Collecting art is an art in itself. And as Women's History Month begins, we’re looking to the collectors making space for and celebrating women artists in museums, galleries, and their own homes.
On the walls of abodes across California, New York, Florida, Montana, London, and the Bahamas, these collectors make clear their goal to uplift women-identifying artists and people of color. Some discovered their love for collecting through careers in computer science and jewelry design, while others unearthed it at an early age, learning under families committed to supporting local creatives. Regardless of the paths they took, all are opening doors for others to follow through.
"Art has the power to provoke, heal, and inspire," says Los Angeles-based collector Ann Soh Woods, "and I am committed to championing voices that push boundaries and spark meaningful conversations." The Kikori Whiskey founder's love of art was first sparked growing up in Chicago, where her parents regularly toted her and her siblings along to the Art Institute. In LA, Soh Woods's home doubles as a dynamic art space where visitors are treated to works by the likes of Andrea Bowers and Haegue Yang, as well as other artists challenging traditional narratives of power and inclusion. She caught up with CULTURED to share her experience getting immersed in the city's art scene, which artists she's got an eye on, and what shows travelers should make sure to see while they're traversing LA.
When Ivana Berendika made her first visit to a museum—to see an exhibition of World War II ephemera—she was confronted with artifacts that felt all too familiar for a child growing up in what was then Yugoslavia: bombs, guns, and tanks. “There was no space for art in that environment; that was our reality,” she remembers. The Serbian jewelry designer and collector’s current surroundings are a far cry from those beginnings. After leaving her home country at 18 and settling in Miami, Berendika now has homes in New York, Montana, and the Bahamas. Her home in Baker’s Bay, where she spends part of the year, is airy, sprawling, and verdant—and full of works from a formidable art collection that includes a plethora of female artists including Jenny Holzer, Kelly Akashi, and Lauren Halsey.
Komal Shah was fascinated by computer science from an early age despite her childhood surrounded by the arts in her native Ahmedabad, India. After earning her master’s degree at Stanford University and MBA from Berkeley, she went on to high-profile tech roles before shifting priorities in 2008 to co-found the mission-driven Shah Garg Collection, which—along with featuring Shah’s personal love of abstract art—spotlights women-identifying artists and people of color. In addition to sitting on the board of various museums—including SFMOMA, the Hammer, and the Studio Museum in Harlem—the collector leads the quarterly Stanford conversation series Artists on the Future for her alma matter. In her conversation with CULTURED, Shah explained how she plans to expand her efforts outside of San Francisco.
It's been over two decades since Valeria Napoleone began curating her remarkable art collection and to this day, she has yet to break one strict, self-imposed rule for her personal acquisitions. Undeterred by eye rolls and skepticism from a once male-dominated art world, Napoleone committed from the onset to exclusively collecting works by women artists. With pieces by Ghada Amer, Lisa Yuskavage, and Margherita Manzelli, Napoleone carefully selects what surprises her, and those who visit her London home. The Valeria Napoleone XX initiative is at the heart of her contributions to the larger art scene. Launched to amplify female representation within institutional spaces, the project partners with the Institute of Fine Arts and SculptureCenter in New York and the Contemporary Arts Society in London. Here, she discusses the piece that first gave her the collecting bug, the initial hurdles she overcame in pursuing such a singular vision, and her genuine commitment to the artists she patronizes.
What do you do when you acquire a story-high assemblage of fabrics and sequins from Nick Cave? If you're Kelly Williams, you build a room to match. CULTURED caught up with the Palm Beach collector at home ahead of this year's Norton Museum of Art gala, held in support of the Florida institution where Williams serves as vice chair of the Board of Trustees. With a thoughtful focus on artists of color and female creatives in her own collection, Williams has helped steer local institutions and the creative community at large toward these essential voices. Here, she takes readers inside her negotiations, collecting considerations, must-see shows, and offers her best tip for nascent art-world explorers. As deep as she's gone, Williams proves that art isn't just for the white cube, or white canon.
