051COLLECTOR HOMELumas, which produces limited editions of
about 100 which brings the price down.”
He adds, “I go to art fairs, and there are
two galleries in New York that I frequent,
George Billis Gallery and Kathryn Markel
Fine Art. There are two paintings by Dan
Gualdoni here and one in my Hong Kong
apartment that I purchased from Kathryn
Markel. There is a small number of dealers
whose advice I value. They are good at
developing relationships with viewers. They
know a lot more than the collector does.”
He also gets advice from some of
his artists. “I have some watercolors of
imaginary cityscapes by Jimmy Chen.
When he stopped painting I asked himfor artists he thought painted interesting
cityscapes. He wrote back and suggested
Nicholas Evans-Cato. I found his work at
George’s gallery and now have several of
his paintings,” Halperin notes. “Above the
fireplace mantle is a painting by Kevin
Kearns, which I purchased from Stricoff
Fine Art in Chelsea. I have two other of his
paintings in my Hong Kong apartment.”
The eclectic nature of his collection
reflects his tastes and interests. “It gives
me a lot of pleasure and my guests enjoy
the eclectic nature of the art and objects,”
the collector shares. “They remind me of
places I’ve lived and the times I’ve been in
those places. I have some Asian things hereand some European things in Hong Kong.
My apartment in Bangkok, though, is floor
to ceiling Asian art.”
He says, “I don’t have a theme.” When
he says, “I like to mix it up a bit” he doesn’t
mean only works from different time
periods and places in the world. On a
chest in the living room is an extraordinary
assemblage of insect wings and parts of toy
animals by Jane Edden, an artist whose
work he discovered at Flowers gallery.
He admits to being “slightly put off to the
extent many collectors are obsessed with
recalibrating the value of their collection.
I don’t look at paintings to translate into an
increase in value. That’s not the point.”119107
Two oil on linen cityscapes
by Nicholas Evans-Cato are
in the bookcase.
8
Rafael Neff ’s photograph
Nationalbibliothek Prag,
2007/2008, hangs above
the sofa. Against the
window is an early-19th-
century Burmese temple
carving.
9
Two paintings by Dan
Gualdoni flank 16th- and
19 th-century portraits in
the entry.
10
In the hallway is a
cityscape by Nicholas
Evans-Cato. On the right
is House of Louisa Faxas—
Havana, a photograph
by German artist Werner
Pawlok.
11
David Halperin in his
Sutton Place apartment.
Behind him are two
scenes of Brooklyn by Brad
Aldridge.