Cinema and TV's Most Famous Art Collectors

The article explores how collectors are portrayed in film and television, using the recent death of Alain Delon as a springboard. Delon, who died in August 2024, was a noted collector who sold parts of his collection in 1999 and 2007. The impulse to collect is presented as fundamental to human nature, with examples from Neolithic grave goods to Julio Cortázar's novel 'Hopscotch' (1963), where a character argues the world can be seen as a series of collections. Films about collectors often show the collector being trapped by their own desire, as in Giuseppe Tornatore's 'The Best Offer' (2013). Documentaries have profiled figures like Peggy Guggenheim ('Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict', 2015), the Vogels ('Herb & Dorothy', 2009), the Spanus ('Garrison: A Postcard from Paradise', 2010), and Albert C. Barnes. Barnes's collection, valued at $25 billion and originally housed in Merion, was controversially moved to Philadelphia in 2004 despite his will forbidding relocation. The collection, now branded as the Frances M. Maguire Art Museum, opened in 2023. The article argues that collections become 'zombies' that outlive their creators, provoking obsession and desire. It concludes that collections are cultural and political devices that attract filmmakers and actors.