Lieberman wonders aloud if he wants to build his photography collection or his more recent one in Chinese art. He says that he has changed direction somewhat as the artists’ values in his collection go into the “millions and millions. Chinese contemporary is fresh, it’s new, it’s a lot of fun.” And he’s found that prices for his old favorites have skyrocketed in the past year. He is looking at a Fernand Léger: “That would have been $750,000 two years ago, it was $1.25 million last year, who knows what it is this year. I’ve been following some of the prices at Sotheby’s, and they are out of control.” He chats a few minutes with the dealer of a small Léger gouache but moves on saying, “Somewhere there is an oil of that work twice the size, but I can’t even afford this—and I’m rich!” He laughs. The dealer points to a Kandinsky she has but Lieberman seems lukewarm. He asks the dealer if she is the one who had a Kandinsky for $5 million last year. She confirms and he queries the price of the one she has hanging. She answers $6.5 million and he tells her “if you were asking a million I would almost do it.” It is a Bauhaus oil. “Midcentury art is now out of reach.”
Lieberman says he would not consider selling any of his collection to fund other purchases. “I never sell anything—not art and not buildings. He still owns more than 2,000 apartments in Philadelphia, even though he started buying up property in South Beach in the 1970s. He currently owns and operates seven art deco hotels in the district including the Chesterfield and the Catalina, which he has emptied out for Art Basel exhibits and turned into mini galleries.
Everything about Lieberman is brisk and quick, from his bristle-cut salt-and-pepper haircut to his laceless brown Converse sneakers. An edgy guy, he rockets through the gallery in a double-breasted denim jacket over black jeans and Christian Audigier T shirt. A Philadelphia native, a product of Temple University, a deal maker, he talks about art as being better than cars because they don’t need maintenance—but then jokes that one of the first pieces he and his wife bought has to go back every so often to be touched up.
The hall is filling up, and deals are being made in seconds. Lieberman marvels at all the art that surrounds him—wall after wall after wall. “You don’t have to know art, you don’t have to like art—you know this is the most amazing collection of art in the world.” He says he is looking for pieces to put in his hotels but then concedes that these are too high end to hazard. “It’s not that I worry that it would be stolen, just damaged.” His hotels cater to a clientele in their 20s and 30s and to celebrities coming to SoBe to party. They host events like Girls Gone Wild, Playboy Party and Victoria’s Secret. “And this stuff is a little too serious, too sophisticated.”
He passes a Willem De Kooning, and pauses to laugh: “De Kooning prices go by their leg span—the wider they spread their legs, the more they cost!”
We are only 10 minutes into the preview—but already far into the space—when suddenly Lieberman is stopped dead by two very large black-and-white photographs on the outside wall of a cubicle gallery. One is “Big Nude Raquel,” a startlingly graphic image of a buxom blonde full on, impish smile on her lips, hands on hips, shoulders thrust forward wearing only black high-heeled pumps, dark pubic hair starkly contrasted against pale skin. Next to it, Lieberman is taken by “Big Nude IX, The Two Violettas (Koletta and her Dummy, Paris 1991).” Both photographs are 78.5 inches high, 47 inches wide, silver gelatin prints, pelvises at eye level, by the German-born photographer Helmut Newton, who died in 2004. “The Two Violettas” shows a model posed next to her mirror-image mannequin, wearing only dark lipstick and dark hair here and here and here. Their identical heads twisted to the side, one arm behind their backs, holding the opposite elbow, one foot pointed, leg turned out. Leiberman confers briefly with Annette Kicken, one of the owners of the gallery Kicken Berlin, to find that it is an exhibition print, one of only three made, and the price is $160,000. (The same image was sold through eBay in a live auction in April for $90,000.) He inquires if they will take less, to which she replies, “Perhaps … if he takes both.” He takes her card and is off again weaving through the crowd.
Soon his wife, Diane, arrives. She is tiny, bright eyed and as quick as her husband, but her tastes are not as edgy as his. She talks about her love for the work of Frank Stella, the American minimalist painter and sculptor, and Tom Wesselman, the American pop artist. She stops in awe at the work of the British digital artist Julian Opie. She brings Alan over to discuss a piece with the gallery owner only to be disappointed that they’ve already been sold—and it’s only 45 minutes since the doors have opened.
Their son, Nathan, soon joins them and the three roam the halls, greeting friends, all handshakes and air kisses. (When Nathan was around 12, they took him to an exhibition of Cy Twombly, the abstract artist who sometimes uses curse words in his work, at MoMA. Nathan insisted on being called ‘Cy’ for weeks afterward.) They run into some old friends, including one who claims to have bought all five of the Opies that Diane was interested in. Gradually they work their way back to the Violettas.
Alan talks to his wife about the print as they walk. It is to be an anniversary present to each other. “There is so much here to absorb. For me to spend $150,000 on a print, I had to think about it,” he says. “Do we want to expand our photography or Chinese art? We really have no edgy stuff for the apartment.”
Diane’s first impression is not good. She is disturbed by the real model—flat-chested, angular hips. “It’s freaky. I don’t know about looking at that body every day. It’s like the person’s body hasn’t caught up yet. It’s like a mixture of man and girl. I think it would be scary to look at day after day. A lot of artists do this kind of thing for shock value.”
Alan is a little concerned about the price. “You have to really be an impulse buyer to come here at 12 [noon] when no dealer is going to cut you a deal. But this would really put you on the photography map.” Alan starts talking with the gallery owner, Rudolf Kicken, an older white-haired gentleman in a gray suit, crisp white shirt and dark silk tie with a large golden ant pattern. Alan nonchalantly wanders with him looking at other prints the gallery is showing and gets to talking about some art books he is looking for. Kicken agrees to show him where they are and off they go—heads together talking about Newton and how his work is very natural, very normal. Kicken tells Alan the print was first shown in an exhibition in Hamburg, then was dry mounted so it wouldn’t disintegrate. Alan inquires as to what he would be buying—merely the image or rights to the image (no copyright, just the image). Kicken tells him that Newton’s work is very tightly controlled and that there will be no posthumous printing of the negative. Lieberman’s wife and son trail behind helplessly.
They arrive where the art books are displayed and Alan confers briefly about an artist. Kicken stands to the side and talks with Diane and Nathan a little. Diane senses the deal is about to go down, whether she likes it or not, and brushes off incoming phone calls from friends. Kicken says he doesn’t believe in marking up prices just so he can give a discount and tells a story loudly, within earshot of the family, about Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow visiting his gallery in Berlin in search of Helmut Newton photographs. Kicken agreed to discount the prints 10 percent but Madonna had an assistant call the following day asking for a much deeper discount. Kickin replied he would happily oblige if the star would agree to take the photograph on stage in concert and announce she had bought it from Kicken Berlin. He says he later found out that other gallery owners mark their works way up when Madonna is scheduled to visit, just so they can offer her big discounts. Kicken says the photograph fetched a much higher price weeks later and both stars later bought their Newtons.
Kicken tells Alan that the price is fair and that in two years he will still be glad he bought the work. “It’s a good work of art and it is worth the money.” Alan looks at Diane and asks if she loves it. “I never said I loved it. I don’t love that particular one. It’s too much. Where do you envision hanging it?” Alan responds that he would like to just lean it somewhere—against a bookcase perhaps. Diane thinks this is a little insane to buy an expensive print and then casually lean it somewhere. Kickin laughs that he has seen a lot of marriage crises at this point of the buy. “This makes our photography collection real,” Alan responds.
Alan starts tossing around figures—the dealmaking ensues—low figures starting at $125,000. “I’ll give you a deposit right now.” Kicken: “I know I can get $160,000.” He says the dollar is so weak that Lieberman can wait until January to see if the dollar strengthens, as it went up three cents yesterday. Lieberman: “$130,000 and I’ll give you a deposit now.” Kicken: “Let me do this, 15 percent off, and I’ll ship it for you to pick up in New York.” Lieberman: “Isn’t $130,000 about right then?” He turns to Diane: “You think you can learn to love it? Give me a check.” Kicken is busy on the calculator. “$135 and call it a deal.” Lieberman: “$133.” They go back and forth a couple of times and then Lieberman borrows a pen and starts writing. Diane looks a tad askance but she’s giving in to her husband. Nathan is kind of smirking. Diane looks over at him and says, “Nathan says write the check because we are going to be dead and they [he and his sister] are going to get it.” She turns to me: “I know it is an important piece but the model freaks me out.”
The check is signed, there are handshakes and kisses. Kicken heads back to his booth/gallery and the Liebermans head off to lunch at one of their hotels to celebrate his first conquest of this year’s show.
