Collecting Books

A patron of art since the 1930s, Peggy Guggenheim, in a candid self-portrait, provides an insider's view of the early days of modern art, with revealing accounts of her eccentric wealthy family, her personal and professional relationships, and often surprising portrayals of the artists themselves. Here is a book that ...more

In 1987, Richard Polsky put aside $100,000 to buy a Warhol painting, a dream that took twelve years to realize. In a book that spans the years from the wild speculation of the late 1980s to the recession of the 1990s, Polsky, himself a private dealer, takes his readers on ...more

Nearly everyone collects something, even those who don’t think of themselves as collectors. William Davies King, on the other hand, has devoted decades to collecting nothing—and a lot of it. With Collections of Nothing, he takes a hard look at this habitual hoarding to see what truths it can reveal ...more

Their names are splashed all over the newspapers: Marion True, Robert Hecht, Giacomo Medici. The Medici Conspiracy tells the complete history behind the headlines. The story begins with a botched robbery and a police chase. Eight ancient vases are discovered in the swimming pool of a German-based art smuggler. More ...more

Money and power in the contemporary art world of dealers, collectors, artists and museums. Funny, bitchy, insightful, revealing — it changed the way the art world did business. "A lot of dynamite." —John Canady "Gossipy reading that explodes a well-documented firecracker." —Publishers Weekly "Delicious reading." —Hal Burton ...more

Ready to upgrade your artwork from framed Monet posters but intimidated by what you see in galleries? In The Intrepid Art Collector, Lisa Hunter shows you how to start a fine art collection without spending a fortune. This accessible, jargon-free resource contains up-to-date information on the most popular original art—everything ...more

Remarkable and riveting, this fascinating and scholarly "biography" of a van Gogh masterpiece illuminates the dynamics of the art market and of culture in our time. 8-page photo insert. ...more

Delving into one of the most sacrosanct areas of culture--fine art collecting--Thomas Hoving presents a gallery of art fakes, fakers, and the suckers who fell for the scams. From the shroud of Turin to pre-Colombian pottery, Hoving reveals the biggest, the best, the most embarrassing, and the most costly forgeries ...more

According to author Marilynn Gelfman Karp, collecting is a calling; and those who are driven to collect unloved objects are the purest collectors of all. In this literary and sophisticated celebration of humble objects, Karp shares her passionate insights on what she calls the "rapture of the capture." In Flagrante ...more

Great Collectors of Our Time is the first major survey of contemporary collecting and collectors since Douglas Cooper's Great Private Collections, published in 1963. It examines many of the greatest collectors of our time in Europe, North America and the Far East, and follows their tastes - whether in the ...more