefinitely, and add more and more as time passes. Since I last visited, there are at least 15 new shows on view, with many others from before that I still haven't had time to check out. Here's a list of what's new:

Solo Shows:

Zhang Dali
Jason Florio
Adam Fuss
Fernando Gonclaves
Kevin Kallaugher
Yuki Onodera
Selina Ou
Gilles Peress
Judith Joy Ross
Fazal Sheikh

Group Shows:

Hope Photographs
Surveillance
Trends to Watch (with another 12 shows underneath)

Features in the 21st Century Galleries:

Christophe Agou
Water Chappell

There are also plenty of excellent artist interview videos in the Theater. I've recently watched the following, but there are many more worth your time:

Daido Moriyama, Memories of a Dog
Toshio Shibata, Borrowing a Place
Danwen Xing, Urban Fictions

Overall, the Forward Thinking Museum has plenty of top tier photography to entice viewers of all kinds. It's open all the time, there are no crowds, and it's free. For those of you out there starved for some photography excitement in the doldrums of the summer, this is a terrific place to find it.

Photography Collectors in the 2009 ARTnews 200

ARTnews has published its annual roundup of the largest, most active art collectors in the world (here, magazine cover at right, via ARTnews), and it's pretty near impossible to use it as any kind of map of the photography market, except in the broadest sense. Each of the collectors is designated by their geographic location(s), how they came into their money, and the general categories of their often varied collections.

There are a total of 10 collectors who have the word "photography" in their bio:

Cristina and Thomas W. Bechtler-Lanfranconi
Leonora and Jimmy Belilty
Joop van Caldenborgh
Danielle and David Ganek
Ydessa Hendeles
Martin Z. Margulies
Lisa S. and John A. Pritzker
Aby J. Rosen
Chara Schreyer
Sheikh Saud bin Mohammad bin Ali al-Thani

This is certainly a good list as a starter. What's hard to reconcile is that better than 3/4s of the names on the overall list are designated by "modern" or "contemporary" art, so nearly all of them could (and likely do) collect photography as a subset of their larger efforts, often writing big checks. There are also quite a few notable pure play photography collectors who are not on the list, but who certainly have the power to move the market when they want.

So I suppose this kind of list brings with it a combination of congratulations and condolences, depending on your perspective. If you wanted to be on the list and were, or didn't want to be on the list and weren't (likely for privacy reasons), congratulations are in order. If on the other hand, you wanted to be included and weren't, or didn't want to be listed but somehow ended up there, you have our deepest sympathies.

Collector Michael Mattis on Edward Weston

Photography collector Michael Mattis and his wife almost certainly have the best and deepest collection of Edward Weston photographs in private hands. An exhibit containing a selection of works from their Weston collection was recently on view at the Akron Art Museum, entitled Edward Weston: Life Work (here, including shots of the installation).

Michael is an example of a professional collector who meticulously develops scholarly knowledge of his chosen subjects. He can be seen talking about Weston in a short video produced by Ohio public television (here); there is a short introduction, followed by 5 or 6 minutes of video.

Collectors as Market Makers

There was a fascinating article in the New York Times Sunday Magazine about Jose, David, and Alberto Mugrabi, the famous and powerful collectors of Warhols and other Pop and contemporary artists. (Article here.) With over 3000 works and over 800 Warhols in their collection, they have evolved into an entirely new kind of collecting animal: the market maker. Following over 100 auctions a year, the Mugrabis buy and sell their inventory and protect/defend/run up the prices of their artists all over the world. They are likely involved in one way or another in every major transaction of Warhol's art that occurs on the planet. They collect on a scale and in a pattern unlike nearly all other collectors: they are full-time professionals.

This got me thinking about this collecting approach and its impact on the photography markets. We know of only a very small number of photography collectors that operate as market makers in any form, but there are a few that use this model. The challenge to this approach is that it requires enormous scale and meaningful financial resources. More importantly, it takes time to amass a significant inventory of any one artist's best output (unless one buys an estate in one fell swoop) and then real effort to follow each and every transaction that occurs for that artist going forward.

It seems to us there are a couple of bright lines that define collectors. The first is when a collector makes those first handful of purchases that change his/her perspective from someone looking for decoration for their walls to someone fascinated and obsessed by the art and the artists. The second bright line comes when a collector evolves to the point that they are buying art they don't really have room to display (we call this "buying for the box" and unfortunately, we would reluctantly place ourselves in this category). At this point, the collections are larger, more defined, and often more manic.

The Mugrabis and the others like them in the uppermost tier have moved beyond another final bright line. They are gathering inventory at such a pace and scale that they effectively start to corner the market in their areas of interest, which leads them to behave in ways that are wholly different from other collectors. We might call them pseudo dealers, or wholesalers, or just museums in the making. I'm not sure that we have any conclusion to offer here, other than given the fact that most major collectors are extremely wary of talking about themselves and their collecting activities in public, it was interesting to see the piece about the Mugrabis in the magazine section. Of course, when you are a market maker, you live in the bizarro world where big PR is actually a good thing.