The Mougins Museum of Classical Art, located in the south of France and owned by Christian de Levett, will close at the end of the month to become the first in Europe dedicated to art made by women.
In a post on Instagram, Levett, the museum’s founder and owner, said that works by artists from his collection including Joan Mitchell, Lee Krasner, Elaine de Kooning, Howardena Pindell, Cecily Brown and Nancy Graves will be displayed in the renovated venue.
Levett, creator of the initiative, bought more than 3,000 pieces in the last 25 years with which he fed a collection of classical antiquities, one of the largest in private hands, and contemporary art that includes works by artists such as Damien Hirst and Marc Quinn. .
However, his collecting strategy changed during the pandemic. “During confinement, I began to build a collection of female Abstract Expressionism. I researched artists from that period, even the lesser known ones.
Many works, which have also been exhibited in museums, were available on the market through auction houses and other collections, and I began to collect them,” Levett said during an interview with Lampoon magazine.
She acquired works by 20th-century female artists and subsequently lent numerous paintings to the Whitechapel Gallery in London for her recent exhibition.